THE YOUNG GIRL IN THE VILLAGE, AND THE AWFUL VISIT.
It is now necessary that we draw the reader’s attention to a humbler
place of residence than the Grange, with its spacious chambers and
lordly halls.
Situated not very far from the church, and almost close to the
churchyard, upon which its little garden abutted, was a cottage, the
picture of rural neatness and beauty. In the winter it was beautiful
and picturesque, but in the summer time, when its porch was overrun
with the woodbine and the sweet clematis, it was one of the sweetest of
abodes that content and happiness could ever live in.
This cottage was inhabited by an old woman and her only child, a young
girl of sixteen, beautiful as a rose, and as guileless as an angel.
They contrived to live upon a small annuity that the mother had from a
family in whose service she spent the best years of her life, and who,
with a generosity that would be well to be abundantly and extensively
imitated, would not see their old dependant want.
These two innocent and blameless persons had retired to rest at nine
o’clock, their usual hour, and had slept the calm sleep of contentment
until about half-past one, when the mother was awakened by a loud and
piercing shriek from her daughter’s chamber.
To spring from her humble couch was the work of a moment.
“Anna, Anna! my child, Anna!” she shrieked.
As she did so, she rushed across the small stair landing which
separated the two, and the only two upper rooms of the cottage, and was
about to enter her daughter’s room, when the door of it was opened from
within, and the old dame’s heart died within her, as she saw a figure
upon the threshold, attired in the vestments of the grave, and opposing
her entrance.
Was it a dream, or did she really see such a sight?
Aghast and trembling the mother stood, unable for a moment or two to
speak, and as she fell fainting upon the landing, she thought that
something passed her, but she could not be quite sure, as it was at the
instant her faculties were flitting from her.
How long she lay in that seeming death she knew not, and when she
recovered, it was some few minutes before recollection came back to
her, and she really remembered what had so completely overpowered her.
But when her reason did resume its sway, and she recollected that it
was some danger to Anna, which had first alarmed her, she called her
loudly by her name.
“Anna, Anna, speak to me.”
“Mother, mother,” replied the young girl. “Oh, come to me.”
These words supplied strength to the old woman, and rising she made her
way immediately into the chamber of her daughter, whom she found in an
agony of fear; a light was procured, and then Anna flung herself upon
her mother’s neck, and wept abundantly.
“Oh, mother, tell me, convince me that it was only a dream.”
“What, my child? oh what?”
The girl trembled so much that it was only by the utmost persuasion
that the following account was got from her, of the cause of her fright.
She said that she had gone to sleep as usual within a very few minutes
after going to bed, that she enjoyed a calm, and uninterrupted slumber,
the duration of which she had no means whatever of guessing, but she
was partially awakened by a noise at the window of her room.
She instantly rose and stood looking at the window, on which a sort of
shadow seemed to pass without, which alarmed her exceedingly.
Still as it did not come gain, and as she certainly had not been fully
awake when she sprung from her bed, she had thought it quite possible
that all might be a dream, and had forborne from making any alarm upon
the subject.
After some hesitation she had persuaded herself to go to bed again, and
when there, although she sometimes started awake fancying she heard
something, she at length yielded to sleep, and again slept, soundly for
a time, until a new circumstance awakened her.
She thought she felt something touching her about the neck, and after
opening her eyes, the moonlight, which at that moment happened to be
very bright, disclosed to her a white figure standing by the side of
her bed, the face of which figure was leaning over her, and within a
very few inches of her own.
Terror at first deprived her of all power of speech or motion, but as
the figure did not move, she at length gave utterance to her fears
in that shriek which had come from her lips, and so much alarmed the
mother.
This was all the young girl could say, with the exception that the
figure when she shrieked appeared to glide away, but where to she had
no means of telling, for some clouds at that moment came again over the
face of the moon.
The mother was much affected and terrified, and at first she thought of
calling up her neighbours, but at length as the night was considerably
advanced, and the intruder gone, they agreed to let the matter rest
till morning, and the mother retired to her room again.
