------This to me
In dreadful secrecy they did impart,
And I with them the third night kept the watch.
SHAKESPEARE.
“As they spoke, a soft knock was heard, such as kindness gives at the
door of misfortune, and Everhard started up to answer it. “Stay,” said
Walberg, absently, “Where are the servants?” Then recollecting himself,
he smiled agonizingly, and waved his hand to his son to go. It was the
good priest. He entered, and sat down in silence,--no one spoke to him.
It might be truly said, as it is sublimely said in the original, “There
was neither speech nor language, but voices were heard among them--_and
felt too_.” The worthy priest piqued himself on his orthodoxy of all
matters of belief and form enjoined by the Catholic church; and,
moreover, had acquired a kind of monastic apathy, of sanctified
stoicism, which priests sometimes imagine is the conquest of grace over
the rebellion of nature, when it is merely the result of a profession
that denies nature its objects and its ties. Yet so it was, that as he
sat among this afflicted family, after complaining of the keenness of
the morning air, and wiping away in vain the moisture, which he said it
had brought into his eyes, he at last yielded to his feelings, and
“lifted up his voice and wept.” But tears were not all he had to offer.
On hearing the plans of Walberg and his family, he promised, with a
faultering voice, his ready assistance in promoting them; and, as he
rose to depart, observing that he had been entrusted by the faithful
with a small sum for the relief of the unfortunate, and knew not where
it could be better bestowed, he dropped from the sleeve of his habit a
well filled purse on the floor, and hurried away.
“The family retired to rest as the day approached, but rose in a few
hours afterwards without having slept; and the remainder of that day,
and the whole of the three following, were devoted to applications at
every door where encouragement might be expected, or employment
obtained, the priest in person aiding every application. But there were
many circumstances unfavourable to the ill-starred family of Walberg.
They were strangers, and, with the exception of their mother, who acted
as interpreter, ignorant of the language of the country. This was “a
sore evil,” extending almost to the total preclusion of their exertions
as teachers. They were also heretics,--and this alone was a sufficient
bar to their success in Seville. In some families the beauty of the
daughters, in others that of the son, was gravely debated as an
important objection. In others the recollection of their former
splendour, suggested a mean and rancorous motive to jealous inferiority
to insult them by a rejection, for which no other cause could be
assigned. Unwearied and undismayed, they renewed their applications
every day, at every house where admission could be obtained, and at many
where it was denied; and each day they returned to examine the
diminished stock, to divide the scantier meal, calculate how far it was
possible to reduce the claims of nature to the level of their ebbing
means, and smile when they talked of the morrow to each other, but weep
when they thought of it alone. There is a withering monotony in the
diary of misery,--“one day telleth another.” But there came at length a
day, when the last coin was expended, the last meal devoured, the last
resource exhausted, the last hope annihilated, and the friendly priest
himself told them weeping, he had nothing to give them but his prayers.
“That evening the family sat in profound and stupified silence together
for some hours, till the aged mother of Walberg, who had not for some
months uttered any thing but indistinct monosyllables, or appeared
conscious of any thing that was going on, suddenly, with that ominous
energy that announces its effort to be the last,--that bright flash of
parting life that precedes its total extinction, exclaimed aloud,
apparently addressing her husband, “There is something wrong here,--why
did they bring us from Germany? They might have suffered us to die
there,--they have brought us here to mock us, I think. Yesterday,--(her
memory evidently confounding the dates of her son’s prosperous and
adverse fortune), yesterday they clothed me in silk, and I drank wine,
and to-day they give me this sorry crust,--(flinging away the piece of
bread which had been her share of the miserable meal),--there is
something wrong here. I will go back to Germany,--I will!” and she rose
from her seat in the sight of the astonished family, who, horror-struck,
as they would have been at the sudden resuscitation of a corse, ventured
not to oppose her by word or movement. “I will go back to Germany,” she
repeated; and, rising, she actually took three or four firm and equal
steps on the floor, while no one attempted to approach her. Then her
force, both physical and mental, seemed to fail,--she tottered,--her
voice sunk into hollow mutterings, as she repeated, “I know the way,--I
know the way,--if it was not so dark.--I have not far to go,--I am very
near--_home_!” As she spoke, she fell across the feet of Walberg. The
family collected round her, and raised--a corse. “Thank God!” exclaimed
her son, as he gazed on his mother’s corse.--And this reversion of the
strongest feeling of nature,--this wish for the death of those for whom,
in other circumstances, we would ourselves have died, makes those who
have experienced it feel as if there was no evil in life but want, and
no object of rational pursuit but the means of avoiding it. Alas! if it
be so, for what purpose were hearts that beat, and minds that burn,
bestowed on us? Is all the energy of intellect, and all the enthusiasm
of feeling, to be expended in contrivances how to meet or shift off the
petty but torturing pangs of hourly necessity? Is the fire caught from
heaven to be employed in lighting a faggot to keep the cold from the
numbed and wasted fingers of poverty. Pardon this digression, Senhor,”
said the stranger, “but _I had a painful feeling, that forced me to make
it_.” He then proceeded.
“The family collected around the dead body,--and it might have been a
subject worthy the pencil of the first of painters, to witness its
interment, as it took place the following night. As the deceased was a
heretic, the corse was not allowed to be laid in consecrated ground; and
the family, solicitous to avoid giving offence, or attracting notice on
the subject of their religion, were the only attendants on the funeral.
In a small inclosure, at the rear of their wretched abode, her son dug
his mother’s grave, and Ines and her daughters placed the body in it.
Everhard was absent in search of employment,--as they hoped,--and a
light was held by the youngest child, who smiled as he watched the
scene, as if it had been a pageant got up for his amusement. That light,
feeble as it was, showed the strong and varying expression of the
countenances on which it fell;--in Walberg’s there was a stern and
fearful joy, that she whom they were laying to rest had been “taken from
the evil to come,”--in that of Ines there was grief, mingled with
something of horror, at this mute and unhallowed ceremony.--Her
daughters, pale with grief and fear, wept silently; but their tears were
checked, and the whole course of their feelings changed, when the light
fell on another figure who appeared suddenly standing among them on the
edge of the grave,--it was that of Walberg’s father. Impatient of being
left alone, and wholly unconscious of the cause, he had groped and
tottered his way till he reached the spot; and now, as he saw his son
heap up the earth over the grave, he exclaimed, with a brief and feeble
effort of reminiscence, sinking on the ground, “Me, too,--lay me there,
the same spot will serve for both!” His children raised and supported
him into the house, where the sight of Everhard, with an unexpected
supply of provisions, made them forget the horrors of the late scene,
and postpone once more the fears of want till to-morrow. No inquiry how
this supply was obtained, could extort more from Everhard than that it
was the gift of charity. He looked exhausted and dreadfully pale,--and,
forbearing to press him with further questions, they partook of this
manna-meal,--this food that seemed to have dropped from heaven, and
separated for the night. * * * *
“Ines had, during this period of calamity, unremittingly enforced the
application of her daughters to those accomplishments from which she
still derived the hopes of their subsistence. Whatever were the
privations and disappointments of the day, their musical and other
exercises were strictly attended to; and hands enfeebled by want and
grief, plied their task with as much assiduity as when occupation was
only a variation of luxury. This attention to the ornaments of life,
when its actual necessaries are wanted,--this sound of music in a house
where the murmurs of domestic anxiety are heard every moment,--this
subservience of talent to necessity, all its generous enthusiasm lost,
and only its possible utility remembered or valued,--is perhaps the
bitterest strife that ever was fought between the opposing claims of our
artificial and our natural existence. But things had now occurred that
shook not only the resolution of Ines, but even affected her feelings
beyond the power of repression. She had been accustomed to hear, with
delight, the eager application of her daughters to their musical
studies;--now--when she heard them, the morning after the interment of
their grandmother, renewing that application--she felt as if the sounds
struck through her heart. She entered the room where they were, and they
turned towards her with their usual smiling demand for her approbation.
