RUPERT'S JOURNAL--Continued.
April 10, 1907.
For some days after what I call "the episode" I was in a strange
condition of mind. I did not take anyone--not even Aunt Janet--into
confidence. Even she dear, and open-hearted and liberal-minded as
she is, might not have understood well enough to be just and
tolerant; and I did not care to hear any adverse comment on my
strange visitor. Somehow I could not bear the thought of anyone
finding fault with her or in her, though, strangely enough, I was
eternally defending her to myself; for, despite my wishes,
embarrassing thoughts WOULD come again and again, and again in all
sorts and variants of queries difficult to answer. I found myself
defending her, sometimes as a woman hard pressed by spiritual fear
and physical suffering, sometimes as not being amenable to laws that
govern the Living. Indeed, I could not make up my mind whether I
looked on her as a living human being or as one with some strange
existence in another world, and having only a chance foothold in our
own. In such doubt imagination began to work, and thoughts of evil,
of danger, of doubt, even of fear, began to crowd on me with such
persistence and in such varied forms that I found my instinct of
reticence growing into a settled purpose. The value of this
instinctive precaution was promptly shown by Aunt Janet's state of
mind, with consequent revelation of it. She became full of gloomy
prognostications and what I thought were morbid fears. For the first
time in my life I discovered that Aunt Janet had nerves! I had long
had a secret belief that she was gifted, to some degree at any rate,
with Second Sight, which quality, or whatever it is, skilled in the
powers if not the lore of superstition, manages to keep at stretch
not only the mind of its immediate pathic, but of others relevant to
it. Perhaps this natural quality had received a fresh impetus from
the arrival of some cases of her books sent on by Sir Colin. She
appeared to read and reread these works, which were chiefly on occult
subjects, day and night, except when she was imparting to me choice
excerpts of the most baleful and fearsome kind. Indeed, before a
week was over I found myself to be an expert in the history of the
cult, as well as in its manifestations, which latter I had been
versed in for a good many years.
The result of all this was that it set me brooding. Such, at least,
I gathered was the fact when Aunt Janet took me to task for it. She
always speaks out according to her convictions, so that her thinking
I brooded was to me a proof that I did; and after a personal
examination I came--reluctantly--to the conclusion that she was
right, so far, at any rate, as my outer conduct was concerned. The
state of mind I was in, however, kept me from making any
acknowledgment of it--the real cause of my keeping so much to myself
and of being so distrait. And so I went on, torturing myself as
before with introspective questioning; and she, with her mind set on
my actions, and endeavouring to find a cause for them, continued and
expounded her beliefs and fears.
Her nightly chats with me when we were alone after dinner--for I had
come to avoid her questioning at other times--kept my imagination at
high pressure. Despite myself, I could not but find new cause for
concern in the perennial founts of her superstition. I had thought,
years ago, that I had then sounded the depths of this branch of
psychicism; but this new phase of thought, founded on the really deep
hold which the existence of my beautiful visitor and her sad and
dreadful circumstances had taken upon me, brought me a new concern in
the matter of self-importance. I came to think that I must
reconstruct my self-values, and begin a fresh understanding of
ethical beliefs. Do what I would, my mind would keep turning on the
uncanny subjects brought before it. I began to apply them one by one
to my own late experience, and unconsciously to try to fit them in
turn to the present case.
The effect of this brooding was that I was, despite my own will,
struck by the similarity of circumstances bearing on my visitor, and
the conditions apportioned by tradition and superstition to such
strange survivals from earlier ages as these partial existences which
are rather Undead than Living--still walking the earth, though
claimed by the world of the Dead. Amongst them are the Vampire, or
the Wehr-Wolf. To this class also might belong in a measure the
Doppelganger--one of whose dual existences commonly belongs to the
actual world around it. So, too, the denizens of the world of
Astralism. In any of these named worlds there is a material
presence--which must be created, if only for a single or periodic
purpose. It matters not whether a material presence already created
can be receptive of a disembodied soul, or a soul unattached can have
a body built up for it or around it; or, again, whether the body of a
dead person can be made seeming quick through some diabolic influence
manifested in the present, or an inheritance or result of some
baleful use of malefic power in the past. The result is the same in
each case, though the ways be widely different: a soul and a body
which are not in unity but brought together for strange purposes
through stranger means and by powers still more strange.