How long it was before the shriek from her daughter’s room came again
she did not know, but come again it did.
Yes, again came the dreadful shriek. It was—it could be no delusion
now—and the mother once more sprung from her couch to rush to the
rescue of her child.
Confused and bewildered, she darted onward to the chamber, but the door
was fast, nor could all her exertions suffice to open it.
“Anna, Anna!” she shouted, “speak to me. One word only, my child, my
child.”
All was still. The trembling mother placed her ear to the door, and she
heard a strange sucking sound, as if an animal was drinking with labour
and difficulty. Her head seemed to be on fire, and her senses were upon
the point of leaving her, but she did manage to reach her own room. She
flew to the little casement—she dashed it open.
“Help! help! help!—for the love of God, help!”
There was no reply.
Again she raised her voice in shrieking wild accents.
“Help!—murder!—help!”
“What is it?” shouted a man’s voice. It was one who was going some
distance to take in his fishing nets.
“Oh! thank God, some human being hears me. Come in, come in.”
“How am I to get in?”
“Stay a moment, and I will come down and open the cottage door for you.
For the love of mercy do not go away.”
Trembling and terrified to a dreadful excess, the old woman went down
stairs and let the man into the cottage, when they both proceeded up to
the chamber of the daughter.
“What do you suppose is the matter?” asked the fisherman.
“Oh! I know not—I know not; but twice to-night—twice has this dreadful
alarm happened. Do not leave us—oh, do not.”
“I don’t want; but I should hardly think thieves would find it worth
their while to come here at all for what they would get. You must have
been dreaming.”
“Oh, that I could think so!”
Anna’s chamber was reached; and there, to the horror of the mother, she
was found lying perfectly insensible on her bed, with a quantity of
blood smeared about her neck.
“Why, it’s a murder!” cried the fisherman; and firmly impressed with
such a belief, he ran out of the house to spread an alarm.
The window of the chamber was wide open, and from that the mother now
cried aloud for help; so that between her and the fisherman, such a
disturbance was made all over the neighbourhood, that they were soon
likely to have more assistance than could be useful.
The people living the nearest were soon roused, and they roused others,
while the distracted woman, who believed Anna was dead, called for
justice and for vengeance.
The alarm spread from house to house—from cottage to hall—and, in the
course of half-an-hour, most of the inhabitants of the village had
risen to hear the old dame’s account of the horrible proceeding that
had taken place that night in the cottage.
Exaggeration was out of the question. The fact itself was more than
sufficient to induce the greatest amount of horror in the minds of
all who heard it, and there was one, and only one, whose information
enabled him to give a name to the apparition that had assaulted Anna.
That one was the schoolmaster of the place, and he, after hearing the
story, said,—
“If one could persuade oneself at all of the existence of such horrors,
one would suppose that a vampire had visited the cottage.”
This was a theme that was likely to be popular. The schoolmaster
foolishly gave way to the vanity, and explained what a vampire was—or
was supposed and said to be; and soon the whole place was in a state of
the most indescribable alarm upon the subject.
As yet the horrible news had not reached the Grange, but it was
destined soon to do so; and better would it have been that any one had
at once plunged a dagger in the heart of poor Sir George Crofton than
that there should be thought to be such a horrible confirmation of his
worst fears.
To be sure, his daughter was not named, but he received the news with a
scream of anguish, and fell insensible into the arms of his son.
All was confusion. The servants ran hither and thither, not knowing
what to do, and it was not until Mr. Bevan arrived that something like
order was restored. He as a privileged friend assumed for the nonce
a kind of dictatorship at the Grange, and gave orders, which were
cheerfully and promptly obeyed. Then he desired a strictly private
interview with Sir George.
It was, or course, granted to him; but the old baronet begged that
Charles and Edwin might now know all. It was Emma alone from whom he
wished to keep the awful truth.