THE GHOST OF BARMOUTH MANOR.
I wouldn’t make a fuss about it if I were you,” said Charlie Craven, pursuing that search from pocket to pocket which men, having no particular reputation for tidiness to maintain, are accustomed to institute when they have filled a pipe and are anxious to light it.
“A fuss about it?” cried his sister Madge. “A fuss—good gracious! What is there to make a fuss about in all that I have told you? A dream—I ask you candidly if you think that I am the sort of girl to make a fuss over a dream?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Charlie. He had succeeded in finding in one of his pockets a match-box—an empty match-box.
“Well, you should know,” said Madge severely.
“There now, you are; making a fuss over something a deal flimsier than your dream,” laughed her brother. “I wonder if that palace of your dream was no better supplied than this house with matches: if it wasn’t, I shouldn’t care to live in it for any length of time.”
“It’s so like a man to keep on bothering himself and every one about him for a match, while all the time a fire is roaring on the hearth behind him, and his pockets are full of bills—the usual Christmas bills, the least of which would light all the pipes he smokes in a day, and that’s saying a good deal.”
“How clever you are! I never thought of the fire. Well, as I was remarking, I wouldn’t bother telling my dreams to any one if I were you. Dreams—well, dreams are all rot, you know.”
“I’m not quite so sure of that as you seem to be, O wisest of brothers. The wisest of people in the world—next to you, of course—have thought that there was something in dreams, haven’t they?”
“They were wrong. My aunt! the rot that I have dreamt from time to time!”
“Oh, that settles the question.”
“It does, so far as I am concerned. Look here, Madge; don’t come to me again with the story of your dreams, hoping to find a sympathetic ear. Dreams, I say, are all——Of course, you saw that particular house and that particular staircase in some picture, and they stuck somewhere at the back of your brain. It’s a rummy thing the brain, you know—a jolly rum thing!”
“It is. I am becoming more impressed every minute with the truth of that discovery of yours.”
“Oh, if you are becoming sarcastic, I have nothing more to say. But please to remember that sarcasm is no argument. I tell you, my dear girl, you have seen a picture of that house at some period of your life—I don’t say recently, mind you—and my theory is that the brain is like a sensitized plate: it records an impression once and for all, and stores it away, and you never know exactly when it means to bring it out again before your eyes. Oh, believe me, it plays a lot of tricks upon even the most commonplace people.”
“Among whom I suppose I must count myself? Well, I daresay you are right.”
“I know that I am right. Dreams! Did you ever hear the story of the old woman who won a big prize in a lottery, the ticket being No. 26? Had she chosen that number on chance or in accordance with some system? she was asked, and she replied that she had dreamt it all out. Dreamt it all out? What did she mean by that? they inquired. ‘Well, a week ago I dreamt that I won the prize, and that the ticket I took was No. 9,’ said she. ‘The next night I dreamt exactly the same, and the ticket was No. 9. The third night the same thing happened, so, of course, I chose No. 26.’ ‘No. 26? Why not No. 9 as you dreamt it?’ the people asked. ‘Oh, you fools!’ said she; ‘didn’t I tell you that I dreamt it three times? the number was 9, and doesn’t every one know that three times 9 are 26?’ Now that’s the stuff that dreams are made of, as Shakespeare remarks, so don’t you bother about this particular vision of yours; and if you take my advice you’ll say nothing to Uncle Philip or the lot of them about it. They would only laugh at you.”
“Why on earth should I go about proclaiming my dream to all our relations?” cried the girl. “Dear Charlie, I’m not suffering just yet from softening of the brain. Besides, I can recall many instances of disaster following people who bored others with the story of their dreams. There was the notable case of Joseph and his brethren, and later in history there was the case of the Duke of Clarence. You remember how swiftly retribution followed his story of his dream? Now, of course, my dream was only a little insignificant thing compared to Joseph’s and Clarence’s, still something might happen if I bored people with it—something proportionate—the plum-pudding might come to the table in a state of squash, or the custards might be smoked. Oh no, I’ll be forewarned, and talk only of facts. I suppose a dream cannot, by even the most indulgent of people, be called a fact.”
“I’m off to the stables,” said her brother, after a little pause.
Then he went off to the stables. He was an excellent fellow and the best of brothers, although he was more at home in the stables than when engaged in a discussion on a subject involving some exercise of the imagination. There is not much room in a stable for a play of the imagination, especially where the corn accounts are kept on a system.
When he had left the breakfast-room on this bright Christmas morning his sister paused for a few moments in her morning duty of collecting a breakfast for the birds which were loitering about the Italian balustrade in front of the window, reminding her, in their own way, that they expected an exceptionally liberal repast on this Christmas morning: she paused and began to think once more upon this strange dream of hers, which she had been rehearsing to her brother.
After all, it was not so strange a dream, she reflected. The only queer thing about it was that it had come to her on every Christmas Eve for five consecutive years—since she was seventeen—and that its details did not differ in the least from one year to another. Perhaps it was also different from the majority of dreams in its vividness, and in the fact that, on awaking from it, she felt as exhausted as if she had just returned from a long journey. Even now it required almost an effort on her part to walk round the old oak table sweeping the crumbs on to a plate to throw to the birds; and when she had discharged this duty she seated herself with a sigh of relief in one of the arm-chairs that stood by the side of the great wood fire.
She closed her eyes and once again recalled her dream. She had no difficulty in doing so. She had fancied herself in the act of driving up to a fine old house, standing in the middle of a well-timbered park of oak and chestnut. The lawn extended across the full front of the mansion, and in the centre she noticed a beautiful old fountain, composed of a great marble basin with a splendid group of figures in the centre—Neptune with his dolphins and a Naiad or two. She passed into the house through a great hall hung with trophies of war and of the chase. In front of her was the enormous head of a moose, and at one side there was a great grey skull of some animal such as she had never seen before,—a fearful thing with huge tusks—quite the monster of a dream.
