by Oscar Wilde
“There was a sudden knocking, he thought, the door, and went and opened it, but nothing was to be seen.
“Oh! I see—somebody next door; and if it wasn’t, it don’t matter. There’s nobody here. I’m alone, and there’s plenty of valuables in the house. That is what I call very good company. I wouldn’t wish for better.”
He turned about, looked over room after room, and satisfied himself that he was alone—that the house was empty.
At every room he entered he paused to think over the value—what it was worth, and that he was a very fortunate man in having dropped into such a good thing.”
“Ah! there’s the old boy’s secretary, too—his bureau—there’ll be something in that that will amuse me mightily; but I don’t think I shall sit up late. He was a rum old man, to say the least of it—a very odd sort of man.”
With that he gave himself a shrug, as if some very uncomfortable feeling had come over him.
“I’ll go to bed early, and get some sleep, and then in daylight I can look after these papers. They won’t be less interesting in the morning than they are now.”
There had been some rum stories about the old man, and now the nephew seemed to think he might have let the family sleep on the premises for that night; yes, at that moment he could have found it in his heart to have paid for all the expense of their keep, had it been possible to have had them back to remain the night.
But that wasn’t possible, for they would not have done it, but sooner have remained in the streets all night than stay there all night, like so many house-dogs, employed by one who stepped in between them and their father’s goods, which were their inheritance, but for one trifling circumstance—a mere ceremony.
The night came on, and he had lights. True it was he had not been down stairs, only just to have a look. He could not tell what sort of a place it was; there were a good many odd sort of passages, that seemed to end nowhere, and others that did.
There were large doors; but they were all locked, and he had the keys; so he didn’t mind, but secured all places that were not fastened.
He then went up stairs again, and sat down in the room where the bureau was placed.
“I’ll be bound,” said one of the guests, “he was in a bit of a stew, notwithstanding all his brag.”
“Oh! I don’t believe,” said another, “that anything done that is dangerous, or supposed to be dangerous, by the bravest man, is any way wholly without some uncomfortable feelings. They may not be strong enough to prevent the thing proposed to be done from being done, but they give a disagreeable sensation to the skin.”
“You have felt it, then?”
“Ha! ha! ha!”
“Why, at that time I slept in the churchyard for a wager, I must say I felt cold all over, as if my skin was walking about me in an uncomfortable manner.”
“But you won your wager?”
“I did.”
“And of course you slept there?”
“To be sure I did.”
“And met with nothing?”
“Nothing, save a few bumps against the gravestones.”
“Those were hard knocks, I should say.”
“They were, I assure you; but I lay there, and slept there, and won my wager.”
“Would you do it again?”
“No.”
“And why not?”
“Because of the rheumatism.”
“You caught that?”
“I did; I would give ten times my wager to get rid of them. I have them very badly.”
“Come, order, order—the tale; let’s hear the end of that, since it has begun.”
“With all my heart. Come, neighbour.”
“Well, as I said, he was fidgetty; but yet he was not a man to be very easily frightened or overcome, for he was stout and bold.
“When he shut himself up in the room, he took out a bottle of some good wine, and helped himself to drink; it was good old wine, and he soon felt himself warmed and, comforted. He could have faced the enemy.
“If one bottle produces such an effect,” he muttered, “what will two do?”
This was a question that could only be solved by trying it, and this he proceeded to do.
But first he drew a brace of long barrelled pistols from his coat pocket, and taking a powder-flask and bullets from his pocket also, he loaded them very carefully.
“There,” said he, “are my bull-dogs; and rare watch-dogs they are. They never bark but they bite. Now, if anybody does come, it will be all up with them. Tricks upon travellers ain’t a safe game when I have these; and now for the other bottle.”
He drew the other bottle, and thought, if anything, it was better than the first. He drank it rather quick, to be sure, and then he began to feel sleepy and tired.
“I think I shall go to bed,” he said; “that is, if I can find my way there, for it does seem to me as if the door was travelling. Never mind, it will make a call here again presently, and then I’ll get through.”
So saying he arose. Taking the candle in his hand, he walked with a better step than might have been expected under the circumstance. True it was the candle wagged to and fro, and his shadow danced upon the wall; but still, when he got to the bed, he secured his door, put the light in a safe place, threw himself down, and was fast asleep in a few moments, or rather he fell into a doze instantaneously.
How long he remained in this state he knew not, but he was suddenly awakened by a loud bang, as though something heavy and flat had fallen upon the floor—such, for instance, as a door, or anything of that sort. He jumped up, rubbed his eyes, and could even then hear the reverberations through the house.
“What is that?” he muttered; “what is that?”
He listened, and thought he could hear something moving down stairs, and for a moment he was seized with an ague fit; but recollecting, I suppose, that there were some valuables down stairs that were worth fighting for, he carefully extinguished the light that still burned, and softly crept down stairs.
