‘Aye, aye, sir,’ and away they went down the avenue, leaving the grooms looking after them with intense admiration.
‘They’re a rare couple,’ said one to the other.
‘Aye, the finest this part o’ the country,’ and with a laugh both went inside.
Meanwhile Miss Harkness and her lover had reached the park gates, and had just passed through them when they saw the Professor coming along the road. Philippa’s heart gave a jump as she saw those gleaming eyes once more fixed on hers.
‘Good morning, Miss Harkness,’ said the Professor; ‘I see you are indulging in your favourite pastime. I am calling on Sir Gilbert.’
‘You will find him in the library,’ said Philippa, bowing coldly, while Dulchester passed him with a curt ‘Good morning.’
The Professor stood looking after them with a sneer on his face as they rode away laughing and chatting merrily, and the same envy of their happiness came into his heart as Satan felt when he saw Adam and Eve in the garden.
‘Oh, Hell, what do mine eyes with grief behold?’
The feeling, however, soon passed, and with a shrug of his shoulders he resumed his way.
He was immediately ushered into the library on his arrival at the Hall, and found its master anxiously expecting his arrival.
‘Ah, Professor,’ he said, shaking him heartily by the hand, ‘I am so delighted you have come. I want to find out a certain point; but first I must show you all my treasures.’
The Professor assented with delight, for he felt the true joy of a bibliomaniac as he stood in this treasure-house of books. All day long they examined the treasures of the shelves, and ate their lunch as hurriedly as possible, eager to return to the feast of intellect. Sir Gilbert found that he had a truly congenial spirit in the Professor, and expounded his favourite theories and rode his favourite hobbies until the twilight began to close in. All this time the astute Professor had been thinking of the ‘Giraldus,’ but did not ask where it was, fearing lest too great eagerness on his part might cause suspicion in the jealous breast of the bookworm. He led the conversation round to the request which the baronet had made to him when he came into the room.
‘You were saying something about a point you wanted elucidated, when I came in, Sir Gilbert,’ he said, looking at him keenly.
‘Yes, yes,’ replied Sir Gilbert, ‘it is in regard to the discovery of the philosopher’s stone. Can you tell me any notable work on the subject?’
‘I think you will find what you require in “Giraldus,”’ said the Professor, whose pulse was beating quickly.
‘But he is an obscure chemist,’ objected Sir Gilbert.
‘You find pearls in oysters,’ quoth the German, calmly; ‘and the obscure chemist gives the best description of the philosopher’s stone I have met with.’
‘I thought you had never read the “Giraldus?”’ said Sir Gilbert, sharply.
The Professor felt that he was on dangerous ground.
‘Not the work itself,’ he answered, coolly; ‘but other authors which I have studied give extracts, and, putting them together, I have arrived at the conclusion that the work of “Giraldus” is the best on the subject.’
‘Well, I had better bring the book, and you can show me the part you refer to,’ answered Sir Gilbert, and went off to find it.
The Professor sat down in the baronet’s chair by the writing-table, and waited with his heart beating rapidly. At last he had arrived at the consummation of his hope, and in another minute would know the name of the drug which was to be of such value to him. Presently the baronet came back and laid on the table an old yellow book, the counterpart of that stored in the Professor’s study at Heidelberg. The Professor took it up and turned over the leaves carelessly, although the touch of every page caused a thrill to go through him.
‘You had better get Von Helme too,’ he said, looking at the baronet. ‘I think he will prove also useful to you.’
Sir Gilbert hurried away well pleased, while the Professor took the ‘Giraldus’ to the window and turned to the tenth page. Then, counting four lines down, he ran his finger along until it stopped at the fifth word, ‘maiden’s blood …’
When Sir Gilbert came back with the book wanted, he found Brankel standing by the window turning over the leaves of the ‘Giraldus.’ In handing him Von Helme’s work he glanced up to see if it was the one required, but recoiled in a moment with a cry,
‘Brankel! What ails you?’