Then she seemed to go from room to room, as if she had been a member of the family living in the place, but—and this she felt to be a true dream-touch—the moment she entered a room every one who was there fled from her; but apparently this did not cause her any surprise, any more than did the strange costume of the figures who fled at her approach—costumes of the sixteenth century, mingled with those of the seventeenth and eighteenth. Thinking of the figures hurrying from every room suggested to her the family portraits of three centuries in motion. After visiting several fine rooms she found herself walking up a broad oaken staircase of shallow steps, until she came to a large lobby, where the staircase divided to right and left. There she found a curious settee of some dark wood, the long centre panel of which was carved with many figures. She saw all this by the aid of the moonlight which flowed in through the panes of coloured glass in a high window, painted with many coats of arms.
She remembered having rested in this seat for some time, feeling very lonely, and then some one had come to her, sitting by her side and taking her hand, saying—
“I have been waiting for you all these years. I am so glad that you are here at last.”
She remembered that the sound of the voice and the touch of the hand had banished her loneliness, and made her feel happier than she had ever felt in all her life before. Even now she felt supremely happy, recalling this incident of her dream, though she recollected that she had not yet seen the face of the man who had come to her to banish her loneliness. She wished that her dream had been less whimsical in this one particular. She felt that she could have spared some of the other details that came before her so vividly—the skull of that strange animal that hung in the hall, for instance—if in their place she had been allowed to see what manner of man it was who had sat with her.
Still, the recollection of him gave her pleasure even when the dream had first come to her and he had come in the dream, and this pleasure had been increasing year by year, until she knew that she had actually gone asleep on the previous night, full of joy in the hope of hearing the sound of that voice and feeling the touch of that hand as she had done in the past.
And that was the end of her dream, unless the feeling of happiness—happiness mingled with a certain sadness—of which she was conscious while she recalled its details should be accounted part of the dream. Her pleasure was the same as one experiences in recalling the incidents of a visit to a dear friend; her sadness was the same as one experiences on thinking that a long time must elapse before one can see that friend again.
Madge actually found herself reflecting that a year must pass before she could once more find herself wandering through the strange mansion of her dream—find herself once more seated on that carved seat in the lobby beneath the painted window.
She kept on thinking, and wondering as she thought, over the strange features of this experience of hers. She knew that she was what people would call a commonplace, practical girl—a girl without fads or fancies of any sort. Since her mother’s death, three years before, she had managed all the household affairs of Craven Court for her brother, who had inherited the property before she had left the schoolroom. Every one was bound to acknowledge that her management of the household had been admirable, though only her brother knew exactly how admirable it was.
“There are no frills about Madge; she is the best woman of business in the county, and we have none of the bothers of other people with our servants,” he had frequently said.
And yet here was this embodiment of all that is practical in life, dreaming upon a dream upon this bright and frosty Christmas morning, and actually feeling sad at the thought that a whole year must elapse before the same vision should return to her.
The chiming of the church bells startled her out of her reverie.
“Pshaw!” she cried, jumping up from her chair; “I am quite as great a goose as Charlie believes me to be—quite! or I should not have told him that that dream had come to me again. I should have had the sense to know that he would have the sense to know that dreams are, one and all, the utterest folly!”
She knew that she was trying to convince herself that there was nothing more in this particular dream than in the many casual dreams that came to her as well as to other people; but before she had reached the door of the dining-room she knew that she had failed in her attempt. The curious fatigue of which she was conscious, quickly told her that this oft-recurring vision was not as others were.
She went to church with her brother, and in the afternoon their uncle, Colonel Craven, and his wife duly arrived at the Court to spend their annual week at the family mansion, and Madge took her brother’s advice and refrained from saying a word to either of them on the subject of her dream. Indeed, she had so much to think of and so much to do during the week, she had no time to give to anything so immaterial as a dream, however interesting it might be to herself.
On the last morning of the stay of Colonel and Mrs Craven at Craven Court, the former received a letter which he tossed across the breakfast-table to Charlie.
“Funny, isn’t it?” he said. “We were talking about wild-duck-shooting no later than last night, and here’s a letter from Jack Tremaine telling me that he is taking over his cousin’s place for six months and promising me some good sport if I go to him for a week in January. You will see that he suggests that you should be of the party: he asks if you are here. See what he says about the ducks.”
“Who is his cousin?” inquired Charlie, “and where is his place?”
“His cousin is a chap named Clifford, and his place is in Dorsetshire—on the coast—Barmouth Manor it is called, and I know that it’s famous for its duck-shooting. Tremaine will no doubt write to you.”
“Where has the cousin gone, that the place is available for Jack Tremaine?” asked Charlie.
“Turn over the page and you’ll see what he says about the Cliffords,” replied Colonel Craven.
Charlie found on the last leaf half a dozen lines on the point in question. Jack Tremaine said that Mrs Clifford was not satisfied as to the health of her son, and was going abroad with him during the first week in January.
“I should like to have a go at the ducks,” said Charlie Craven, handing back the letter. “I suppose there is a duck-punt or two at the place?”
“You may be sure of that,” said his uncle. “Young Clifford is a good sportsman, I believe, but I have never met him. I’ll write to Tremaine to-day telling him that you are at home. I’m sure he means to invite you.”
All doubt on this point was removed by the arrival two days later of an invitation from Mr Tremaine to Charlie Craven for a fortnight’s duck-shooting at Barmouth Manor, and he enclosed a letter from his wife to Madge expressing the hope that she would be able to accompany her brother.