Through much thought and a process of exclusions the eerie form which
seemed to be most in correspondence with my adventure, and most
suitable to my fascinating visitor, appeared to be the Vampire.
Doppelganger, Astral creations, and all such-like, did not comply
with the conditions of my night experience. The Wehr-Wolf is but a
variant of the Vampire, and so needed not to be classed or examined
at all. Then it was that, thus focussed, the Lady of the Shroud (for
so I came to hold her in my mind) began to assume a new force. Aunt
Janet's library afforded me clues which I followed with avidity. In
my secret heart I hated the quest, and did not wish to go on with it.
But in this I was not my own master. Do what I would--brush away
doubts never so often, new doubts and imaginings came in their stead.
The circumstance almost repeated the parable of the Seven Devils who
took the place of the exorcised one. Doubts I could stand.
Imaginings I could stand. But doubts and imaginings together made a
force so fell that I was driven to accept any reading of the mystery
which might presumably afford a foothold for satisfying thought. And
so I came to accept tentatively the Vampire theory--accept it, at
least, so far as to examine it as judicially as was given me to do.
As the days wore on, so the conviction grew. The more I read on the
subject, the more directly the evidences pointed towards this view.
The more I thought, the more obstinate became the conviction. I
ransacked Aunt Janet's volumes again and again to find anything to
the contrary; but in vain. Again, no matter how obstinate were my
convictions at any given time, unsettlement came with fresh thinking
over the argument, so that I was kept in a harassing state of
uncertainty.
Briefly, the evidence in favour of accord between the facts of the
case and the Vampire theory were:
Her coming was at night--the time the Vampire is according to the
theory, free to move at will.
She wore her shroud--a necessity of coming fresh from grave or tomb;
for there is nothing occult about clothing which is not subject to
astral or other influences.
She had to be helped into my room--in strict accordance with what one
sceptical critic of occultism has called "the Vampire etiquette."
She made violent haste in getting away at cock-crow.
She seemed preternaturally cold; her sleep was almost abnormal in
intensity, and yet the sound of the cock-crowing came through it.
These things showed her to be subject to SOME laws, though not in
exact accord within those which govern human beings. Under the
stress of such circumstances as she must have gone through, her
vitality seemed more than human--the quality of vitality which could
outlive ordinary burial. Again, such purpose as she had shown in
donning, under stress of some compelling direction, her ice-cold wet
shroud, and, wrapt in it, going out again into the night, was hardly
normal for a woman.
But if so, and if she was indeed a Vampire, might not whatever it may
be that holds such beings in thrall be by some means or other
exorcised? To find the means must be my next task. I am actually
pining to see her again. Never before have I been stirred to my
depths by anyone. Come it from Heaven or Hell, from the Earth or the
Grave, it does not matter; I shall make it my task to win her back to
life and peace. If she be indeed a Vampire, the task may be hard and
long; if she be not so, and if it be merely that circumstances have
so gathered round her as to produce that impression, the task may be
simpler and the result more sweet. No, not more sweet; for what can
be more sweet than to restore the lost or seemingly lost soul of the
woman you love! There, the truth is out at last! I suppose that I
have fallen in love with her. If so, it is too late for me to fight
against it. I can only wait with what patience I can till I see her
again. But to that end I can do nothing. I know absolutely nothing
about her--not even her name. Patience!
RUPERT'S JOURNAL--Continued.
April 16, 1907.