The cold light of the evening was striking fair on the face of the German, and the rest of his body was in the shadow. His face was livid, with great drops of perspiration standing on it, and with the jet-black eyebrows, wild hair, and thin, sneering mouth, he looked the incarnation of the arch-fiend – a modern Mephistopheles. When the baronet spoke he turned to him with a cold smile, and the writhe of pain, passing over his face vanished, and left him with his usual countenance.
‘I had a spasm of pain,’ he explained, gently going back to the study table; ‘it is gone now.’
The baronet looked at him doubtfully, and then suggested that some brandy should be brought.
‘Nothing, thank you,’ replied the Professor, holding the ‘Giraldus’ with one hand and waving the other. ‘I am subject to these attacks. I am perfectly well now. See, here is the remark of Giraldus on the philosopher’s stone.’ And they were soon deep in the book.
The Professor refused to stay to dinner on the plea that he had an engagement, and hastened away almost immediately. When he got to his hotel he went to his bedroom, and began to write rapidly, in his diary.
November 15th. – At last I have solved this problem, which has been my aim these many days. I have had the second volume of ‘Giraldus’ in my hands, and on turning to the page mentioned in the cryptogram I find that the mysterious drug is ‘maiden’s blood.’ To bring out the highest powers of the elixir I must mingle with it the heart blood of a pure maiden. It is a terrible ingredient, and will be difficult to obtain, but I shall not shrink, for I consider it my duty to bring this elixir to its highest state. But where am I to find the maiden from whom to obtain the blood?
Murder is a crime generally punished by the gallows. Bah! why do I bring these things into my thoughts? The killing of a person in the cause of science is no murder. If my own blood were necessary I should not hesitate a moment, but give it freely, in order to consummate this great discovery. Before we can wrest the secrets from the great mother, Nature, we must propitiate her with victims. How many human beings have been slain in a less noble cause than this? Was not the daughter of Agamemnon slain by her own father to satisfy the wrath of Artemis? and shall I shrink from offering up a woman on the altar of science? A thousand times no. The cause of science must be advanced even at the cost of human blood, and I, who am appointed by fate to give this secret of Nature to the world, shall not shrink from my task.
Everything is prepared, the altar, the priest, and the victim, for Miss Harkness will have the honour of contributing her heart’s blood to this great discovery. I have made up my mind that she is to die in this cause; and what greater honour can I offer her? Do not the Hindoo maidens immolate themselves cheerfully under the death-dealing wheels of the chariot of their god, and shall an Englishwoman shrink from sacrificing herself in the cause of science? I cannot tell her my wish, for such is the lack of ambition in her soul that she would not comprehend the magnitude of the thing, and doubtless refuse. I must decoy her into my power.
It is a terrible thing to do, no doubt, but in my case must be used the motto of the Jesuits, ‘The end justifies the means.’ Did I believe in the existence of a Supreme Being I would pray to him to direct me; but as I have no such belief I must kneel to thee, O Science, and entreat thine aid to bring about this sacrifice on thy shrine. The blood of this one maiden will be of more value to the world than that which thousands of human beings have shed on the fields of Marathon and Waterloo.
VII
Wolfden.
‘Good gentlemen,
The house is stuffed with ghosts, pray you be wary;
For every footfall wakes a hundred fiends,
Who have the power to do us devilries.’
IT was a queer, rambling old place, built of grey stone, almost hidden in dark-green ivy. The stones in some places were so eaten away and cracked by the lapse of years that it seemed to be held together by the clinging parasite. A quaint, picturesque house, it was built in the Elizabethan style of architecture, with narrow, diamond-paned windows, huge stacks of chimneys twisted into all kinds of fantastic shapes; and little red-roofed turrets starting out of the walls at all sorts of odd corners, and clinging to the grey old stones like birds’ nests. Under the sloping eaves – where the swallows built every summer – over the great oaken doors, beside the elaborately wrought windows, grotesque faces, carved out of stone into a fixed grin, peered everywhere, like the goblin inhabitants of the deserted mansion. Grass grew between the crevices of the broad stones of the balcony, thistles waved in the deserted courtyard, and everywhere there was a damp, green slime. Some of the shutters, torn off by the force of the wind, were lying half-buried in the grass beneath, while others hung crazily on their broken hinges, and swung noisily with every breeze.