Madge was delighted at the prospect of the visit, for she and Mrs Tremaine were close friends.
The frost which had set in a few days before Christmas had not gone when she and her brother were due at Barmouth Manor, so that there was a likelihood of her having some skating on the lake. Mrs Tremaine had, in her invitation, laid some stress upon the possibility of a week’s skating on the lake which, she said, was within the Manor Park.
A carriage met them at Barmouth Station, for the Manor was quite five miles from the picturesque little town; and it was late in the afternoon before they passed through the spacious entrance gates to the Manor Park. There was, however, quite enough light to enable Madge to see every detail of the place, and it was observing some of the details that caused her to make a rather startling exclamation of surprise.
“Hallo!” said her brother, “what has startled you?”
There was a little pause before she had recovered herself sufficiently to be able to make an excuse that would sound plausible. She pointed to a group of deer looking over the barrier of their enclosure.
“One of the stags,” she said; “it seemed for a moment as if it were about to jump the rail.”
“What matter if it did? They are as tame as cats at this time of the year,” said Charlie.
“Of course, I should have remembered,” she said. “I wonder in what direction is the pond. Does the sunset look promising?”
“There may be no thaw before the end of the month,” said he.
That was the end of their conversation, and she flattered herself that he had no notion how excited she was as the carriage reached that part of the drive which was beside the lawn, and the red level rays of the sun streaming through the naked trees stained the marble basin of an Italian fountain, the central group of which was in every detail the same as the figures in the fountain of her dream. In another minute the front of the house was disclosed, and she saw that it was the house of her dream. She would have been greatly disappointed had it been otherwise.
She entered the great hall, and could scarcely reply to the cordial greeting of her aunt and Mrs Tremaine, for she found herself stared at by the sleepy eyes that looked out from the head of a moose just as they had stared at her in her sleep. She turned to the wall on her right. Yes, there was the curious skull with the mighty tusks.
“Oh yes, we had a delightful journey,” she managed to say in reply to Mrs Tremaine’s inquiry. “Thank you; I should like a cup of tea immensely. Do you have it in the hall or in the tapestry room beyond?”
“What; you have been here before? I had no idea of that,” said Mrs Tremaine.
For more than a moment Madge was confused.
Luckily for her, however, the lamps had not been lighted in the hall, and the sudden flush that came over her face was unobserved by her friends.
She gave a laugh.
“What a good shot I made!” she cried. “Isn’t this just the sort of house to have an old-panelled dining-room and a tapestry chamber beside it? I think we should have tea here. What sort of prehistoric creature is that on the wall?”
“I believe it is a skull that was found when they were digging the foundations of one of the lodges,” said Mrs Tremaine.
“I seem to have read some description of this very place,” said Charlie, standing in front of the great skull.
Madge wondered if he would remember enough of her account of the house of her dreams to enable him to recognise the details before him.
“It is fully described in Hall’s History, and in every guide-book of the district. The animal that that skull belonged to lived some thousands of years before the Flood, I understand.”
“What is the exact date b.c. carved on it?” laughed Charlie. “Yes, I daresay I came upon a paragraph or an illustration of the place. No house is safe from the depredations of the magazines nowadays.”
Tea was served in the hall to give Madge’s maid time to unpack; and then the girl was shown to her room. She ran up the broad, shallow staircase to the lobby; she had made up her mind to sit, if only for a moment, on the carved settee; but a surprise awaited her,—no carved settee was there. The painted window was there, but no settee was beneath it.
She was so surprised that she stood for some moments gazing at the vacant place.
“That lobby looks quite bare without the settee, Miss Craven,” said the housekeeper, who was beside her. “It’s a fine bit of carving—all ebony.”
“Was there a settee here?” asked Madge innocently.
“It was only taken away to-day to be in a better light for Mrs Tremaine to photograph it,” said the housekeeper. “Mrs Tremaine has done most of the rare pieces in the house. This is your room, Miss Craven. It’s called the Dauphin’s chamber, for it was here he slept fifty years ago when he was in Dorsetshire.”
Madge entered the room, remarking that it was beautifully furnished and that it seemed extremely comfortable. When the door was closed she threw herself into a chair and had a good think.
What could it all mean? she asked herself. Why should this house become so associated with her life? Was she going to die here? Was something going to happen to her? Was she to meet here the man who had upon five different occasions come to her side, telling her that he had been waiting for her?
For ten days she remained in the house, looking forward day by day to some occurrence that would cause her to realise what her dream meant; but she returned with her brother to Craven Court in disappointment. Nothing particular happened all the time, and she came to the conclusion that her dream was as meaningless as her brother had said it was.
Madge Craven and her brother were staying with the Tremaines at their own place during the pheasant shooting the following October, and one morning their hostess mentioned that her husband’s cousin, Mrs Clifford, had returned to England from South America and was expected to join their party that day.
She arrived before the shooters had come back from their day’s sport, and she and Mrs Tremaine had a long chat in front of the fire before tea. Mrs Clifford was a handsome old lady of the grande dame type; and being a close observer and an admirable describer of all that she observed, she was able to entertain Mrs Tremaine with an account of the adventures of her son and herself in South America.
“I hope Rawdon’s health is more satisfactory now than it was,” said Mrs Tremaine when her guest had declared that there was no more to be told.
“I can only hope for the best,” said Mrs Clifford, becoming grave. “Rawdon is gone across the mountains to Chili, and will not be at home until the middle of January.”
“He must be pretty robust to be able to undertake such a journey,” said Mrs Tremaine.
