With the fresh air and the rising of morning, every feeling of the
preceding night had passed away from Colonel Everard’s mind, excepting
wonder how the effects which he had witnessed could be produced. He
examined the whole room, sounding bolt, floor, and wainscot with his
knuckles and cane, but was unable to discern any secret passages; while
the door, secured by a strong cross-bolt, and the lock besides,
remained as firm as when he had fastened it on the preceding evening.
The apparition resembling Victor Lee next called his attention.
Ridiculous stories had been often circulated, of this figure, or one
exactly resembling it, having been met with by night among the waste
apartments and corridors of the old palace; and Markham Everard had
often heard such in his childhood. He was angry to recollect his own
deficiency of courage, and the thrill which he felt on the preceding
night, when by confederacy, doubtless, such an object was placed before
his eyes.
“Surely,” he said, “this fit of childish folly could not make me miss
my aim—more likely that the bullet had been withdrawn clandestinely
from the pistol.”
He examined that which was undischarged—he found the bullet in it. He
investigated the apartment opposite to the point at which he had fired,
and, at five feet from the floor in a direct line between the bed-side
and the place where the appearance had been seen, a pistol-ball had
recently buried itself in the wainscot. He had little doubt, therefore,
that he had fired in a just direction; and indeed to have arrived at
the place where it was lodged, the bullet must have passed through the
appearance at which he aimed, and proceeded point blank to the wall
beyond. This was mysterious, and induced him to doubt whether the art
of witchcraft or conjuration had not been called in to assist the
machinations of those daring conspirators, who, being themselves
mortal, might, nevertheless, according to the universal creed of the
times, have invoked and obtained assistance from the inhabitants of
another world.
His next investigation respected the picture of Victor Lee itself. He
examined it minutely as he stood on the floor before it, and compared
its pale, shadowy, faintly-traced outlines, its faded colours, the
stern repose of the eye, and death-like pallidness of the countenance,
with its different aspect on the preceding night, when illuminated by
the artificial light which fell full upon it, while it left every other
part of the room in comparative darkness. The features seemed then to
have an unnatural glow, while the rising and falling of the flame in
the chimney gave the head and limbs something which resembled the
appearance of actual motion. Now, seen by day, it was a mere picture of
the hard and ancient school of Holbein; last night, it seemed for the
moment something more. Determined to get to the bottom of this
contrivance if possible, Everard, by the assistance of a table and
chair, examined the portrait still more closely, and endeavoured to
ascertain the existence of any private spring, by which it might be
slipt aside,—a contrivance not unfrequent in ancient buildings, which
usually abounded with means of access and escape, communicated to none
but the lords of the castle, or their immediate confidants. But the
panel on which Victor Lee was painted was firmly fixed in the
wainscoting of the apartment, of which it made a part, and the Colonel
satisfied himself that it could not have been used for the purpose
which he had suspected.
He next aroused his faithful squire, Wildrake, who, notwithstanding his
deep share of the “blessedness of sleep,” had scarce even yet got rid
of the effects of the grace-cup of the preceding evening. “It was the
reward,” according to his own view of the matter, “of his temperance;
one single draught having made him sleep more late and more sound than
a matter of half-a-dozen, or from thence to a dozen pulls, would have
done, when he was guilty of the enormity of rere-suppers,[1] and of
drinking deep after them.”
[1] Rere-suppers (_quasi arrière_) belonged to a species of luxury
introduced in the jolly days of King James’s extravagance, and
continued through the subsequent reign. The supper took place at an
early hour, six or seven o’clock at latest—the rere-supper was a
postliminary banquet, a _hors d’œuvre_, which made its appearance at
ten or eleven, and served as an apology for prolonging the
entertainment till midnight.
“Had your temperate draught,” said Everard, “been but a thought more
strongly seasoned, Wildrake, thou hadst slept so sound that the last
trump only could have waked thee.”
“And then,” answered Wildrake, “I should have waked with a headache,
Mark; for I see my modest sip has not exempted me from that epilogue.—
But let us go forth, and see how the night, which we have passed so
strangely, has been spent by the rest of them. I suspect they are all
right willing to evacuate Woodstock, unless they have either rested
better than we, or at least been more lucky in lodgings.”
“In that case, I will dispatch thee down to Joceline’s hut, to
negotiate the re-entrance of Sir Henry Lee and his family into their
old apartments, where, my interest with the General being joined with
the indifferent repute of the place itself, I think they have little
chance of being disturbed either by the present, or by any new
Commissioners.”
“But how are they to defend themselves against the fiends, my gallant
Colonel?” said Wildrake. “Methinks had I an interest in yonder pretty
girl, such as thou dost boast, I should be loth to expose her to the
terrors of a residence at Woodstock, where these devils—I beg their
pardon, for I suppose they hear every word we say—these merry
goblins—make such gay work from twilight till morning.”
“My dear Wildrake,” said the Colonel, “I, as well as you, believe it
possible that our speech may be overheard; but I care not, and will
speak my mind plainly. I trust Sir Henry and Alice are not engaged in
this silly plot; I cannot reconcile it with the pride of the one, the
modesty of the other, nor the good sense of both, that any motive could
engage them in so strange a conjunction. But the fiends are all of your
own political persuasion, Wildrake, all true-blue cavaliers; and I am
convinced, that Sir Henry and Alice Lee, though they be unconnected
with them, have not the slightest cause to be apprehensive of their
goblin machinations. Besides, Sir Henry and Joceline must know every
corner about the place: it will be far more difficult to play off any
ghostly machinery upon him than upon strangers. But let us to our
toilet, and when water and brush have done their work, we will
enquire—what is next to be done.”
“Nay, that wretched puritan’s garb of mine is hardly worth brushing,”
said Wildrake; “and but for this hundred-weight of rusty iron, with
which thou hast bedizened me, I look more like a bankrupt Quaker than
anything else. But I’ll make _you_ as spruce as ever was a canting
rogue of your party.”