The only relief I have had from the haunting anxiety regarding the
Lady of the Shroud has been in the troubled state of my adopted
country. There has evidently been something up which I have not been
allowed to know. The mountaineers are troubled and restless; are
wandering about, singly and in parties, and holding meetings in
strange places. This is what I gather used to be in old days when
intrigues were on foot with Turks, Greeks, Austrians, Italians,
Russians. This concerns me vitally, for my mind has long been made
up to share the fortunes of the Land of the Blue Mountains. For good
or ill I mean to stay here: J'y suis, j'y reste. I share henceforth
the lot of the Blue Mountaineers; and not Turkey, nor Greece, nor
Austria, nor Italy, nor Russia--no, not France nor Germany either;
not man nor God nor Devil shall drive me from my purpose. With these
patriots I throw in my lot! My only difficulty seemed at first to be
with the men themselves. They are so proud that at the beginning I
feared they would not even accord me the honour of being one of them!
However, things always move on somehow, no matter what difficulties
there be at the beginning. Never mind! When one looks back at an
accomplished fact the beginning is not to be seen--and if it were it
would not matter. It is not of any account, anyhow.
I heard that there was going to be a great meeting near here
yesterday afternoon, and I attended it. I think it was a success.
If such is any proof, I felt elated as well as satisfied when I came
away. Aunt Janet's Second Sight on the subject was comforting,
though grim, and in a measure disconcerting. When I was saying good-
night she asked me to bend down my head. As I did so, she laid her
hands on it and passed them all over it. I heard her say to herself:
"Strange! There's nothing there; yet I could have sworn I saw it!"
I asked her to explain, but she would not. For once she was a little
obstinate, and refused point blank to even talk of the subject. She
was not worried nor unhappy; so I had no cause for concern. I said
nothing, but I shall wait and see. Most mysteries become plain or
disappear altogether in time. But about the meeting--lest I forget!
When I joined the mountaineers who had assembled, I really think they
were glad to see me; though some of them seemed adverse, and others
did not seem over well satisfied. However, absolute unity is very
seldom to be found. Indeed, it is almost impossible; and in a free
community is not altogether to be desired. When it is apparent, the
gathering lacks that sense of individual feeling which makes for the
real consensus of opinion--which is the real unity of purpose. The
meeting was at first, therefore, a little cold and distant. But
presently it began to thaw, and after some fiery harangues I was
asked to speak. Happily, I had begun to learn the Balkan language as
soon as ever Uncle Roger's wishes had been made known to me, and as I
have some facility of tongues and a great deal of experience, I soon
began to know something of it. Indeed, when I had been here a few
weeks, with opportunity of speaking daily with the people themselves,
and learned to understand the intonations and vocal inflexions, I
felt quite easy in speaking it. I understood every word which had up
to then been spoken at the meeting, and when I spoke myself I felt
that they understood. That is an experience which every speaker has
in a certain way and up to a certain point. He knows by some kind of
instinct if his hearers are with him; if they respond, they must
certainly have understood. Last night this was marked. I felt it
every instant I was talking and when I came to realize that the men
were in strict accord with my general views, I took them into
confidence with regard to my own personal purpose. It was the
beginning of a mutual trust; so for peroration I told them that I had
come to the conclusion that what they wanted most for their own
protection and the security and consolidation of their nation was
arms--arms of the very latest pattern. Here they interrupted me with
wild cheers, which so strung me up that I went farther than I
intended, and made a daring venture. "Ay," I repeated, "the security
and consolidation of your country--of OUR country, for I have come to
live amongst you. Here is my home whilst I live. I am with you
heart and soul. I shall live with you, fight shoulder to shoulder
with you, and, if need be, shall die with you!" Here the shouting
was terrific, and the younger men raised their guns to fire a salute
in Blue Mountain fashion. But on the instant the Vladika {1} held up
his hands and motioned them to desist. In the immediate silence he
spoke, sharply at first, but later ascending to a high pitch of
single-minded, lofty eloquence. His words rang in my ears long after
the meeting was over and other thoughts had come between them and the
present.