“He is not wanting in strength,” said Mrs Clifford. “Only—poor boy!”
“‘Poor boy!’ ‘Why poor boy’?” asked the other.
There was a pause before the elder lady said—
“It is rather difficult to explain. By the way, did any of your party at the Manor House see the ghost?”
“Heavens! I did not know that your family was blessed with a ghost,” laughed Mrs Tremaine. “No, I can assure you, we were not so lucky. What sort of a ghost is it? A ghastly figure with rattling chains? Have you seen it?”
“Yes, I have seen it,” said Mrs Clifford in a low voice.
“How interesting! Do tell me what it is like!” cried the other.
“Like? What is it like?” Mrs Clifford rose slowly from her chair, and walked to another chair. She only remained seated for a moment, however: with a sigh she began pacing the room slowly.
“I fear I have touched upon a forbidden topic,” said Mrs Tremaine. “I had no idea that you were serious.”
“Serious—serious,” said Mrs Clifford. She was still pacing the room, and had just reached the window when she spoke. The next moment she had uttered a cry. Mrs Tremaine saw that she was staring out of the window, her hands grasping the back of a chair.
She was by her side in a moment.
“Pray, what is the matter?” she said.
“You are weak—overcome by———-Let me ring for brandy.”
Mrs Clifford clutched her suddenly by the arm.
“Who is that—that—on the terrace?” she said in a fearful whisper.
“Who? Why, that is our cousin, Madge Craven,” replied Mrs Tremaine.
Madge was standing on the terrace bareheaded, tossing grain to the peacocks.
“She was with you when you were at the Manor House,” said Mrs Clifford. “She was there, and yet you did not see the ‘ghost’?”
“What on earth do you mean?” said Mrs Tremaine.
“I mean this: that girl out there is the ghost that appears at the Manor House every Christmas Eve, and it is because my poor boy, as well as I myself, saw it, that his mind has become unhinged.”
“Heavens! You mean to say——”
“The poor boy has fallen, in love with a shadow—a phantom! It comes every Christmas Eve and walks from room to room. It comes up the stairs—I tell you that I have seen it—and sits on the old carved settee, and then suddenly vanishes into the air whence it came.... And that ghost is as surely that girl as I am I.”
“This is terrible—quite uncanny! Are you quite sure?”
“Sure—sure!”
“It is awful to think upon. But—but—listen to me—I have an idea. If Madge is the ghost, why not ask her down again to your place, and give Rawdon a thing of flesh and blood to transfer his affections to?”
“What do you say?”
“Madge is the best girl in the world. Every eligible man in her county, and quite as many ineligible, have wanted to marry her. You will find out how nice she is.”
Mrs Clifford sank into the chair.
“Oh that it were possible!” she whispered. “He is everything to me, my dearest boy, and until this fancy————Oh, if it were only possible!”
And at this point Madge entered the room, and was duly presented to Mrs Clifford.
If Madge was at first under the impression that the manner of Mrs Clifford in regard to her was somewhat formal and constrained, before a week had passed she had good reason to change her opinion on this point. The fact was that Mrs Clifford had formed an attachment for her which she could sincerely return; and that was why the girl was delighted to accept her invitation to spend Christmas in Dorsetshire. It suited her brother’s arrangements for her to do so, for he was anxious to join a big-game expedition which was starting for India early in December.
Mrs Clifford said she was delighted to be able to have Madge all to herself for at least a fortnight.
“My son cannot possibly be home until the middle of January,” said she, “and then we shall probably have a large party at the Manor. But meantime you and I shall be together.”
“I do not think that we shall quarrel,” said Madge.
“Alas! alas!” said Mrs Clifford to Mrs Tremaine, after one of the many whispered colloquies which they had together during the week. “Alas! Rawdon cannot be home for Christmas. It was I who took the greatest pains to arrange matters to prevent his spending another Christmas Eve at home until he should have completely recovered from the effects of his strange attachment, and yet now I would give worlds to be able to have him with us on Christmas Eve.”
“Could you not send a cable?” suggested Mrs Tremaine.
“I might send a dozen without being able to find him. Besides, it would be impossible for me to tell him what has occurred.”
“I suppose you could hardly cable him ‘Come home at once. Ghost found,” laughed Mrs Tremaine. “Never mind. He should be all the better pleased when the Ghost of Christmas Eve becomes a creature of flesh and blood by the middle of January.”
It was Christmas Eve at the Manor House. Madge’s maid had just left her for the night, but the girl showed no inclination to go to bed. She remained sitting by her fire thinking how strange it was that she should be on this Christmas Eve in the flesh at the house which she had visited in her dreams. And while she sat thinking over this, she found herself overcome by that strange longing which she had had just a year ago, to be again by the side of the man who had come to her side in her dream.
She clasped her hands, saying in a whisper—“Come to me. Come to me again and tell me that you have been waiting for me.”
She began to undress with feverish haste, when suddenly her hands dropped by her sides, for the terrible thought occurred to her—
“What if my dream will not come to me this year because I happen to be in the midst of the real scene where it took place?”
The thought that it might be as capricious as other dreams oppressed her. She now felt sorry that she had agreed to visit the place. She should have remained at Craven Court, where her dream had always been faithful to her.
A sudden idea occurred to her: she would leave her room and sit in reality on the carved settee under the painted window, and then, going to bed immediately after, she might sink unconsciously into the kind embrace of her dream.
She opened her door very gently and went along the silent corridor until she reached the head of the staircase, and saw the moonlight streaming through the coloured glass to the lobby beneath. She stole down, and in another instant she was in the seat, the moonlight streaming over her and throwing the coloured pattern of the glass upon her white dress. She closed her eyes, feeling that perhaps she might fall asleep and find herself in the midst of her dream.