“The mother, with the forced smile of a sickening heart, said she
believed there was no occasion for their practising any further that
day. The daughters, who understood her too well, relinquished their
instruments, and, accustomed to see every article of furniture converted
into the means of casual subsistence, they thought no worse than that
their ghitarras might be disposed of this day, and the next they hoped
they would have to teach on those of their pupils. They were mistaken.
Other symptoms of failing resolution,--of utter and hopeless
abandonment, appeared that day. Walberg had always felt and expressed
the strongest feelings of tender respect towards his parents--his father
particularly, whose age far exceeded that of his mother. At the division
of their meal that day, he shewed a kind of wolfish and greedy jealousy
that made Ines tremble. He whispered to her--“How much my father
eats--how heartily he feeds while we have scarce a morsel!”--“And let us
want that morsel, before your father wants one!” said Ines in a
whisper--“I have scarce tasted any thing myself.”--“Father--father,”
cried Walberg, shouting in the ear of the doting old man, “you are
eating heartily, while Ines and her children are starving!” And he
snatched the food from his father’s hand, who gazed at him vacantly, and
resigned the contested morsel without a struggle. A moment afterwards
the old man rose from his seat, and with horrid unnatural force, tore
the untasted meat from his grandchildren’s lips, and swallowed it
himself, while his rivelled and toothless mouth grinned at them in
mockery at once infantine and malicious.
“Squabbling about your supper?” cried Everhard, bursting among them with
a wild and feeble laugh,--“Why, here’s enough for to-morrow--and
to-morrow.” And he flung indeed ample means for two day’s subsistence on
the table, but he looked _paler and paler_. The hungry family devoured
the hoard, and forgot to ask the cause of his increasing paleness, and
obviously diminished strength. * * * * * *
“They had long been without any domestics, and as Everhard disappeared
mysteriously every day, the daughters were sometimes employed on the
humble errands of the family. The beauty of the elder daughter, Julia,
was so conspicuous, that her mother had often undertaken the most menial
errands herself, rather than send her daughter into the streets
unprotected. The following evening, however, being intently employed in
some domestic occupation, she allowed Julia to go out to purchase their
food for to-morrow, and lent her veil for the purpose, directing her
daughter to arrange it in the Spanish fashion, with which she was well
acquainted, so as to hide her face.
“Julia, who went with trembling steps on her brief errand, had somehow
deranged her veil, and a glimpse of her beauty was caught by a cavalier
who was passing. The meanness of her dress and occupation suggested
hopes to him which he ventured to express. Julia burst from him with the
mingled terror and indignation of insulted purity, but her eyes rested
with unconscious avidity on the handful of gold which glittered in his
hand.--She thought of her famishing parents,--of her own declining
strength, and neglected useless talents. The gold still sparkled before
her,--she felt--she knew not what, and to escape from some feelings is
perhaps the best victory we can obtain over them. But when she arrived
at home, she eagerly thrust the small purchase she had made into her
mother’s hand, and, though hitherto gentle, submissive, and tractable,
announced, in a tone of decision that seemed to her startled mother
(whose thoughts were always limited to the exigencies of the hour) like
that of sudden insanity, that she would rather starve than ever again
tread the streets of Seville alone.
“As Ines retired to her bed, she thought she heard a feeble moan from
the room where Everhard lay, and where, from their being compelled to
sell the necessary furniture of the bed, he had entreated his parents to
allow Maurice to sleep with him, alleging that the warmth of his body
would be a substitute for artificial covering to his little brother.
Twice those moans were heard, but Ines did not dare to awake Walberg,
who had sunk into that profound sleep which is as often the refuge of
intolerable misery, as that of saturated enjoyment. A few moments after,
when the moans had ceased, and she had half persuaded herself it was
only the echo of that wave that seems for ever beating in the ears of
the unfortunate,--the curtains of her bed were thrown open, and the
figure of a child covered with blood, stained in breast, arms, and legs,
appeared before her, and cried,--“It is Everhard’s blood--he is bleeding
to death,--I am covered with his blood!--Mother--mother--rise and save
Everhard’s life!” The object, the voice, the words, seemed to Ines like
the imagery of some terrible dream, such as had lately often visited her
sleep, till the tones of Maurice, her youngest, and (in her heart) her
favourite child, made her spring from the bed, and hurry after the
little blood-spotted figure that paddled before her on its naked feet,
till she reached the adjoining room where Everhard lay. Amid all her
anguish and fear, she trod as lightly as Maurice, lest she should awake
Walberg.