"Silence!" he thundered. "Make no echoes in the forest or through
the hills at this dire time of stress and threatened danger to our
land. Bethink ye of this meeting, held here and in secret, in order
that no whisper of it may be heard afar. Have ye all, brave men of
the Blue Mountains, come hither through the forest like shadows that
some of you, thoughtless, may enlighten your enemies as to our secret
purpose? The thunder of your guns would doubtless sound well in the
ears of those who wish us ill and try to work us wrong. Fellow-
countrymen, know ye not that the Turk is awake once more for our
harming? The Bureau of Spies has risen from the torpor which came on
it when the purpose against our Teuta roused our mountains to such
anger that the frontiers blazed with passion, and were swept with
fire and sword. Moreover, there is a traitor somewhere in the land,
or else incautious carelessness has served the same base purpose.
Something of our needs--our doing, whose secret we have tried to
hide, has gone out. The myrmidons of the Turk are close on our
borders, and it may be that some of them have passed our guards and
are amidst us unknown. So it behoves us doubly to be discreet.
Believe me that I share with you, my brothers, our love for the
gallant Englishman who has come amongst us to share our sorrows and
ambitions--and I trust it may be our joys. We are all united in the
wish to do him honour--though not in the way by which danger might be
carried on the wings of love. My brothers, our newest brother comes
to us from the Great Nation which amongst the nations has been our
only friend, and which has ere now helped us in our direst need--that
mighty Britain whose hand has ever been raised in the cause of
freedom. We of the Blue Mountains know her best as she stands with
sword in hand face to face with our foes. And this, her son and now
our brother, brings further to our need the hand of a giant and the
heart of a lion. Later on, when danger does not ring us round, when
silence is no longer our outer guard; we shall bid him welcome in
true fashion of our land. But till then he will believe--for he is
great-hearted--that our love and thanks and welcome are not to be
measured by sound. When the time comes, then shall be sound in his
honour--not of rifles alone, but bells and cannon and the mighty
voice of a free people shouting as one. But now we must be wise and
silent, for the Turk is once again at our gates. Alas! the cause of
his former coming may not be, for she whose beauty and nobility and
whose place in our nation and in our hearts tempted him to fraud and
violence is not with us to share even our anxiety."
Here his voice broke, and there arose from all a deep wailing sound,
which rose and rose till the woods around us seemed broken by a
mighty and long-sustained sob. The orator saw that his purpose was
accomplished, and with a short sentence finished his harangue: "But
the need of our nation still remains!" Then, with an eloquent
gesture to me to proceed, he merged in the crowd and disappeared.
How could I even attempt to follow such a speaker with any hope of
success? I simply told them what I had already done in the way of
help, saying:
"As you needed arms, I have got them. My agent sends me word through
the code between us that he has procured for me--for us--fifty
thousand of the newest-pattern rifles, the French Ingis-Malbron,
which has surpassed all others, and sufficient ammunition to last for
a year of war. The first section is in hand, and will soon be ready
for consignment. There are other war materials, too, which, when
they arrive, will enable every man and woman--even the children--of
our land to take a part in its defence should such be needed. My
brothers, I am with you in all things, for good or ill!"
It made me very proud to hear the mighty shout which arose. I had
felt exalted before, but now this personal development almost
unmanned me. I was glad of the long-sustained applause to recover my
self-control.
I was quite satisfied that the meeting did not want to hear any other
speaker, for they began to melt away without any formal notification
having been given. I doubt if there will be another meeting soon
again. The weather has begun to break, and we are in for another
spell of rain. It is disagreeable, of course; but it has its own
charm. It was during a spell of wet weather that the Lady of the
Shroud came to me. Perhaps the rain may bring her again. I hope so,
with all my soul.
RUPERT'S JOURNAL--Continued.
April 23, 1907.