Suddenly she opened her eyes. She fancied that she heard the sound of a footstep in the hall below. Yes, there could be no doubt about it. Some one was in the hall—some one was coming up the stairs. She sprang to her feet, and was about to rush up to her room, when she heard a voice—the voice that she had heard so often in that dream of hers, saying—
“Ah, do not go now. You cannot go now that I have come to you—now that I have been waiting for you for five years.”
She could not move from where she was standing. She saw a tall man with a bronzed face coming up the stairs. She somehow had never seen his face in her dream, but she recognised it from the photograph which his mother had shown her: she knew that the man was Rawdon Clifford.
He stood before her on the lobby.
“They thought to separate us,” he said. “They thought that my love for you was a form of madness. But I tell you, as I told them, I would rather stand by your side for a few minutes once a-year than be for ever by the side of another—a more real creature. That is why I have come over land and sea to be here in time for your visit this Christmas Eve. I promised my mother to stay away; but I could not—I could not keep my promise, and I came to England a fortnight sooner than I expected, and entered the house only this moment—like a burglar. But I am rewarded.”
“I do not understand. I am Mrs Clifford’s guest. Madge Craven is my name,” said Madge.
The man sprang back and raised his hands in surprise.
“Great heavens! She is flesh and blood—at last—at last!” he cried.
He put out his hand slowly—doubtfully. Madge put out hers to it. A cry of delight came from him as he felt her warm hand, and he made it still warmer by his kisses. She could not stop him. She made no attempt to do so.
“Tell me that I was not mad—that I am not mad now,” he said in a loving whisper.
“Oh no—only—is it not strange?—For five years I have this dream—this very dream—and yet I never was in this house until last January,” said Madge.
“You have been with me every Christmas Eve for five years, and you will remain here for ever,” said he. “Do not tell me that we have not met before—do not tell me that you have not loved me as I have loved you all these years. What did that dream of yours mean?”
“I think I know now—now,” whispered the girl.
Mrs Tremaine considers, herself the only survivor of the people who professed to exorcise the ghosts in whom our grandfathers were foolish enough to believe.
THE BLOOD ORANGES
Ah, my friend,” said the Marchesa, “you Englishmen are like to our mountain which we see smoking over there.” She threw herself into the attitude of the ‘prima donna assoluta in an impassioned moment preceding the singing of the romanza, as she pointed across the blue Bay of Naples to where Vesuvius was sending forth a delicate hazy fume.
“I don’t know anything about Englishmen,” said Sir Percival morosely; “but I know that when you are near me my heart is a volcano—my soul——”
The lady’s laugh interrupted him—one cannot make use of similes with a poetical flavour about them when a violet-eyed lady is leaning back her head in laughter, even though the action displays a beautiful throat and the curves of a superb neck. The Marchesa del Grippo displayed a marvellous throat and neck, and was fully aware of this fact. Her laugh rang out like a soprano dwelling with delight on a high note and producing it tremolo.
“Ah,” she cried, “you are at pains to prove to me that I am right in the way I judge you Englishmen: to-day you are volcanic, to-morrow we find not the blaze and the thunder but only—ecco! a puff of smoke.”
Once again she pointed—but this time carelessly—in the direction of the mountain.
The man frowned.
“For heaven’s sake do not say ‘You Englishmen’ when I am by!” he cried. “I have nothing in common with Englishmen.”
“I have never met an Englishman who did not try to impress upon me that he was not as other Englishmen,” said the Marchesa. “The last one to say so to me was your wicked young Lord Byron. The Guicciola presented him to me at Genoa. Heavens! the old Count is more like an Englishman than Lord Byron! He can keep his eyes fast shut when it suits him. Enough; I said ‘You Englishmen,’ and he became red with anger. Droll! I had to ask forgiveness for having accused his lordship of being English. Oh, you are a nation of patriots.”
“You do not mean to keep up the acquaintance of Lord Byron, I would fain hope,” said Sir Percival with another frown.
Again the lady laughed.
“After that do not tell me that you are not an Englishman,” she said. “It is so very English to frown when the name of Lord Byron is mentioned—to give a young woman with a husband a solemn warning to beware of that wicked young noble, while all the time the one that utters the warning is doing his best to earn the reputation of the disreputable Byron. The English detest Byron; but if you want to flatter an Englishman to the farthest point, all you have to do is to tell him that you believe him to be a second Lord Byron. Never mind: I like the Lord Byron, and I like—yes, a little—another of his countrymen, though he is, I fear, very wicked.”
“Wicked?—wicked?” cried Sir Percival—he was plainly flattered. “What is it to be wicked?”
“Ah, do not ask me to give it a definition: I might say that it was to be you—you yourself.”
“If it is wicked to love—madly—blindly—then indeed I admit that——”
“That you are aut Diabolus, aut Byron? I know not which of the two the English regard as the worse. Well, suppose I do not admit your right to tell me of your love: I suppose I dare not dispute your right to love, but I can dispute your right to tell me of it—that is, if it exists.”
“If it exists? Heavens! my beloved creature, would I have followed you here from England if I did not love you to distraction?”
“It needs such extraordinary self-sacrifice on the part of an Englishman to leave England for Italy! I think you were glad to make some excuse—even so feeble a one as that of being in love with an Italian woman—to make a journey to Naples. But I forgot; you were in Italy once before, were you not?”
“Yes; I was in some parts,—the north—Tuscany—Florence—never here—no, never here.”
“Never here? ah, yes; now I remember well. You said you had never been to Sorrento. I wonder did I hold out any inducement to you to come to Sorrento?—you must have been studying a map of our bay, for you knew by name every landmark, every island, when I tried to be your cicerone just now.”