“The moon-light fell strongly through the unshuttered windows on the
wretched closet that just contained the bed. Its furniture was
sufficiently scanty, and in his spasms Everhard had thrown off the
sheet. So he lay, as Ines approached his bed, in a kind of corse-like
beauty, to which the light of the moon gave an effect that would have
rendered the figure worthy the pencil of a Murillo, a Rosa, or any of
those painters, who, inspired by the genius of suffering, delight in
representing the most exquisite of human forms in the extremity of human
agony. A St Bartholomew flayed, with his skin hanging about him in
graceful drapery--a St Laurence, broiled on a gridiron, and exhibiting
his finely-formed anatomy on its bars, while naked slaves are blowing
the coals beneath it,--even these were inferior to the form
half-veiled,--half-disclosed by the moon-light as it lay. The snow-white
limbs of Everhard were extended as if for the inspection of a sculptor,
and moveless, as if they were indeed what they resembled, in hue and
symmetry, those of a marble statue. His arms were tossed above his head,
and the blood was trickling fast from the opened veins of both,--his
bright and curled hair was clotted with the red stream that flowed from
his arms,--his lips were blue, and a faint and fainter moan issued from
them as his mother hung over him. This sight banished in a moment all
other fears and feelings, and Ines shrieked aloud to her husband for
assistance. Walberg, staggering from his sleep, entered the room,--the
object before him was enough. Ines had only strength left to point to
it. The wretched father rushed out in quest of medical aid, which he was
obliged to solicit gratuitously, and in bad Spanish, while his accents
betrayed him at every door he knocked at,--and closed them against him
as a foreigner and a heretic. At length a barber-surgeon (for the
professions were united in Seville) consented, with many a yawn, to
attend him, and came duly armed with lint and styptics. The distance was
short, and he was soon by the bed of the young sufferer. The parents
observed, with consternation unspeakable, the languid looks of
recognition, the ghastly smile of consciousness, that Everhard viewed
him with, as he approached the bed; and when he had succeeded in
stopping the hæmorrhage, and bound up the arms, a whisper passed between
him and the patient, and the latter raised his bloodless hand to his
lips, and uttered, “Remember our bargain.” As the man retired, Walberg
followed, and demanded to know the meaning of the words he had heard.
Walberg was a German, and choleric--the surgeon was a Spaniard, and
cool. “I shall tell you to-morrow, Senhor,” said he, putting up his
instruments,--“in the mean time be assured of my gratuitous attendance
on your son, and of his certain recovery. We deem you heretics in
Seville, but that youth is enough to canonize the whole family, and
cover a multitude of sins.” And with these words he departed. The next
day he attended Everhard, and so for several, till he was completely
recovered, always refusing the slightest remuneration, till the father,
whom misery had made suspicious of every thing and nothing, watched at
the door, and heard the horrible secret. He did not disclose it to his
wife,--but from that hour, it was observed that his gloom became more
intense, and the communications he used to hold with his family, on the
subject of their distress, and the modes of evading it by hourly
expedients, utterly and finally ceased.
“Everhard, now recovered, but still pale as the widow of Seneca, was at
last able to join the family consultation, and give advice, and suggest
resources, with a mental energy that his physical weakness could not
overcome. The next day, when they were assembled to debate on the means
of procuring subsistence for the following one, they for the first time
missed their father. At every word that was uttered, they turned to ask
for his sanction--but he was not there. At last he entered the room, but
without taking a part in their consultation. He leaned gloomily against
the wall, and while Everhard and Julia, at every sentence, turned their
appealing looks towards him, he sullenly averted his head. Ines,
appearing to pursue some work, while her trembling fingers could scarce
direct the needle, made a sign to her children not to observe him. Their
voices were instantly depressed, and their heads bent closely towards
each other. Mendicity appeared the only resource of this unfortunate
family,--and they agreed, that the evening was the best time for trying
its effect. The unhappy father remained rocking against the shattered
wainscot till the arrival of evening. Ines repaired the clothes of the
children, which were now so decayed, that every attempt at repair made a
fresh rent, and the very thread she worked with seemed less attenuated
than the worn-out materials it wrought on.
“The grandfather, still seated in his ample chair by the care of Ines,
(for his son had grown very indifferent about him), watched her moving
fingers, and exclaimed, with the petulance of dotage, “Aye,--you are
arraying them in embroidery, while I am in rags.--In rags!” he repeated,
holding out the slender garments which the beggared family could with
difficulty spare him. Ines tried to pacify him, and showed her work, to
prove that it was the remnants of her children’s former dress she was
repairing; but, with horror unutterable, she perceived her husband
incensed at these expressions of dotage, and venting his frantic and
fearful indignation in language that she tried to bury the sound of, by
pressing closer to the old man, and attempting to fix his bewildered
attention on herself and her work. This was easily accomplished, and all
was well, till they were about to separate on their wretched precarious
errands. Then a new and untold feeling trembled at the heart of one of
the young wanderers. Julia remembered the occurrence of a preceding
evening,--she thought of the tempting gold, the flattering language, and
the tender tone of the young cavalier. She saw her family perishing
around her for want,--she felt it consuming her own vitals,--and as she
cast her eye round the squalid room, the gold glittered brighter and
brighter in her eye. A faint hope, aided perhaps by a still more faint
suggestion of venial pride, swelled in her heart. “Perhaps he might love
me,” she whispered to herself, “and think me not unworthy of his hand.”
Then despair returned to the charge. “I must die of famine,” she
thought, “if I return unaided,--and why may I not by my death benefit my
family! I will never survive shame, but they may,--for they will not
know it!”--She went out, and took a direction different from that of the
family.
“Night came on,--the wanderers returned slowly one by one,--_Julia was
the last_. Her brothers and sister had each obtained a trifling alms,
for they had learned Spanish enough to beg in,--and the old man’s face
wore a vacant smile, as he saw the store produced, which was, after all,
scarce sufficient to afford a meal for the youngest. “And have you
brought us nothing, Julia?” said her parents. She stood apart, and in
silence. Her father repeated the question in a raised and angry voice.
She started at the sound, and, rushing forward, buried her head in her
mother’s bosom. “Nothing,--nothing,” she cried, in a broken and
suffocated voice; “I tried,--my weak and wicked heart submitted to the
thought for a moment,--but no,--no, not even to save you from perishing,
could I!--I came home to perish first myself!” Her shuddering parents
comprehended her,--and amid their agony they blessed her and wept,--but
not from grief. The meal was divided, of which Julia at first steadily
refused to partake, as she had not contributed to it, till her
reluctance was overcome by the affectionate importunity of the rest, and
she complied.
“It was during this division of what all believed to be their last meal,
that Walberg gave one of those proofs of sudden and fearful violence of
temper, bordering on insanity, which he had betrayed latterly. He seemed
to notice, with sullen displeasure, that his wife had (as she always
did) reserved the largest portion for his father. He eyed it askance at
first, muttering angrily to himself. Then he spoke more aloud, though
not so as to be heard by the deaf old man, who was sluggishly devouring
his sordid meal. Then the sufferings of his children seemed to inspire
him with a kind of wild resentment, and he started up, exclaiming, “My
son sells his blood to a surgeon, to save us from perishing(2)! My
daughter trembles on the verge of prostitution, to procure us a meal!”
Then fiercely addressing his father, “And what dost thou do, old dotard?
Rise up,--rise up, and beg for us thyself, or thou must starve!”--and,
as he spoke, he raised his arm against the helpless old man. At this
horrid sight, Ines shrieked aloud, and the children, rushing forward,
interposed. The wretched father, incensed to madness, dealt blows among
them, which were borne without a murmur; and then, the storm being
exhausted, he sat down and wept.
(2) Fact,--it occurred in a French family not many years ago.