The rain has continued for four whole days and nights, and the low-
lying ground is like a quagmire in places. In the sunlight the whole
mountains glisten with running streams and falling water. I feel a
strange kind of elation, but from no visible cause. Aunt Janet
rather queered it by telling me, as she said good-night, to be very
careful of myself, as she had seen in a dream last night a figure in
a shroud. I fear she was not pleased that I did not take it with all
the seriousness that she did. I would not wound her for the world if
I could help it, but the idea of a shroud gets too near the bone to
be safe, and I had to fend her off at all hazards. So when I doubted
if the Fates regarded the visionary shroud as of necessity
appertaining to me, she said, in a way that was, for her, almost
sharp:
"Take care, laddie. 'Tis ill jesting wi' the powers o' time
Unknown."
Perhaps it was that her talk put the subject in my mind. The woman
needed no such aid; she was always there; but when I locked myself
into my room that night, I half expected to find her in the room. I
was not sleepy, so I took a book of Aunt Janet's and began to read.
The title was "On the Powers and Qualities of Disembodied Spirits."
"Your grammar," said I to the author, "is hardly attractive, but I
may learn something which might apply to her. I shall read your
book." Before settling down to it, however, I thought I would have a
look at the garden. Since the night of the visit the garden seemed
to have a new attractiveness for me: a night seldom passed without
my having a last look at it before turning in. So I drew the great
curtain and looked out.
The scene was beautiful, but almost entirely desolate. All was
ghastly in the raw, hard gleams of moonlight coming fitfully through
the masses of flying cloud. The wind was rising, and the air was
damp and cold. I looked round the room instinctively, and noticed
that the fire was laid ready for lighting, and that there were small-
cut logs of wood piled beside the hearth. Ever since that night I
have had a fire laid ready. I was tempted to light it, but as I
never have a fire unless I sleep in the open, I hesitated to begin.
I went back to the window, and, opening the catch, stepped out on the
terrace. As I looked down the white walk and let my eyes range over
the expanse of the garden, where everything glistened as the
moonlight caught the wet, I half expected to see some white figure
flitting amongst the shrubs and statues. The whole scene of the
former visit came back to me so vividly that I could hardly believe
that any time had passed since then. It was the same scene, and
again late in the evening. Life in Vissarion was primitive, and
early hours prevailed--though not so late as on that night.
As I looked I thought I caught a glimpse of something white far away.
It was only a ray of moonlight coming through the rugged edge of a
cloud. But all the same it set me in a strange state of
perturbation. Somehow I seemed to lose sight of my own identity. It
was as though I was hypnotized by the situation or by memory, or
perhaps by some occult force. Without thinking of what I was doing,
or being conscious of any reason for it, I crossed the room and set
light to the fire. Then I blew out the candle and came to the window
again. I never thought it might be a foolish thing to do--to stand
at a window with a light behind me in this country, where every man
carries a gun with him always. I was in my evening clothes, too,
with my breast well marked by a white shirt. I opened the window and
stepped out on the terrace. There I stood for many minutes,
thinking. All the time my eyes kept ranging over the garden. Once I
thought I saw a white figure moving, but it was not followed up, so,
becoming conscious that it was again beginning to rain, I stepped
back into the room, shut the window, and drew the curtain. Then I
realized the comforting appearance of the fire, and went over and
stood before it.
Hark! Once more there was a gentle tapping at the window. I rushed
over to it and drew the curtain.
There, out on the rain-beaten terrace, stood the white shrouded
figure, more desolate-appearing than ever. Ghastly pale she looked,
as before, but her eyes had an eager look which was new. I took it
that she was attracted by the fire, which was by now well ablaze, and
was throwing up jets of flame as the dry logs crackled. The leaping
flames threw fitful light across the room, and every gleam threw the
white-clad figure into prominence, showing the gleam of the black
eyes, and fixing the stars that lay in them.
Without a word I threw open the window, and, taking the white hand
extended to me, drew into the room the Lady of the Shroud.
As she entered and felt the warmth of the blazing fire, a glad look
spread over her face. She made a movement as if to run to it. But
she drew back an instant after, looking round with instinctive
caution. She closed the window and bolted it, touched the lever
which spread the grille across the opening, and pulled close the
curtain behind it. Then she went swiftly to the door and tried if it
was locked. Satisfied as to this, she came quickly over to the fire,
and, kneeling before it, stretched out her numbed hands to the blaze.