The glance that he cast at her after giving a little start had something of suspicion in it.
“Everyone knows the landmarks of the lovely Bay of Naples,” said he; “but I—ah, my beloved, did you not tell me all its beauties when we first met in London six months ago? Had you no idea that every word which fell from your lips—even the words in which you described the scenery around your home—should be burnt into my memory for evermore? Ah, sweet one, will you never listen to me? Does my devotion count for nothing with you?”
“My husband,” she whispered with a tremulous downward glance—the glance of love’s surrender—he knew it well: he was a man of considerable experience of woman in all her phases. He knew that he had not been fooled by the Marchesa.
“Did not you tell me that you detested him?” he cried. “If a husband treats a wife cruelly, as he has treated you, he has wilfully forfeited all claim to her devotion. There are some acts so atrocious that it is impossible to find an adequate punishment for them.”
“You think that even if the punishment were a crime in the eyes of the world it would be sanctified by heaven if it were meted out to a monster of cruelty?” The Marchesa was looking at him through half-closed eyes. He saw that her hands were clenched tightly, and he did not fail to notice how tumultuously her bosom was heaving. He was exultant. He had conquered. That opportune word which he had thrown in regarding her husband’s cruelty had overcome her last scruple.
She was his.
“My beloved—my beloved,” he whispered, “cruelty to such a woman as you makes sacred the mission of avenging it. You will leave him—with me you will never know aught save happiness.”
She gave a little laugh, and then put her hand in his, not doubtfully, but with an expression of the amplest trustfulness.
“My last scruple is gone,” said she in the same low tone that he had employed. “What you have said has made my mind easy.”
“You will come to me?”
“Till one of us dies.”
She spoke the words with the fire flashing from her eyes as she gazed into his face. The force of that gaze of hers gave him a little shock. It was only a momentary sensation, however; in a second he recollected that he was talking to an Italian, not an Englishwoman.
“Till one of us dies—till one of us dies,” he whispered, poorly imitating her intensity. “Ah, I knew that it would come, my darling. Would I have travelled from England if I had not been certain of you—certain of my own love for you, I mean? And you will come with me—you will leave him? It is his punishment—his righteous punishment.”
“I shall leave him with you, I swear to you,” cried the Marchesa.
For a moment he failed to catch her exact meaning. He did not want the Marchese to be left with him; but of course he perceived the next instant that she meant to say that she would leave her husband and go with him, her lover; and there was no tremor in his voice as he said—
“You will never repent it! Ah, what happiness will be ours, my soul! Shall it be tomorrow? I can hire a vessel to take us to Malta,—there we shall be safe.”
“Nay, it is too sudden,” said she. “My husband could not fail to have his suspicions aroused. Nay, we shall have to await our opportunity. If he asks you to pay us a visit you must come. He will be going to Rome in a day or two, and I shall contrive to be left behind.”
“Ah, that will be our chance,” he cried. “Fate is on our side, my dear one.”
“Yes, Fate is on our side,” she said in a low tone that could not possibly reach the ear of the tall and straight man who approached them as they stood at the balustrade of the Villa Galeotto overlooking the lovely Bay of Naples.
“It is such a great pleasure to me to meet you once again, Sir Percival Cleave,” said the Marchese, with a smile. “I hope that the Marchesa has offered you the hospitality of our humble home?”
“The Marchesa has been so very kind as suggest that I should visit your castle for an hour or two before I leave this lovely neighbourhood,” said Sir Percival.
“Nay, surely she made you name the day,” said the Marchese, turning to his wife. “Is it possible, my dear, that you failed to be more specific?” he asked with great gravity.
The lady gave a shrug in response, and her husband became still more grave.
“The hospitality which I received in England can never be forgotten by me, though my mission was an unpleasant one,” said he. “The King of Naples—but we will avoid politics, as people must if they mean to remain good friends. Enough; you will honour us by paying us a visit—but when? What day will suit your convenience?”
“I am only remaining in this neighbourhood for a day or two,” said Sir Percival. “I have, alas! some important business that will take me northward; but—well, I have no engagement to-morrow, if that day would suit your Excellency.”
“It will suit me better than any other day,” replied the Marchese. “I have myself to go to Rome almost at once. I shall never cease to be thankful to Fate for having so delayed my departure as to enable me to have the pleasure of meeting Sir Percival Cleave. You will come in the afternoon and eat a simple dinner at our table. You are already acquainted with the road to the Castle?”
“Oh yes—that is, no; I do not know the road, but I do not suppose I shall have any difficulty in finding it out.”
“What!” the Marchese had turned once more to his wife and had assumed the tone of a reproof. “What! you did not make Sir Percival aware of the direction to the Castle?”
“Sir Percival has been studying a map of the Bay,” said she. “Though he has never before been here he shows a remarkable acquaintance with the neighbourhood.”
“It is not right to take so much for granted,” said the Marchese. “Allow me to repair the negligence of the Marchesa, Sir Percival.”
He then pointed out to the Englishman the direction to take in order to reach the road leading to the cliffs a mile beyond Sorrento, where the Castello del Grippo stood in the centre of its olive-groves. Sir Percival thanked him, and said that having received such plain directions he would not now carry out his intention of driving to the castle; he would ride there instead.
Before the Marchese and his wife took their departure, the latter had managed to whisper in the ear of Sir Percival as she returned the pressure of his hand—
“Without fail.”
“Till one of us dies,” he replied.