“At this moment, to the astonishment and terror of all except Walberg,
the old man, who, since the night of his wife’s interment, had never
moved but from his chair to his bed, and that not without assistance,
rose suddenly from his seat, and, apparently in obedience to his son,
walked with a firm and steady pace towards the door. When he had reached
it, he paused, looked back on them with a fruitless effort at
recollection, and went out slowly;--and such was the terror felt by all
at this last ghastly look, which seemed like that of a corse moving on
to the place of its interment, that no one attempted to oppose his
passage, and several moments elapsed before Everhard had the
recollection to pursue him.
“In the mean time, Ines had dismissed her children, and sitting as near
as she dared to the wretched father, attempted to address some soothing
expressions to him. Her voice, which was exquisitely sweet and soft,
seemed to produce a mechanical effect on him. He turned towards her at
first,--then leaning his head on his arm, he shed a few silent
tears,--then flinging it on his wife’s bosom, he wept aloud. Ines seized
this moment to impress on his heart the horror she felt from the outrage
he had committed, and adjured him to supplicate the mercy of God for a
crime, which, in her eyes, appeared scarce short of parricide. Walberg
wildly asked what she alluded to; and when, shuddering, she uttered the
words,--“Your father,--your poor old father!”--he smiled with an
expression of mysterious and supernatural confidence that froze her
blood, and, approaching her ear, softly whispered, “I have no father! He
is dead,--long dead! I buried him the night I dug my mother’s grave!
Poor old man,” he added with a sigh, “it was the better for him,--he
would have lived only to weep, and perish perhaps with hunger. But I
will tell you, Ines,--and let it be a secret, I wondered what made our
provisions decrease so, till what was yesterday sufficient for four, is
not to-day sufficient for one. I watched, and at last I discovered--it
must be a secret--an old goblin, who daily visited this house. It came
in the likeness of an old man in rags, and with a long white beard, and
it devoured every thing on the table, while the children stood hungry
by! But I struck at--I cursed it,--I chased it in the name of the
All-powerful, and it is gone. Oh it was a fell devouring goblin!--but
it will haunt us no more, and we shall have enough. Enough,” said
the wretched man, involuntarily returning to his habitual
associations,--“enough for to-morrow!”
“Ines, overcome with horror at this obvious proof of insanity, neither
interrupted or opposed him; she attempted only to soothe him, internally
praying against the too probable disturbance of her own intellects.
Walberg saw her look of distrust, and, with the quick jealousy of
partial insanity, said, “If you do not credit me in that, still less, I
suppose, will you in the account of that fearful visitation with which I
have latterly been familiar.”--“Oh, my beloved!” said Ines, who
recognized in these words the source of a fear that had latterly, from
some extraordinary circumstances in her husband’s conduct, taken
possession of her soul, and made the fear even of famine trifling in
comparison,--“I dread lest I understand you too well. The anguish of
want and of famine I could have borne,--aye, and seen you bear, but the
horrid words you have lately uttered, the horrid thoughts that escape
you in your sleep,--when I think on these, and guess at”---- “You need
not guess,” said Walberg, interrupting her, “I will tell you all.” And,
as he spoke, his countenance changed from its expression of wildness to
one of perfect sanity and calm confidence,--his features relaxed, his
eye became steady, and his tone firm.--“Every night since our late
distresses, I have wandered out in search of some relief, and
supplicated every passing stranger;--latterly, I have met every night
the enemy of man, who”---- “Oh cease, my love, to indulge these horrible
thoughts,--they are the results of your disturbed unhappy state of
mind.”--“Ines, listen to me. I see that figure as plainly as I see
yours,--I hear his voice as distinctly as you hear mine this moment.
Want and misery are not naturally fertile in the production of
imagination,--they grasp at realities too closely. No man, who wants a
meal, conceives that a banquet is spread before him, and that the
tempter invites him to sit down and eat at his ease. No,--no, Ines, the
evil one, or some devoted agent of his in human form, besets me every
night,--and how I shall longer resist the snare, I know not.”--“And in
what form does he appear?” said Ines, hoping to turn the channel of his
gloomy thoughts, while she appeared to follow their direction. “In that
of a middle-aged man, of a serious and staid demeanour, and with nothing
remarkable in his aspect except the light of two burning eyes, whose
lustre is almost intolerable. He fixes them on me sometimes, and I feel
as if there was fascination in their glare. Every night he besets me,
and few like me could have resisted his seductions. He has offered, and
proved to me, that it is in his power to bestow all that human cupidity
could thirst for, on the condition that----I cannot utter! It is one so
full of horror and impiety, that, even to listen to it, is scarce less a
crime than to comply with it!”
“Ines, still incredulous, yet imagining that to soothe his delirium
was perhaps the best way to overcome it, demanded what that condition
was. Though they were alone, Walberg would communicate it only in a
whisper; and Ines, fortified as she was by reason hitherto undisturbed,
and a cool and steady temper, could not but recollect some vague
reports she had heard in her early youth, before she quitted Spain,
of a being permitted to wander through it, with power to tempt men
under the pressure of extreme calamity with similar offers, which had
been invariably rejected, even in the last extremities of despair
and dissolution. She was not superstitious,--but, her memory now
taking part with her husband’s representation of what had befallen
him, she shuddered at the possibility of his being exposed to similar
temptation; and she endeavoured to fortify his mind and conscience,
by arguments equally appropriate whether he was the victim of a
disturbed imagination, or the real object of this fearful persecution.
She reminded him, that if, even in Spain, where the abominations of
Antichrist prevailed, and the triumph of the mother of witchcrafts
and spiritual seduction was complete, the fearful offer he alluded
to had been made and rejected with such unmitigated abhorrence,
the renunciation of one who had embraced the pure doctrines of the
gospel should be expressed with a tenfold energy of feeling and
holy defiance. “You,” said the heroic woman, “you first taught me
that the doctrines of salvation are to be found alone in the holy
scriptures,--I believed you, and wedded you in that belief. We are
united less in the body than in the soul, for in the body neither of
us may probably sojourn much longer. You pointed out to me, not the
legends of fabulous saints, but the lives of the primitive apostles
and martyrs of the true church. There I read no tales of “voluntary
humility,” of self-inflicted--fruitless sufferings, but I read that
the people of God were “destitute, afflicted, tormented.” And shall
we dare to murmur at following the examples of those you have pointed
out to me as ensamples of suffering? They bore the spoiling of their
goods,--they wandered about in sheep skins and goat skins,--they
resisted unto blood, striving against sin.--And shall we lament the
lot that has fallen to us, when our hearts have so often burned within
us, as we read the holy records together? Alas! what avails feeling
till it is brought to the test of fact? How we deceived ourselves, in
believing that we indeed participated in the feelings of those holy
men, while we were so far removed from the test by which they were
proved! We read of imprisonments, of tortures, and of flames!--We
closed the book, and partook of a comfortable meal, and retired to
a peaceful bed, triumphing in the thought, while saturated with all
the world’s good, that if their trials had been ours, we could have
sustained those trials as they did. Now, _our_ hour has come,--it is an
hour sharp and terrible!”--“It is!” murmured the shuddering husband.