When he got down stairs he thought he could hear some one scramble up the kitchen stairs, and then into the room where the bureau was. Listening for a moment to ascertain if there were more than one, and then feeling convinced there was not, he followed into the parlour, when he heard the cabinet open by a key.
This was a new miracle, and one he could not understand; and then he hoard the papers begin to rattle and rustle; so, drawing out one of the pistols, he cocked it, and walked in.
The figure instantly began to jump about; it was dressed in white—in grave-clothes. He was terribly nervous, and shook, so he feared to fire the pistol; but at length he did, and the report was followed by a fall and a loud groan.
This was very dreadful—very dreadful; but all was quiet, and he lit the candle again, and approached the body to examine it, and ascertain if he knew who it was. A groan came from it. The bureau was open, and the figure clutched firmly a will in his hand.
The figure was dressed in grave-clothes, and he started up when he saw the form and features of his own uncle, the man who was dead, who somehow or other had escaped his confinement, and found his way up, here. He held his will firmly; and the nephew was so horrified and stunned, that he threw down the light, and rushed out of the room with a shout of terror, and never returned again.
* * * *
The narrator concluded, and one of the guests said—
“And do you really believe it?”
“No, no—to be sure not.”
“You don’t?”
“Why should I? My friend was, out of all hand, one of the greatest liars I ever came near; and why, therefore, should I believe him? I don’t, on my conscience, believe one word of it.”
It was now half-past twelve, and, as Tom Eccles came not back, and the landlord did not feel disposed to draw any more liquor, they
left the inn, and retired to their separate houses in a great state of anxiety to know the fate of their respective wagers.
CHAPTER LXIV.
THE VAMPIRE IN THE MOONLIGHT.—THE FALSE FRIEND.
Part of the distance being accomplished towards the old ruins, Tom Eccles began to feel that what he had undertaken was not altogether such child’s-play as he had at first imagined it to be. Somehow or another, with a singular and uncomfortable sort of distinctness, there came across his mind every story that he had remembered of the wild and the wonderful. All the long-since forgotten tales of superstition that in early childhood he had learned, came now back upon him, suggesting to his mind a thousand uncomfortable fancies of the strangest description.
It was not likely that when once a man, under such circumstances, got into such a frame of mind, he would readily get out of it again, while he continued surrounded by such scenes as had first called them into existence.
No doubt, had he turned about, and faced the inn again instead of the old ruins he would soon have shaken off these “thick coming fancies;” but such a result was no to be expected, so long as he kept on towards the dismal place he had pledged himself to reach.
As he traversed meadow after meadow he began to ask himself some questions which he found that he could not answer exactly in a consolatory manner, under the present state of things.
Among these question was the very pertinent one of—“It’s no argument against vampires, because I don’t see the use of ’em—is it?” This he was compelled to answer as he had put it; and when, in addition, he began to recollect that, without the shadow of a doubt, Sir Francis Varney the supposed vampire, had been chased across the fields to that very ruin whither he was bound, and had then and there disappeared, he certainly found himself in decidedly uncomfortable and most unpromising situation.
“No,” he said, “no. Hang it, I won’t go back now, to be made the laughing-stock of the whole town, which I should be. Come what may of it, I will go on as I have commenced; so I shall put on as stout a heart as I can.”
Then, having come to this resolve, he strove might and main to banish from his mind those disagreeable reminiscences that had been oppressing him, to turn his attention to subjects of a different complexion.
During the progress of making this endeavour, which was rather futile, he came within sight of the ruins. Then he slackened his pace a little, telling himself, with a pardonable self-deceit, that it was common, ordinary caution only, which induced him to do so, and nothing at all in the shape of fear.
“Time enough,” he remarked, “to be afraid, when I see anything to be afraid of, which I don’t see as yet. So, as all’s right, I may as well put a good face upon the matter.”
He tried to whistle a tune, but it turned out only a melancholy failure; so he gave that up in despair, and walked on until he got within a hundred yards, or thereabouts, of the old ruins.
He thus proceeded, and bending his ear close to the ground, he listened attentively for several minutes. Somehow, he fancied that a strange, murmuring sound came to his ears; but he was not quite sure that it proceeded from the ruins, because it was just that sort of sound that might come from a long way off, being mellowed by distance, although, perhaps, loud enough at its source.
“Well, well,” he whispered to himself, “it don’t matter much, after all. Go I must, and hide the handkerchiefs somewhere, or else be laughed at, besides losing my wages. The former I don’t like, and the latter I cannot afford.”
Thus clinching the matter by such knock-down arguments, he walked on until he was almost within the very shadow of the ruins, and, probably, it was at this juncture that his footsteps may have been heard by Marchdale and Sir Francis Varney.
Then he paused again; but all was profoundly still, and he began to think that the strange sort of murmuring noise which he had heard must have come from far off and not at all from any person or persons within the ruins.