How strange it all was! he thought that night as he stood at the door of the inn where he was staying at Sorrento, and listened to the singing of the fishermen putting out to sea. How strange it all was! The seven years that had passed since he had last heard the hymn of the fishermen in that Bay seemed no more than so many days. He had had his adventures since he had been so foolish as to fancy himself in love with Paolina—poor Paolina! A good many faces had interposed between the face of the Italian girl of 1815 and the face of the Italian Marchesa in 1822. But what a whimsical fate it was that had made him fall in love with the Marchesa del Grippo more deeply than he had ever permitted himself to fall in regard to other women! He had never known what it was to love before, though she was the woman whom he should have avoided, even if there were no other woman to love in the wide world.
Ah, it was fate—the Marchesa had said so that afternoon at the Villa Galeotto. She had loved him from the first—he was ready to swear to that. He remembered now certain indications of her passion which he had noticed the first evening they had met, but which had escaped his memory. It was at Lady Blessington’s in Kensington, and the Marchesa had expressed the pleasure it gave her to meet with an Englishman who spoke such excellent Italian. He had been very cautious at that time in replying to her questions as to the length of time he had been in Italy and the places that he had visited. It was not beyond the bounds of possibility that, after the lapse of seven years, any one might recognise him as the lover of Paolina, so it was just as well, he thought, to be careful. He had not mentioned a word about Sorrento, and not until the Marchesa had stood by his side in the garden of the Villa Galeotto had he lapsed in his feigning a complete ignorance of the locality. It was the force of his passion for that lovely woman which had overwhelmed him, causing him to forget himself and to refer by name to various landmarks.
But what did it matter now? The woman had responded to him, and in a day or two would be by his side for—well, for as long as he pleased. A short distance away Lord Byron was affording the Italians a new reading of the cold-blooded Englishman; but Sir Percival Cleave would take very good care that he was not made such a fool of by the Marchesa as Lord Byron was by the Contessa Guicciola. Byron was practically a pauper, whereas he, Sir Percival Cleave, was rich. He could therefore (the logic was his) prevent himself from ever being made a fool of by any woman, Marchesa or Contessa though she might be.
But he loved her—of that he was certain. He had asked her if he would have faced the discomforts of a journey from England to Italy had he not been in love with her; and now as he stood listening to the fishermen’s hymns sung in the boats that were drifting out of the Bay, he asked himself the same question. Oh yes, he loved her! and her husband was cruel to her—she had told him so in England, and she had been greatly comforted by his assurance—given in answer to her inquiry—that the crime of being cruel to her was so great as to condone any act of hers—say, running away with another man.
She was superstitious; she had some scruples. The priests, no doubt, were in the pay of her husband, and they had probably exaggerated the crime of a wife’s leaving a husband,—it would be so like a greasy Italian priest to lay emphasis upon this one particular act; but he, an English gentleman to the core, and properly sensible of the blessings of a Protestant king and constitution, had succeeded in counteracting the insidious teaching of the priests. She had listened to him. She had readily accepted that great truth: a woman’s retaliation to her husband’s cruelty is sanctified in the eyes of heaven. That was his point: the eyes of heaven. It was immaterial in what light such an act of retaliation as he suggested to her would appear in the eyes of the people of the world.
Before he slept he had brought himself to believe that he was actually the lady’s honourable champion, boldly coming forward to rescue her from an intolerable oppressor.
The Castello del Grippo was built on the summit of the headland that sloped away from the sea at one side, but was very precipitous on the other. For three hundred years the family of Del Grippo had been accustomed to display a light in the tower nightly for the guidance of the fishing-boats, for the Castle could be seen from the north as well as the south. For more than a mile on the shoreward side of the Castle the olive-trees grew mixed with lemons and oranges; and as Sir Percival rode along the somewhat rough avenue on his way to accept the hospitality of the man whose wife he had the previous day been instructing on some interesting points in regard to her duty, he was entranced with the perfumes of the fruits and flowers. The air was heavy with odours of the citrons, and the gold of the luscious fruit gleamed among the glossy leaves. Though he had never been on the avenue before, the gleam of the fruit and the exquisite scents brought back to him the sweet memory of Paolina. It was not at this side of the great garden that he had been accustomed to meet her, but on the other side—that nearest the cliff, a mile away.
It was a sweet sad memory, and it was so poignant that it even caused him to sigh and murmur—
“Ah, la povera Paolina! la povera Paolina!”
And having thereby satisfied himself that his heart was as soft as the heart of a little child, he urged his horse forward.
He soon reached the Castle, and it seemed gloomy enough, outlined against the wonderful blue sky. He had seen numbers of the peasants working among the olives, but close to the Castle none were in sight. It was not until he had dismounted and pulled the handle of the old iron bell that a servant appeared. In a few moments the Marchese himself came out of a room at one side of the hall and welcomed his guest, giving instructions to another servant to stable the horse.
“You have not met the Marchesa?” he inquired of Sir Percival. “She left the Castle half-an-hour ago, trusting to meet you. Pray enter and we shall have some refreshment.”
But Sir Percival declined to enter in the absence of the Marchesa. He felt that to do so would be very gross—to say the least of it. The idea of sitting down with the Marchese while the lady—his lady—was wandering disconsolately around the grounds in search of him was very repugnant to him.
“As you will,” said the Marchese with a shrug when he remarked that he would like to go in search of the Marchesa. “As you will. She is not likely to get lost. Oh yes; we shall go in search of her, and that will serve me as an excuse for showing you some of the spots to which interest attaches within our grounds.”
He picked up a hat and stick and left the Castle with his visitor.
“We shall first go to the grove where the historic duel was fought between my ancestor and the two nephews of Pope Adrian,” said the Marchese. “You have heard of that affair, no doubt.”