“But shall we therefore shrink?” replied his wife. “Your ancestors,
who were the first in Germany that embraced the reformed religion,
have bled and blazed for it, as you have often told me,--can there be
a stronger attestation to it?”--“I believe there can,” said Walberg,
whose eyes rolled fearfully,--“that of starving for it!--Oh Ines,”
he exclaimed, as he grasped her hands convulsively, “I have felt,--I
still feel, that a death at the stake would be mercy compared to
the lingering tortures of protracted famine,--to the death that we
die daily--and yet do not die! What is this I hold?” he exclaimed,
grasping unconsciously the hand he held in his. “It is my hand, my
love,” answered the trembling wife.--“Yours!--no--impossible!--Your
fingers were soft and cool, but these are dry,--is this a human
hand?”--“It is mine,” said the weeping wife. “Then you must have been
famishing,” said Walberg, awakening as if from a dream. “We have all
been so latterly,” answered Ines, satisfied to restore her husband’s
sanity, even at the expense of this horrible confession,--“We have all
been so--but I have suffered the least. When a family is famishing,
the children think of their meals--but the mother thinks only of her
children. I have lived on as little as--I could,--I had indeed no
appetite.”--“Hush,” said Walberg, interrupting her--“what sound was
that?--was it not like a dying groan?”--“No--it is the children who
moan in their sleep.”--“What do they moan for?” “Hunger I believe,”
said Ines, involuntarily yielding to the dreadful conviction of
habitual misery.--“And I sit and hear this,” said Walberg, starting
up,--“I sit to hear their young sleep broken by dreams of hunger,
while for a word’s speaking I could pile this floor with mountains of
gold, and all for the risk of”---- “Of what?”--said Ines, clinging
to him,--“of what?--Oh! think of that!--what shall a man give in
exchange for his soul?--Oh! let us starve, die, rot before your eyes,
rather than you should seal your perdition by that horrible”---- “Hear
me, woman!” said Walberg, turning on her eyes almost as fierce and
lustrous as those of Melmoth, and whose light, indeed, seemed borrowed
from his; “Hear me!--My soul is lost! They who die in the agonies of
famine know no God, and want none--if I remain here to famish among
my children, I shall as surely blaspheme the Author of my being, as I
shall renounce him under the fearful conditions proposed to me!--Listen
to me, Ines, and tremble not. To see my children die of famine will
be to me instant suicide and impenitent despair! But if I close with
this fearful offer, I may yet repent,--I may yet escape!--There is
hope on one side--on the other there is none--none--none! Your hands
cling round me, but their touch is cold!--You are wasted to a shadow
with want! Shew me the means of procuring another meal, and I will spit
at the tempter, and spurn him!--But where is that to be found?--Let
me go, then, to meet him!--You will pray for me, Ines,--will you
not?--and the children?--No, let them not pray for me!--in my despair
I forgot to pray myself, and their prayers would now be a reproach to
me.--Ines!--Ines--What? am I talking to a corse?” He was indeed, for
the wretched wife had sunk at his feet senseless. “Thank God!” he again
emphatically exclaimed, as he beheld her lie to all appearance lifeless
before him. “Thank God a word then has killed her,--it was a gentler
death than famine! It would have been kind to have strangled her with
these hands! Now for the children!” he exclaimed, while horrid thoughts
chased each other over his reeling and unseated mind, and he imagined
he heard the roar of a sea in its full strength thundering in his
ears, and saw ten thousand waves dashing at his feet, and every wave
of blood. “Now for the children!”--and he felt about as if for some
implement of destruction. In doing so, his left hand crossed his right,
and grasping it, he exclaimed as if he felt a sword in his hand,--“This
will do--they will struggle--they will supplicate,--but I will tell
them their mother lies dead at my feet, and then what can they say?
Hold now,” said the miserable man, sitting calmly down, “If they cry to
me, what shall I answer? Julia, and Ines her mother’s namesake,--and
poor little Maurice, who smiles even amid hunger, and whose smiles are
worse than curses!--I will tell them their mother is dead!” he cried,
staggering towards the door of his childrens’ apartment--“Dead without
a blow!--that shall be their answer and their doom.”
“As he spoke, he stumbled over the senseless body of his wife; and the
tone of his mind once more strung up to the highest pitch of conscious
agony, he cried, “Men!--men!--what are your pursuits and your
passions?--your hopes and fears?--your struggles and your
triumphs?--Look on me!--learn from a human being like yourselves, who
preaches his last and fearful sermon over the corse of his wife, and
approaching the bodies of his sleeping children, whom he soon hopes to
see corses also--corses made so by his own hand!--Let all the world
listen to me!--let them resign factitious wants and wishes, and furnish
those who hang on them for subsistence with the means of bare
subsistence!--There is no care, no thought beyond this! Let our children
call on me for instruction, for promotion, for distinction, and call in
vain--I hold myself innocent. They may find those for themselves, or
want them if they list--but let them never in vain call on me for bread,
as they have done,--as they do now! I hear the moans of their hungry
sleep!--World--world, be wise, and let your children curse you to your
face for any thing but want of bread! Oh that is the bitterest of
curses,--and it is felt most when it is least uttered! I have felt it
often, but I shall feel it no longer!”--And the wretch tottered towards
the beds of his children.
“Father!--father!” cried Julia, “are these your hands? Oh let me live,
and I will do any thing--any thing but”---- “Father!--dear father!”
cried Ines, “spare us!--to-morrow may bring another meal!” Maurice, the
young child, sprung from his bed, and cried, clinging round his father,
“Oh, dear father, forgive me!--but I dreamed a wolf was in the room, and
was tearing out our throats; and, father, I cried so long, that I
thought you never would come. And now--Oh God! oh God!”--as he felt the
hands of the frantic wretch grasping his throat,--“are you the wolf?”
“Fortunately those hands were powerless from the very convulsion of the
agony that prompted their desperate effort. The daughters had swooned
from horror,--and their swoon appeared like death. The child had the
cunning to counterfeit death also, and lay extended and stopping his
breath under the fierce but faultering gripe that seized his young
throat--then relinquished--then grasped it again--and then relaxed its
hold as at the expiration of a spasm.
“When all was over, as the wretched father thought, he retreated from
the chamber. In doing so, he stumbled over the corse-like form of his
wife.--A groan announced that the sufferer was not dead. “What does this
mean?” said Walberg, staggering in his delirium,--“does the corse
reproach me for murder?--or does one surviving breath curse me for the
unfinished work?”
