“Repentance!” he said, laughing. “What’s repentance but fear? When I
was young and strong, I didn’t fear aught; I repented nothing. What use
now—hey? What d’ye think?”
“I do not know. Yet—”
“Ay, to be safe, be penitent,” he mocked. “You think me near my death,
lad, and I am. To-night a knife seemed to stick into my heart, and the
knife’ll strike again, till my heart’s broken for the pain of it. I die,
soon—maybe this night. I go into the dark. I know not whither. Repent!
I’m no such fool or coward. Hey, John, but I lived my life as it pleased
me, till I was old. I sinned what sins I would. Repent, ay,—and mutter
prayers,—make a good death of it—for fear! I’ve had no god save my own
self. I’ve owned no other judge.” He lifted up his shaking hand, and
the red jewels seemed blood upon it, “For all my sins I’m ready for the
reckoning, repenting nothing, unafraid!”
It seemed as though the very storm took up the challenge. For the wind
smote upon the house with a great sound, as seas upon a cliff, or thunder
from the heaven. The old house shuddered; the chimneys rumbled; the
casement was blown back; the wind struck cold as death upon us.
Instantly the candlelight was gone; the room was black save for the red
glow upon the hearth; horror of darkness and chaotic sound were all about
us. I started up, and rushing to the window sought to close the
casement; momentarily the wind prevailed; vainly I fought against it;
looking back, I saw my grandfather stagger from his chair; the red flames
blowing up from the hearth seemed to burn all about him. Still his
laughter sounded like a madman’s defiance to the wind.
The wind lulled for the time. I closed the casement; I hurried back to
relight the candles. The curtains of the bed flapped yet like the wings
of death about me. With light I saw him lying in his chair; he shuddered
now; he muttered, “For the time—I thought—death came. And yet—and yet—I
live!”
He remarked then the curtains moving, and pointed to the bed, “When the
wind came,” he croaked, “I heard the beating of the wings of death. I
saw the dark take shape and thought to die, and go out on the storm.
’Twas nothing—nothing but the curtains and the darkness and the cold!
Ay, ay, though never have I known ghosts or terrors in the dark and storm
until to-night . . . I could tell you . . . We were off the Cape just
such a night, with the winds and the seas sounding so. I remember
them—Barwise and Thrale and the rest—crying out, and comin’ scuttlin’ all
about me. They’d seen the ghost-ship—the Dutch ship—that seeks to
weather the Cape, while time is. I remember the moon riding white
through the clouds, as it rides this night. Ay, they vowed that they saw
the Dutchman still, the ghosts on the decks, and the lights burning
blue,—we’d never make port again, they swore; and they all fell to
prayers—Barwise and Thrale and the rest. They to pray! But I said no
prayers. For I saw no phantom-ship. And I brought my own ship safe to
port. . . . Hark, the wind comes again. Like voices on it! Hark!”
The wind came crying from the sea. Again it forced the casement open; as
I reached the window, momentarily I saw the garden illumined by the moon.
I saw dark shadows hurrying to the house; I forced the window to,
believing for the instant that I had seen only the shadows of the
wind-tossed trees; remembering then Blunt’s threat to take me from the
house, I feared.
When I re-lit the candles, my grandfather perceived my concern, and
caught me by the arm, muttering, “What did ye see? Or think to see?”