It had formerly been a place of great magnificence, and the lofty ceilings of the state rooms were decorated with beautiful paintings. But the broad oaken stairs, down which had come so many generations, were thick with dust, and the pale moon, looking through the painted windows, saw only dreary rooms filled with floating shadows. But it was not the loneliness of the place that made it such a thing of horror to the simple folk around. There was said to be a curse on it, for the last proprietor had hanged himself, after spending the remains of his fortune in a last banquet. In the great dining-hall a ragged piece of rope, suspended from a hook in the wall, still showed the place where he committed the deed. It was here, after that last terrible orgy was done – after he had exhausted the wine of life, and found that the lees were bitter indeed – that he came and launched himself into another world. His ghost was said to haunt the scene of his former follies, and wail for the past that could not be undone. But the lights which announced his presence were probably only the glimmer of the moon on the glittering windows; and the wail of the wind whistling through the deserted halls, his voice. But the rustics would have been indignant at such a solution, and firmly held to the belief that, whatever modern science might say to the contrary, there were ghosts, and that Wolfden was haunted by one.
On the death of the last squire the estate had gone into Chancery, and the place to rack and ruin. No tenant could be found for it, even in this ghost-despising age, for the place was eerie, and a cloud hung over it. When the German Professor took it he was looked upon as a wonderfully brave man; and, indeed, it was whispered among the village gossips that he must have some acquaintance with the black art itself since he could trust himself so fearlessly among the ghostly inmates of Wolfden. Superstition still has her votaries, even in this enlightened age, among those lonely hills, and the strange-looking foreigner gave rise to many queer surmises.
The Professor did not occupy all the house, but only a small range of rooms on the right side. Those on the left were the state rooms, and these he shut up, leaving them to their dust and loneliness. Immediately above the rooms on the right side was an octagon-shaped apartment, which the Professor turned into a laboratory for the prosecution of his chemical experiments. A light could be seen in this room far into the small hours, for the Professor preferred working at night instead of in the daytime. All day he was at the Hall, in the library with Sir Gilbert, hunting among the books, and helping the baronet with his History of Chemistry. Sir Gilbert was the only member at the Hall with whom the German was on friendly terms. Philippa avoided him, and showed plainly that she did not relish his company, while Lord Dulchester made no attempt to conceal his dislike – a dislike which the Professor cordially returned. The German kept a vigilant watch on Philippa, anxious to seize any opportunity which might offer itself of getting her into his power, for he was firmly resolved in his hideous purpose of killing her so as to add the last ingredient to the elixir. Wherever Philippa went she found those mesmeric eyes fixed steadily on her, like two evil planets blighting her with their malignant influence. Under this continual supervision she began to grow thin and pale. At all times she felt the burning gaze of those eyes, and would start nervously at every sound. Nature could not bear the strain, and at last Philippa saw that unless she removed herself from the influence of the Professor, she would soon be very ill. To this end she took a sudden resolution, and unfolded it to Jack in this wise:
‘Jack,’ said she, one evening, when they were alone in the drawing-room, and the Professor and Sir Gilbert were talking science over their wine; ‘do you believe in the evil eye?’
Lord Dulchester, who was gazing idly into the fire, turned round in dismay.
‘Good heavens, Philippa, what put that idea into your head?’
‘I believe the Professor has the evil eye,’ went on Philippa, solemnly. ‘Whenever I look at him I always find his eyes fixed on me.’
‘Just give me leave, and I’ll soon settle his eyes,’ said Jack, grimly.
‘Don’t be a fool, Jack,’ was Miss Philippa’s ungrateful retort; ‘he is a friend of papa’s.’
‘He doesn’t stay here,’ replied Dulchester, sulkily.