Almost on the instant her wet shroud began to steam. I stood
wondering. The precautions of secrecy in the midst of her suffering-
-for that she did suffer was only too painfully manifest--must have
presupposed some danger. Then and there my mind was made up that
there should no harm assail her that I by any means could fend off.
Still, the present must be attended to; pneumonia and other ills
stalked behind such a chill as must infallibly come on her unless
precautions were taken. I took again the dressing-gown which she had
worn before and handed it to her, motioning as I did so towards the
screen which had made a dressing-room for her on the former occasion.
To my surprise she hesitated. I waited. She waited, too, and then
laid down the dressing-gown on the edge of the stone fender. So I
spoke:
"Won't you change as you did before? Your--your frock can then be
dried. Do! It will be so much safer for you to be dry clad when you
resume your own dress."
"How can I whilst you are here?"
Her words made me stare, so different were they from her acts of the
other visit. I simply bowed--speech on such a subject would be at
least inadequate--and walked over to the window. Passing behind the
curtain, I opened the window. Before stepping out on to the terrace,
I looked into the room and said:
"Take your own time. There is no hurry. I dare say you will find
there all you may want. I shall remain on the terrace until you
summon me." With that I went out on the terrace, drawing close the
glass door behind me.
I stood looking out on the dreary scene for what seemed a very short
time, my mind in a whirl. There came a rustle from within, and I saw
a dark brown figure steal round the edge of the curtain. A white
hand was raised, and beckoned me to come in. I entered, bolting the
window behind me. She had passed across the room, and was again
kneeling before the fire with her hands outstretched. The shroud was
laid in partially opened folds on one side of the hearth, and was
steaming heavily. I brought over some cushions and pillows, and made
a little pile of them beside her.
"Sit there," I said, "and rest quietly in the heat." It may have
been the effect of the glowing heat, but there was a rich colour in
her face as she looked at me with shining eyes. Without a word, but
with a courteous little bow, she sat down at once. I put a thick rug
across her shoulders, and sat down myself on a stool a couple of feet
away.
For fully five or six minutes we sat in silence. At last, turning
her head towards me she said in a sweet, low voice:
"I had intended coming earlier on purpose to thank you for your very
sweet and gracious courtesy to me, but circumstances were such that I
could not leave my--my"--she hesitated before saying--"my abode. I
am not free, as you and others are, to do what I will. My existence
is sadly cold and stern, and full of horrors that appal. But I DO
thank you. For myself I am not sorry for the delay, for every hour
shows me more clearly how good and understanding and sympathetic you
have been to me. I only hope that some day you may realize how kind
you have been, and how much I appreciate it."
"I am only too glad to be of any service," I said, feebly I felt, as
I held out my hand. She did not seem to see it. Her eyes were now
on the fire, and a warm blush dyed forehead and cheek and neck. The
reproof was so gentle that no one could have been offended. It was
evident that she was something coy and reticent, and would not allow
me to come at present more close to her, even to the touching of her
hand. But that her heart was not in the denial was also evident in
the glance from her glorious dark starry eyes. These glances--
veritable lightning flashes coming through her pronounced reserve--
finished entirely any wavering there might be in my own purpose. I
was aware now to the full that my heart was quite subjugated. I knew
that I was in love--veritably so much in love as to feel that without
this woman, be she what she might, by my side my future must be
absolutely barren.
It was presently apparent that she did not mean to stay as long on
this occasion as on the last. When the castle clock struck midnight
she suddenly sprang to her feet with a bound, saying:
"I must go! There is midnight!" I rose at once, the intensity of
her speech having instantly obliterated the sleep which, under the
influence of rest and warmth, was creeping upon me. Once more she
was in a frenzy of haste, so I hurried towards the window, but as I
looked back saw her, despite her haste, still standing. I motioned
towards the screen, and slipping behind the curtain, opened the
window and went out on the terrace. As I was disappearing behind the
curtain I saw her with the tail of my eye lifting the shroud, now
dry, from the hearth.