“As he spoke, he placed his foot on his wife’s body. At this moment, a
loud knock was heard at the door. “They are come!” said Walberg, whose
frenzy hurried him rapidly through the scenes of an imaginary murder,
and the consequence of a judicial process. “Well!--come in--knock again,
or lift the latch--or enter as ye list--here I sit amid the bodies of my
wife and children--I have murdered them--I confess it--ye come to drag
me to torture, I know--but never--never can your tortures inflict on me
more than the agony of seeing them perish by hunger before my eyes. Come
in--come in--the deed is done!--The corse of my wife is at my foot, and
the blood of my children is on my hands--what have I further to fear?”
But while the wretched man spoke thus, he sunk sullenly on his chair,
appearing to be employed in wiping from his fingers the traces of blood
with which he imagined they were stained. At length the knocking at the
door became louder,--the latch was lifted,--and three figures entered
the apartment in which Walberg sat. They advanced slowly,--two from age
and exhaustion,--and the third from strong emotion. Walberg heeded them
not,--his eyes were fixed,--his hands locked in each other;--nor did he
move a limb as they approached.
“Do you not know us?” said the foremost, holding up a lanthern which he
held in his hand. Its light fell on a groupe worthy the pencil of a
Rembrandt. The room lay in complete darkness, except where that strong
and unbroken light fell. It glared on the rigid and moveless obduracy of
Walberg’s despair, who appeared stiffening into stone as he sat. It
showed the figure of the friendly priest who had been Guzman’s director,
and whose features, pale and haggard with age and austerities, seemed to
struggle with the smile that trembled over their wrinkled lines. Behind
him stood the aged father of Walberg, with an aspect of perfect apathy,
except when, with a momentary effort at recollection, he shook his white
head, seeming to ask himself why he was there--and wherefore he could
not speak. Supporting him stood the young form of Everhard, over whose
cheek and eye wandered a glow and a lustre too bright to last, and
instantly succeeded by paleness and dejection. He trembled,
advanced,--then shrinking back, clung to his infirm grandfather, as if
needing the support he appeared to give. Walberg was the first to break
the silence. “I know ye who ye are,” he said hollowly--“ye are come to
seize me--ye have heard my confession--why do you delay? Drag me away--I
would rise and follow you if I could, but I feel as if I had grown to
this seat--you must drag me from it yourselves.”
“As he spoke, his wife, who had remained stretched at his feet, rose
slowly but firmly; and, of all that she saw or heard, appearing to
comprehend only the meaning of her husband’s words, she clasped her arms
round him, as if to oppose his being torn from her, and gazed on the
groupe with a look of impotent and ghastly defiance. “Another witness,”
cried Walberg, “risen from the dead against me? Nay, then, it is time to
be gone,”--and he attempted to rise. “Stay, father,” said Everhard,
rushing forward and detaining him in his seat; “stay,--there is good
news, and this good priest has come to tell it,--listen to him, father,
I cannot speak.”--“You! oh you! Everhard,” answered the father, with a
look of mournful reproach, “you a witness against me too,--I never
raised my hand against you!--Those whom I murdered are silent, and will
you be my accuser?”
“They all now gathered round him, partly in terror and partly in
consolation,--all anxious to disclose to him the tidings with which
their hearts were burdened, yet fearful lest the freight might be too
much for the frail vessel that rocked and reeled before them, as if the
next breeze would be like a tempest to it. At last it burst forth from
the priest, who, by the necessities of his profession, was ignorant of
domestic feelings, and of the felicities and agonies which are
inseparably twined with the fibres of conjugal and parental hearts. He
knew nothing of what Walberg might feel as a husband or father,--for he
could never be either; but he felt that good news must be good news,
into whatever ears they were poured, or by whatever lips they might be
uttered. “We have the will,” he cried abruptly, “the true will of
Guzman. The other was--asking pardon of God and the saints for saying
so--no better than a forgery. The will is found, and you and your family
are heirs to all his wealth. I was coming to acquaint you, late as it
was, having with difficulty obtained the Superior’s permission to do so,
and in my way I met this old man, whom your son was conducting,--how
came he out so late?” At these words Walberg was observed to shudder
with a brief but strong spasm. “The will is found!” repeated the priest,
perceiving how little effect the words seemed to have on Walberg,--and
he raised his voice to its utmost pitch. “The will of my uncle is
found,” repeated Everhard. “Found,--found,--found!” echoed the aged
grandfather, not knowing what he said, but vaguely repeating the last
words he heard, and then looking round as if asking for an explanation
of them. “The will is found, love,” cried Ines, who appeared restored to
sudden and perfect consciousness by the sound; “Do you not hear, love?
We are wealthy,--we are happy! Speak to us, love, and do not stare so
vacantly,--speak to us!” A long pause followed. At length,--“Who are
those?” said Walberg in a hollow voice, pointing to the figures before
him, whom he viewed with a fixed and ghastly look, as if he was gazing
on a band of spectres. “Your son, love,--and your father,--and the good
friendly priest. Why do you look so doubtfully on us?”--“And what do
they come for?” said Walberg. Again and again the import of their
communication was told him, in tones that, trembling with varied
emotion, scarce could express their meaning. At length he seemed faintly
conscious of what was said, and, looking round on them, uttered a long
and heavy sigh. They ceased to speak, and watched him in
silence.--“Wealth!--wealth!--it comes too late. Look there,--look
there!” and he pointed to the room where his children lay.
“Ines, with a dreadful presentiment at her heart, rushed into it, and
beheld her daughters lying apparently lifeless. The shriek she uttered,
as she fell on the bodies, brought the priest and her son to her
assistance, and Walberg and the old man were left together alone,
viewing each other with looks of complete insensibility; and this apathy
of age, and stupefaction of despair, made a singular contrast with the
fierce and wild agony of those who still retained their feelings. It was
long before the daughters were recovered from their death-like swoon,
and still longer before their father could be persuaded that the arms
that clasped him, and the tears that fell on his cold cheek, were those
of his living children.
“All that night his wife and family struggled with his despair. At last
recollection seemed to burst on him at once. He shed some tears;--then,
with a minuteness of reminiscence that was equally singular and
affecting, he flung himself before the old man, who, speechless and
exhausted, sat passively in his chair, and exclaiming, “Father, forgive
me!” buried his head between his father’s knees. * * * * *
“Happiness is a powerful restorative,--in a few days the spirits of all
appeared to have subsided into a calm. They wept sometimes, but their
tears were no longer painful;--they resembled those showers in a fine
spring morning, which announce the increasing warmth and beauty of the
day. The infirmities of Walberg’s father made the son resolve not to
leave Spain till his dissolution, which took place in a few months. He
died in peace, blessing and blessed. His son was his only spiritual
attendant, and a brief and partial interval of recollection enabled him
to understand and express his joy and confidence in the holy texts which
were read to him from the scriptures. The wealth of the family had now
given them importance; and, by the interest of the friendly priest, the
body was permitted to be interred in consecrated ground. The family then
set out for Germany, where they reside in prosperous felicity;--but to
this hour Walberg shudders with horror when he recals the fearful
temptations of the stranger, whom he met in his nightly wanderings in
the hour of his adversity, and the horrors of this visitation appear to
oppress his recollection more than even the images of his family
perishing with want.