‘I don’t see what that has to do with it,’ answered Philippa, candidly; ‘he is here every day. But, Jack,’ she went on, ‘I can’t stand this much longer. I am sure I shall be ill—’
‘You do look rather pale,’ interjected Jack, eyeing her anxiously.
‘So I have made up my mind to go up to London and stay with Aunt Gertrude.’
‘Oh!’
Lord Dulchester gave a shiver. He had reason to remember that high-browed, Roman-nosed matron, who had hunted him through several seasons in the most determined manner, to secure him for one of her daughters, who were all equally high-browed and Roman-nosed.
‘Don’t make faces, Jack,’ said Philippa, smiling, for he had confided to her the system of social persecution to which her cousins had subjected him. ‘You need not come.’
‘Oh, won’t I though,’ retorted Dulchester, vivaciously. ‘I am not afraid; I am an engaged man now.’
‘Jack,’ said his ladylove, solemnly, with a malicious twinkle in her eye, ‘let me implore you not to let my beautiful cousins win your heart from me, for you know your engagement will be no obstacle; and oh, Lord Dulchester, they have brought the art of flirting to a very high state of perfection.’
‘Let them try it on,’ said Jack, laughing gaily at the idea; ‘I am quite willing to risk it, Phil.’
And so it was arranged. Philippa wrote to her aunt and received an effusive answer, stating that she would only be too glad, especially as they were going for the winter to the south of France; did dear Philippa mind? No, dear Philippa didn’t; she would have gone to the North Pole if necessary, to escape from those terrible eyes of the Professor. So she began to make arrangements, and fixed an early day for her departure.
Wolfden, November 22nd. – I have been peculiarly unfortunate with regard to the last ingredient of the elixir. I am no nearer the accomplishment of my desire than before. Miss Harkness persistently avoids me, and I am unable to get her alone. That lover is always with her, and I suspect would have no hesitation in doing me a personal injury. He hates me, I see, for he does not take the least pains to conceal his feelings. This is unfortunate, for it adds to my difficulties in the accomplishment of my design. I have asked Miss Harkness over here, but she persistently refuses to come; and at times I despair of getting her at all. Now, to add to my difficulties in the matter, she has arranged to go to the south of France, where, as she told me, she will probably stay for a long time. It is an impossibility for me to prolong my stay in England beyond the six months, so if she goes away now there is every probability that I shall lose her. There i
s yet a week before she leaves, so I may think of some plan before then whereby to accomplish my purpose.
The thought often comes across me that if I kill her I shall be liable to the law of England. The law has no sympathy with the sacred cause of science, and would hang me for the murder (as it would call it) as calmly as if I were some common felon who had beaten his wife to death. It cannot be helped. If I wish to perfect this great discovery I see that there is no alternative but to become a victim to the law. But my discovery will live after me, and I shall be looked on as a glorious martyr to the cause of science. I will give this diary – in the event of my being hanged for the sacrifice of this girl on the altar of science – to some learned savant in my own country, to edit, and the world shall see how gradually I was led to the crowning act of my life. I shall be honoured as a martyr; therefore I have no hesitation in committing the deed which is likely to bring me within the arm of the law. ‘The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church,’ and my death shall be the means of giving to man an elixir by which to foresee both past and future. He will be able to see far ahead, and avert from the world those calamities which hitherto have fallen on it owing to the darkness which has veiled the future. What are a few pangs of physical pain in comparison with the splendid future thus open to the world through my agency? My mind is made up – I am ready and willing to fall a martyr in the cause of science against the powers of ignorance, and over my grave shall be inscribed the one word so pregnant with meaning – ‘Resurgam!’
One! strikes slowly with a sound like thunder from the grey old belfry of the church. Midnight – this is the hour during which the earth is thronged with spirits. They pour from the green graveyards, from the charnel house; the murderer descends from his gibbet, and the rich man rises from his vault. The air is filled with ghosts; their incorporeal forms throng in myriads thick as the leaves of Vallombrosa.
Dracula’s Brethren Page 17