She was out through the window in an incredibly short time, now
clothed once more in that dreadful wrapping. As she sped past me
barefooted on the wet, chilly marble which made her shudder, she
whispered:
"Thank you again. You ARE good to me. You can understand."
Once again I stood on the terrace, saw her melt like a shadow down
the steps, and disappear behind the nearest shrub. Thence she
flitted away from point to point with exceeding haste. The moonlight
had now disappeared behind heavy banks of cloud, so there was little
light to see by. I could just distinguish a pale gleam here and
there as she wended her secret way.
For a long time I stood there alone thinking, as I watched the course
she had taken, and wondering where might be her ultimate destination.
As she had spoken of her "abode," I knew there was some definitive
objective of her flight.
It was no use wondering. I was so entirely ignorant of her
surroundings that I had not even a starting-place for speculation.
So I went in, leaving the window open. It seemed that this being so
made one barrier the less between us. I gathered the cushions and
rugs from before the fire, which was no longer leaping, but burning
with a steady glow, and put them back in their places. Aunt Janet
might come in the morning, as she had done before, and I did not wish
to set her thinking. She is much too clever a person to have
treading on the heels of a mystery--especially one in which my own
affections are engaged. I wonder what she would have said had she
seen me kiss the cushion on which my beautiful guest's head had
rested?
When I was in bed, and in the dark save for the fading glow of the
fire, my thoughts became fixed that whether she came from Earth or
Heaven or Hell, my lovely visitor was already more to me than aught
else in the world. This time she had, on going, said no word of
returning. I had been so much taken up with her presence, and so
upset by her abrupt departure, that I had omitted to ask her. And so
I am driven, as before, to accept the chance of her returning--a
chance which I fear I am or may be unable to control.
Surely enough Aunt Janet did come in the morning, early. I was still
asleep when she knocked at my door. With that purely physical
subconsciousness which comes with habit I must have realized the
cause of the sound, for I woke fully conscious of the fact that Aunt
Janet had knocked and was waiting to come in. I jumped from bed, and
back again when I had unlocked the door. When Aunt Janet came in she
noticed the cold of the room.
"Save us, laddie, but ye'll get your death o' cold in this room."
Then, as she looked round and noticed the ashes of the extinct fire
in the grate:
"Eh, but ye're no that daft after a'; ye've had the sense to light
yer fire. Glad I am that we had the fire laid and a wheen o' dry
logs ready to yer hand." She evidently felt the cold air coming from
the window, for she went over and drew the curtain. When she saw the
open window, she raised her hands in a sort of dismay, which to me,
knowing how little base for concern could be within her knowledge,
was comic. Hurriedly she shut the window, and then, coming close
over to my bed, said:
"Yon has been a fearsome nicht again, laddie, for yer poor auld
aunty."
"Dreaming again, Aunt Janet?" I asked--rather flippantly as it seemed
to me. She shook her head:
"Not so, Rupert, unless it be that the Lord gies us in dreams what we
in our spiritual darkness think are veesions." I roused up at this.
When Aunt Janet calls me Rupert, as she always used to do in my dear
mother's time, things are serious with her. As I was back in
childhood now, recalled by her word, I thought the best thing I could
do to cheer her would be to bring her back there too--if I could. So
I patted the edge of the bed as I used to do when I was a wee kiddie
and wanted her to comfort me, and said:
"Sit down, Aunt Janet, and tell me." She yielded at once, and the
look of the happy old days grew over her face as though there had
come a gleam of sunshine. She sat down, and I put out my hands as I
used to do, and took her hand between them. There was a tear in her
eye as she raised my hand and kissed it as in old times. But for the
infinite pathos of it, it would have been comic:
Aunt Janet, old and grey-haired, but still retaining her girlish
slimness of figure, petite, dainty as a Dresden figure, her face
lined with the care of years, but softened and ennobled by the
unselfishness of those years, holding up my big hand, which would
outweigh her whole arm; sitting dainty as a pretty old fairy beside a
recumbent giant--for my bulk never seems so great as when I am near
this real little good fairy of my life--seven feet beside four feet
seven.