“There are other narratives,” continued the stranger, “relating to this
mysterious being, which I am in possession of, and which I have
collected with much difficulty; for the unhappy, who are exposed to his
temptations, consider their misfortunes as a crime, and conceal, with
the most anxious secresy, every circumstance of this horrible
visitation. Should we again meet, Senhor, I may communicate them to you,
and you will find them no less extraordinary than that I have just
related. But it is now late, and you need repose after the fatigue of
your journey.”--So saying, the stranger departed.
* * * * *
“Don Francisco remained seated in his chair, musing on the singular tale
he had listened to, till the lateness of the hour, combining with his
fatigue, and the profound attention he had paid to the narrative of the
stranger, plunged him insensibly into a deep slumber. He was awoke in a
few minutes by a slight noise in the room, and looking up perceived
seated opposite to him another person, whom he never recollected to have
seen before, but who was indeed the same who had been refused admittance
under the roof of that house the preceding day. He appeared seated
perfectly at his ease, however; and to Don Francisco’s look of surprise
and inquiry, replied that he was a traveller, who had been by mistake
shown into that apartment,--that finding its occupant asleep and
undisturbed by his entrance, he had taken the liberty of remaining
there, but was willing to retire if his presence was considered
intrusive.
“As he spoke, Don Francisco had leisure to observe him. There was
something remarkable in his expression, though the observer did not find
it easy to define what it was; and his manner, though not courtly or
conciliating, had an ease which appeared more the result of independence
of thought, than of the acquired habitudes of society.
“Don Francisco welcomed him gravely and slowly, not without a sensation
of awe for which he could scarcely account;--and the stranger returned
the salutation in a manner that was not likely to diminish that
impression. A long silence followed. The stranger (who did not announce
his name) was the first to break it, by apologizing for having, while
seated in an adjacent apartment, involuntarily overheard an
extraordinary tale or narrative related to Don Francisco, in which he
confessed he took a profound interest, such as (he added, bowing with an
air of grim and reluctant civility) would, he trusted, palliate his
impropriety in listening to a communication not addressed to him.
“To all this Don Francisco could only reply by bows equally rigid, (his
body scarce forming an acute angle with his limbs as he sat), and by
looks of uneasy and doubtful curiosity directed towards his strange
visitor, who, however, kept his seat immoveably, and seemed, after all
his apologies, resolved to sit out Don Francisco.
“Another long pause was broken by the visitor. “You were listening, I
think,” he said, “to a wild and terrible story of a being who was
commissioned on an unutterable errand,--even to tempt spirits in woe, at
their last mortal extremity, to barter their hopes of future happiness
for a short remission of their temporary sufferings.”--“I heard nothing
of that,” said Don Francisco, whose recollection, none of the clearest
naturally, was not much improved by the length of the narrative he had
just listened to, and by the sleep into which he had fallen since he
heard it. “Nothing?” said the visitor, with something of abruptness and
asperity in his tone that made the hearer start--“nothing?--I thought
there was mention too of that unhappy being to whom Walberg confessed
his severest trials were owing,--in comparison with whose fearful
visitations those of even famine were as dust in the balance.”--“Yes,
yes,” answered Don Francisco, startled into sudden recollection, “I
remember there was a mention of the devil,--or his agent,--or
something”---- “Senhor,” said the stranger interrupting him, with an
expression of wild and fierce derision, which was lost on
Aliaga--“Senhor, I beg you will not confound personages who have the
honour to be so nearly allied, and yet so perfectly distinct as the
devil and his agent, or agents. You yourself, Senhor, who, of course, as
an orthodox and inveterate Catholic, must abhor the enemy of mankind,
have often acted as his agent, and yet would be somewhat offended at
being mistaken for him.” Don Francisco crossed himself repeatedly, and
devoutly disavowed his ever having been an agent of the enemy of man.
“Will you dare to say so?” said his singular visitor, not raising his
voice as the insolence of the question seemed to require, but depressing
it to the lowest whisper as he drew his seat nearer his astonished
companion--“Will you dare to say so?--Have you never erred?--Have you
never felt one impure sensation?--Have you never indulged a transient
feeling of hatred, or malice, or revenge?--Have you never forgot to do
the good you ought to do,--or remembered to do the evil you ought not to
have done?--Have you never in trade overreached a dealer, or banquetted
on the spoils of your starving debtor?--Have you never, as you went to
your daily devotions, cursed from your heart the wanderings of your
heretical brethren,--and while you dipped your fingers in the holy
water, hoped that every drop that touched your pores, would be visited
on them in drops of brimstone and sulphur?--Have you never, as you
beheld the famished, illiterate, degraded populace of your country,
exulted in the wretched and temporary superiority your wealth has given
you,--and felt that the wheels of your carriage would not roll less
smoothly if the way was paved with the heads of your countrymen?
Orthodox Catholic--old Christian--as you boast yourself to be,--is not
this true?--and dare you say you have not been an agent of Satan? I tell
you, whenever you indulged one brutal passion, one sordid desire, one
impure imagination--whenever you uttered one word that wrung the heart,
or embittered the spirit of your fellow-creature--whenever you made that
hour pass in pain to whose flight you might have lent wings of
down--whenever you have seen the tear, which your hand might have wiped
away, fall uncaught, or forced it from an eye which would have smiled on
you in light had you permitted it--whenever you have done this, you have
been ten times more an agent of the enemy of man than all the wretches
whom terror, enfeebled nerves, or visionary credulity, has forced into
the confession of an incredible compact with the author of evil, and
whose confession has consigned them to flames much more substantial than
those the imagination of their persecutors pictured them doomed to for
an eternity of suffering! Enemy of mankind!” the speaker
continued,--“Alas! how absurdly is that title bestowed on the great
angelic chief,--the morning star fallen from its sphere! What enemy has
man so deadly as himself? If he would ask on whom he should bestow that
title aright, let him smite his bosom, and his heart will
answer,--Bestow it here!”