“Let me see,” he said to himself; “I have five handkerchiefs to hide among the old ruins somewhere, and the sooner I do so the better, because then I will get away; for, as regards staying here to watch, Heaven knows how long, for Sir Francis Varney, I don’t intend to do it, upon second thoughts and second thoughts, they say, are generally best.”
With the most careful footsteps now, as if he were treading upon some fragile substance, which he feared to injure, he advanced until he was fairly within the precincts of the ancient place, which now bore so ill a reputation.
He then made to himself much the same remark that Sir Francis Varney had made to Marchdale, with respect to the brightening up of the sky, in consequence of its being near the time for the moon to rise from the horizon, and he saw more clearly around him, although he could not find any good place to hide the handkerchiefs in.
“I must and will,” he said, “hide them securely; for it would, indeed, be remarkably unpleasant, after coming here and winning my wages, to have the proofs that I had done so taken away by some chance visitor to the place.”
He at length saw a tolerably large stone, which stood, in a slant position, up against one of the walls. Its size attracted him. He thought, if his strength was sufficient to move it, that it would be a good thing to do so, and to place the handkerchiefs beneath it; for, at all events, it was so heavy that it could not be kicked aside, and no one, without some sort of motive to do so, beyond the mere love of labour, would set about moving it from its position.
“I may go further and fare worse,” he said to himself; “so here shall all the handkerchiefs lie, to afford a proof that I have been here.”
He packed them into a small compass, and then stooped to roll aside the heavy stone, when, at the moment, before he could apply his strength to that purpose, he heard some one, in his immediate neighbourhood, say—“Hist!”
This was so sudden, and so utterly unexpected, that he not only ceased his exertions to move the stone, but he nearly fell down in his surprise.
“Hist—hist!” said the voice again.
“What—what,” gasped Tom Eccles—“what are you?”
“Hush—hush—hush!”
The perspiration broke out upon his brow, and he leaned against the wall for support, as he managed to say, faintly—
“Well, hush—what then?”
“Hist!”
“Well, I hear you. Where are you?”
“Here at hand. Who are you?”
“Tom Eccles. Who are you?”
“A friend. Have you seen anything?”
“No; I wish I could. I should like to see you if I could.”
“I’m coming.”
There was a slow and cautious footstep, and Marchdale advanced to where Tom Eccles was standing.
“Come, now,” said the latter, when he saw the dusky-looking form stalking towards him; “till I know you better, I’ll be obliged to you to keep off. I am well armed. Keep your distance, be you friend or foe.”
“Armed!” exclaimed Marchdale, and he at once paused.—“Yes, I am.”
“But I am a friend. I have no sort of objection frankly to telly you my errand. I am a friend of the Bannerworth family, and have kept watch here now for two nights, in the hopes of meeting with Varney, the vampire.”
“The deuce you have: and pray what may your name be?”
“Marchdale.”
“If you be Mr. Marchdale, I know you by sight: for I have seen you with Mr. Henry Bannerworth several times. Come out from among the shadows, and let us have a look at you; but, till you do, don’t come within arm’s length of me. I am not naturally suspicious; but we cannot be too careful.”
“Oh! certainly—certainly. The silver edge of the moon is now just peeping up from the east, and you will be able to see me well, if you step from the shadow of the wall by which you now are.”
This was a reasonable enough proposition, and
Tom Eccles at once acceded to it, by stepping out boldly into the partial moonlight, which now began to fall upon the open meadows, tinting the grass with a silvery refulgence, and rendering even minute objects visible. The moment he saw Marchdale he knew him, and, advancing frankly to him, he said—
“I know you, sir, well.”
“And what brings you here?”
“A wager for one thing, and a wish to see the vampire for another.”
“Indeed!”
“Yes; I must own I have such a wish, along with a still stronger one, to capture him, if possible; and, as there are now two of us, why may we not do it?”
“As for capturing him,” said Marchdale, “I should prefer shooting him.”
“You would?”
“I would, indeed. I have seen him once shot down, and he is now, I have no doubt, as well as ever. What were you doing with that huge stone I saw you bending over?”
“I have some handkerchiefs to hide here, as a proof that I have tonight really been to this place.”
“Oh, I will show you a better spot, where there is a crevice in which you can place them with perfect safety. Will you walk with me into the ruins?”
“Willingly.”
“It’s odd enough,” remarked Marchdale, after he had shown Tom Eccles where to hide the handkerchiefs, “that you and I should both be here upon so similar an errand.”
“I’m very glad of it. It robs the place of its gloom, and makes it ten times more endurable than it otherwise would be. What do you propose to do if you see the vampire?”
“I shall try a pistol bullet on him. You say you are armed?”
“Yes.”
“With pistols?”
“One. Here it is.”
“A huge weapon; loaded well, of course?”
“Oh, yes, I can depend upon it; but I did not intend to use it, unless assailed.”
“’Tis well. What is that?”
“What—what?”
“Don’t you see anything there? Come farther back. Look—look. At the corner of that wall there I am certain there is the flutter of a human garment.”
“There is—there is.”