So she began as of old, as though she were about to soothe a
frightened child with a fairy tale:
"'Twas a veesion, I think, though a dream it may hae been. But
whichever or whatever it was, it concerned my little boy, who has
grown to be a big giant, so much that I woke all of a tremble.
Laddie dear, I thought that I saw ye being married." This gave me an
opening, though a small one, for comforting her, so I took it at
once:
"Why, dear, there isn't anything to alarm you in that, is there? It
was only the other day when you spoke to me about the need of my
getting married, if it was only that you might have children of your
boy playing around your knees as their father used to do when he was
a helpless wee child himself."
"That is so, laddie," she answered gravely. "But your weddin' was
none so merry as I fain would see. True, you seemed to lo'e her wi'
all yer hairt. Yer eyes shone that bright that ye might ha' set her
afire, for all her black locks and her winsome face. But, laddie,
that was not all--no, not though her black een, that had the licht o'
all the stars o' nicht in them, shone in yours as though a hairt o'
love an' passion, too, dwelt in them. I saw ye join hands, an' heard
a strange voice that talked stranger still, but I saw none ither.
Your eyes an' her eyes, an' your hand an' hers, were all I saw. For
all else was dim, and the darkness was close around ye twa. And when
the benison was spoken--I knew that by the voices that sang, and by
the gladness of her een, as well as by the pride and glory of yours--
the licht began to glow a wee more, an' I could see yer bride. She
was in a veil o' wondrous fine lace. And there were orange-flowers
in her hair, though there were twigs, too, and there was a crown o'
flowers on head wi' a golden band round it. And the heathen candles
that stood on the table wi' the Book had some strange effect, for the
reflex o' it hung in the air o'er her head like the shadow of a
crown. There was a gold ring on her finger and a silver one on
yours." Here she paused and trembled, so that, hoping to dispel her
fears, I said, as like as I could to the way I used to when I was a
child:
"Go on, Aunt Janet."
She did not seem to recognize consciously the likeness between past
and present; but the effect was there, for she went on more like her
old self, though there was a prophetic gravity in her voice, more
marked than I had ever heard from her:
"All this I've told ye was well; but, oh, laddie, there was a
dreadful lack o' livin' joy such as I should expect from the woman
whom my boy had chosen for his wife--and at the marriage coupling,
too! And no wonder, when all is said; for though the marriage veil
o' love was fine, an' the garland o' flowers was fresh-gathered,
underneath them a' was nane ither than a ghastly shroud. As I looked
in my veesion--or maybe dream--I expectit to see the worms crawl
round the flagstane at her feet. If 'twas not Death, laddie dear,
that stood by ye, it was the shadow o' Death that made the darkness
round ye, that neither the light o' candles nor the smoke o' heathen
incense could pierce. Oh, laddie, laddie, wae is me that I hae seen
sic a veesion--waking or sleeping, it matters not! I was sair
distressed--so sair that I woke wi' a shriek on my lips and bathed in
cold sweat. I would hae come doon to ye to see if you were hearty or
no--or even to listen at your door for any sound o' yer being quick,
but that I feared to alarm ye till morn should come. I've counted
the hours and the minutes since midnight, when I saw the veesion,
till I came hither just the now."
"Quite right, Aunt Janet," I said, "and I thank you for your kind
thought for me in the matter, now and always." Then I went on, for I
wanted to take precautions against the possibility of her discovery
of my secret. I could not bear to think that she might run my
precious secret to earth in any well-meant piece of bungling. That
would be to me disaster unbearable. She might frighten away
altogether my beautiful visitor, even whose name or origin I did not
know, and I might never see her again:
"You must never do that, Aunt Janet. You and I are too good friends
to have sense of distrust or annoyance come between us--which would
surely happen if I had to keep thinking that you or anyone else might
be watching me."