“The emotion with which the stranger spoke, roused and affected even the
sluggish and incrusted spirit of the listener. His conscience, like a
state coach-horse, had hitherto only been brought on solemn and pompous
occasions, and then paced heavily along a smooth and well-prepared
course, under the gorgeous trappings of ceremony;--now it resembled the
same animal suddenly bestrid by a fierce and vigorous rider, and urged
by lash and spur along a new and rugged road. And slow and reluctant as
he was to own it, he felt the power of the weight that pressed, and the
bit that galled him. He answered by a hasty and trembling renunciation
of all engagements, direct or indirect, with the evil power; but he
added, that he must acknowledge he had been too often the victim of his
seductions, and trusted for the forgiveness of his wanderings to the
power of the holy church, and the intercession of the saints.
“The stranger (though he smiled somewhat grimly at this declaration)
seemed to accept the concession, and apologized, in his turn, for the
warmth with which he had spoken; and which he begged Don Francisco would
interpret as a mark of interest in his spiritual concerns. This
explanation, though it seemed to commence favourably, was not followed,
however, by any attempt at renewed conversation. The parties appeared to
stand aloof from each other, till the stranger again alluded to his
having overheard the singular conversation and subsequent narrative in
Aliaga’s apartment. “Senhor,” he added, in a voice whose solemnity
deeply impressed the hearer, wearied as he was,--“I am acquainted with
circumstances relating to the extraordinary person who was the daily
watcher of Walberg’s miseries, and the nightly tempter of his
thoughts,--known but to him and me. Indeed I may add, without the
imputation of vanity or presumption, that I am as well acquainted as
himself with every event of his extraordinary existence; and that your
curiosity, if excited at all about him, could be gratified by none so
amply and faithfully as by myself.”--“I thank you, Senhor,” answered Don
Francisco, whose blood seemed congealing in his veins at the voice and
expression of the stranger, he knew not why--“I thank you, but my
curiosity has been completely satisfied by the narrative I have already
listened to. The night is far spent, and I have to pursue my journey
to-morrow; I will therefore defer hearing the particulars you offer to
gratify me with till our next meeting.”
“As he spoke, he rose from his seat, hoping that this action would
intimate to the intruder, that his presence was no longer desirable. The
latter continued, in spite of the intimation, fixed in his seat. At
length, starting as if from a trance, he exclaimed, “When shall our next
meeting be?”
“Don Francisco, who did not feel particularly anxious to renew the
intimacy, slightly mentioned, that he was on his journey to the
neighbourhood of Madrid, where his family, whom he had not seen for many
years, resided--that the stages of his journey were uncertain, as he
would be obliged to wait for communications from a friend and future
relative,--(he alluded to Montilla his intended son-in-law, and as he
spoke, the stranger gave a peculiar smile),--and also from certain
mercantile correspondents, whose letters were of the utmost importance.
Finally, he added, in a disturbed tone, (for the awe of the stranger’s
presence hung round him like a chilling atmosphere, and seemed to freeze
even his words as they issued from his mouth), he could
not--easily--tell when he might again have the honour of meeting the
stranger. “You cannot,” said the stranger, rising and drawing his mantle
over one shoulder, while his reverted eyes glanced fearfully on the pale
auditor--“You cannot,--but I can. Don Francisco di Aliaga, we shall meet
to-morrow night!”
“As he spoke, he still continued to stand near the door, fixing on
Aliaga eyes whose light seemed to burn more intensely amid the dimness
of the wretched apartment. Aliaga had risen also, and was gazing on his
strange visitor with dim and troubled vision,--when the latter, suddenly
retreating from the door, approached him and said, in a stifled and
mysterious whisper, “Would you wish to witness the fate of those whose
curiosity or presumption breaks on the secrets of that mysterious being,
and dares to touch the folds of the veil in which his destiny has been
enshrouded by eternity? If you do, look here!” And as he spoke, he
pointed to a door which Don Francisco well remembered to be that which
the person whom he had met at the inn the preceding evening, and who had
related to him the tale of Guzman’s family, (or rather relatives), had
retired by. Obeying mechanically the waving of the arm, and the
beckoning of the stranger’s awful eye, rather than the impulse of his
own will, Aliaga followed him. They entered the apartment; it was
narrow, and dark, and empty. The stranger held a candle aloft, whose dim
light fell on a wretched bed, where lay what had been the form of a
living man within a few hours. “Look there!” said the stranger; and
Aliaga with horror beheld the figure of the being who had been
conversing with him the preceding part of that very evening,--extended a
corse!
“Advance--look--observe!” said the stranger, tearing off the sheet which
had been the only covering of the sleeper who had now sunk into the long
and last slumber--“There is no mark of violence, no distortion of
feature, or convulsion of limb--no hand of man was on him. He sought the
possession of a desperate secret--he obtained it, but he paid for it the
dreadful price that can be paid but once by mortals. So perish those
whose presumption exceeds their power!”
“Aliaga, as he beheld the body, and heard the words of the stranger,
felt himself disposed to summon the inmates of the house, and accuse the
stranger of murder; but the natural cowardice of a mercantile spirit,
mingled with other feelings which he could not analyse, and dared not
own, withheld him,--and he continued to gaze alternately on the corse
and the corse-like stranger. The latter, after pointing emphatically to
the body, as if intimating the danger of imprudent curiosity, or
unavailing disclosure, repeated the words, “We meet again to-morrow
night!” and departed.
“Aliaga, overcome by fatigue and emotion, sunk down by the corse, and
remained in that trance-like state till the servants of the inn entered
the room. They were shocked to find a dead body in the bed, and scarce
less shocked at the death-like state in which they found Aliaga. His
known wealth and distinction procured for him those attentions which
otherwise their terrors or their suspicions might have withheld. A sheet
was cast over the body, and Aliaga was conveyed to another apartment,
and attended sedulously by the domestics.
“In the mean time, the Alcaide arrived; and having learned that the
person who had died suddenly in the inn was one totally unknown, as
being only a writer, and a man of no importance in public or private
life, and that the person found near his bed in a passive stupor was a
wealthy merchant,--snatched, with some trepidation, the pen from the
ink-horn which hung at his button-hole, and sketched the record of this
sapient inquest:---- “That a guest had died in the house, none could
deny; but no one could suspect Don Francisco di Aliaga of murder.”
“As Don Francisco mounted his mule the following day, on the strength of
this just verdict, a person, who did not apparently belong to the house,
was particularly solicitous in adjusting his stirrups, &c.; and while
the obsequious Alcaide bowed oft and profoundly to the wealthy merchant,
(whose liberality he had amply experienced for the favourable colour he
had given to the strong circumstantial evidence against him), this
person whispered, in a voice that reached only the ears of Don
Francisco, “We meet to-night!”
“Don Francisco checked his mule as he heard the words. He looked round
him--the speaker was gone. Don Francisco rode on with a feeling known to
few, and which those who have felt are perhaps the least willing to
communicate.