“Shall we be likely to find the Marchesa there?” asked Sir Percival.
“As likely as not we shall meet her as we go there,” replied the Marchese.
He led the way through an avenue of ilex, and they soon came upon a cleared space at the foot of a terrace of rocks. The Marchese explained the position occupied by the combatants in the famous duel that had so consolidated the position of the family of Del Grippo. But all the time the details of the incident were being explained to him Sir Percival was casting his eyes around for the appearance of the lady. What did he care about Pope Adrian or his nephews so long as his lady—he had come to think of her as his lady—was roaming the grounds in search of him?
Then his host brought him to where the body of his grandfather had been found by the side of the three men whom he had killed before receiving the fatal blow from behind, dealt by that poltroon, Prince Roberto, who had hired four of his bravos to attack the old man. At another part of the grounds were the ruins of the ancient summer-house, where a certain member of this distinguished family had strangled his wife, whom he had suspected of infidelity, though, as the Marchese explained, the lady had saved him more than once from assassination and was perfectly guiltless.
An hour had been passed viewing these very interesting localities, about which the air of the middle ages still lingered, and still the Marchesa was absent.
“Should we not return to the Castle? the Marchesa may be waiting for us,” suggested Sir Percival.
“A thousand pardons,” cried the Marchese. “I fear I have fatigued you. You are thirsty.”
“Well, yes; I am somewhat thirsty,” laughed the visitor.
“How discourteous I have been! We shall have the refreshment of an orange before returning. There is a famous grove a short way toward the cliff.”
He strode onward, and then, suddenly turning down a narrow path made among the olives, Sir Percival gave a start, for he found himself by the side of the Marchese, at the one part of those grounds with which he was well acquainted. They stood among the orange-trees at the summit of the cliff which he had nightly climbed to meet Paolina.
“Here are our choicest fruits,” said the Marchese, plucking an orange and handing it to his visitor. “Break it open and you will see how exquisite the fruit is.”
Sir Percival broke the orange, but the moment he did so it fell from his fingers and he gave a cry of horror, for out of the fruit had come a red stream staining his hands.
The Marchese laughed loud and long.
“Your hands are embrued with blood,” he said. “Oh, a stranger might fancy for a moment that Sir Percival Cleave was a murderer. Ah! pray pardon my folly. That is only the refreshing juice of the orange. And yet you fancied that it was blood! Come, my friend, take courage; here is another. Eat it; you will find it delicious. I have heard that there are in the world such strange monsters as are refreshed by drinking blood—we have ourselves vampires in this neighbourhood. But you and I, sir, we prefer only the heart’s blood of a simple orange. You will eat one.”
“I could not touch one,” said Sir Percival. “Nay; to do me the favour? What! an Englishman and superstitious?”
Sir Percival took another orange and made a pretence of eating it. His hands trembled so, however, they were soon dripping with the crimson juice.
“You are caught red-handed in the act,” said the Marchese, “red-handed— but the man who came here long ago was not so captured.”
“Another medieval story?” said Sir Percival. “Had your Excellency not better reserve it for the evening?”
“This story is not a medieval one; and it can only be told on the spot,” said the Marchese. “You have never been here before or you would not need to be told that this orange-grove was until seven years ago an ordinary one. It was not until blood was spilt here seven years ago that the fruit became crimson when bruised, and blood—your hands are dyed with it——flowed from it as you have seen—it is on your lips—you have drunk of her blood—Paolina’s.”
“For Gods sake let us leave this place!” said Sir Percival hoarsely. “I have heard enough stories of bloodshed.”
“Nay; this one is so piteous, you shall hear it and weep, sir—ah! tears of blood might be drawn from the most hard-hearted at the story of Paolina. She was a sweet girl. She lived with her sister, who is now the Marchesa——”
“Good God!”
“What amazes you, sir? Is it remarkable that my wife should have had a sister?’
“No, no; of course not; I was only surprised to find those horrid marks still on my hands. Pray let us return to the Castle and permit me to remove the stains.”
“Poor Paolina!—she lived at the Castle with our aunt seven years ago. She was a flower of girlhood. I thought myself in love with her; but when my brother Ugo—he was the elder—confided in me that he loved her, I left the Castle. He loved her, and it seemed that she returned his affection. They were betrothed, and one could not doubt that their happiness was assured. But one evil day she met a man—a scoundrel; I regret to say that he was an Englishman—do not move, sir, you shall hear me out. This villain spoke to her of love. He tempted her. She was accustomed to meet him every evening on this very spot—we learned that he sailed from Sorrento and climbed the cliff. My brother began to suspect. He followed her here one evening, and she confessed everything to him. He was a passionate man, and he strangled her here—here—and then flung himself headlong from the cliff.”
“A gruesome story, Marchese. Now, shall we return?”
“Villain!—assassin!—look at your hands—they are wet with her blood—your lips—they have drunk her blood, but ‘tis their last draught—for——”
Sir Percival sprang at the man and caught him by the throat, but in an instant his hands relaxed. He had only strength to glance round. He saw the woman who had stabbed him, before he fell forward.
“That one was for her—for her—my beloved sister. This one is for our dear brother—the man whom you wronged. This——”
She stabbed him again. His blood mixed with the crimson stains on the earth.
“Look at it—bear witness that I have kept my oath,” cried the Marchesa. “Did not I swear that his blood should be drunk by the same earth that drank hers?”
“Beloved one, you are an angel—an avenging angel!” cried the Marchese, embracing his wife.
The next day Sir Percival Cleave’s horse was found dead at the foot of one of the cliffs; but the body of the “unfortunate baronet”—so he was termed by the newspapers (English)—was never recovered.