WILLIAM MAUBRAY’S VISION.
After some more talk of this kind, they parted, and William Maubray, as
he lay down again in his bed, wondered whether the doctor, whom he had
heard described as a shrewd man, believed in the revelations at which he
had assisted; or, was it possible—could he have been accessory to—Oh,
no, it could not be!
The student, as I have said, had a sort of liking for the supernatural,
and although now and then he had experienced a qualm in his solitary
college chamber at dead of night, when, as he read a well-authenticated
horror, the old press creaked suddenly, or the door of the inner-room
swung slowly open of itself, it yet was “a pleasing terror” that
thrilled him; and now as he lay this night awake, with a patch of
moonlight spread askance on the floor—for Aunt Dinah insisted on a
curfew, and he, “preferring the light that heaven sheds” to no lamp at
all, left the window-shutter a little open, and for a while allowed his
eyes to wander over the old-fashioned and faded furniture of the
apartment, and his fancy to wander among those dreams of superstition
with which he rather liked to try his courage.
He conned over his aunt’s story of the toad, recounted to him by Doctor
Drake, and which he had never heard before, until the nodding shadow of
the sprig of jessamine on the floor took the shape of the sprawling
reptile, and seemed to swagger clumsily towards his bed, and every noise
in the curtains suggested its slimy clamberings.
Youth, fatigue, pure country air, in a little while overpowered these
whimsies, and William Maubray fell into a deep sleep.
I am now going to relate a very extraordinary incident; but upon my
honour the narrative is true. William Maubray dreamed that he was in the
room in which he actually lay; that he was in bed, and that the
moonlight entered the room, just as he had seen it before going to
sleep. He thought that he heard a heavy tread traverse the room over his
head; he heard the same slow and ponderous step descend the narrow back
stair, that was separated from him only by the wall at the back of his
bed. He knew intuitively that the person thus approaching came in quest
of him, and he lay expecting, in a state of unaccountable terror. The
handle of his door turned, and it seemed that his intending visitor
paused, having opened the door about a hand’s breadth, and William knew
that he had only suspended, not abandoned his purpose, be it what it
might. Then the door swung slowly open, and in the deep shadow, a figure
of gigantic stature entered, paused beside his bed, and seized his wrist
with a tremendous gripe.
For a time, unable to stir, he remained passive under its pressure. Then
with a horrified struggle he awoke. There was no figure visible, but his
wrist was actually compressed in a cold grasp, and, with a ghastly
ejaculation, he sprang from his bed, and was released.
He had no means of lighting a candle; he had nothing for it but to
bounce to the window, fling curtains and shutters wide, and admit the
full flood of moonlight, which revealed the contents of the room, and
showed that no figure but his own was there. But there were the marks of
the grasp that had held him still visible. He secured his door, and made
search, in a state of horror, but was convinced. There was no visible
intruder in the chamber.
Now William got back into his bed. For the first time in his life he had
experienced a paroxysm of that wild fear with which it had been so often
his delight to trifle. He heard the clock at the stair-head strike hour
after hour, and at last, after having experienced every stage in the
subsidence of such horrors, fairly overcome by fatigue, he sunk to
sleep.
How welcome and how beautiful shone the morning! Slanting by his window,
the sunbeam touched the quivering jessamine leaves, and the clustering
roses, and in the dewy air he heard the chirp and whistle of the happy
birds. He threw up his window and breathed the perfumed air, and
welcomed all the pleasant sounds of morning in that pleasant season.
“The cock he crew,
Away then flew
The fiends from the church-door.”
And so the uncomfortable and odious shadows of the night winged their
foul flight before these cheerful influences, and William Maubray,
though he felt the want of his accustomed sleep, ran down the well-known
stairs, and heard with a happy heart from Winnie Dobbs that his kind old
aunt was ever so much better.
Doctor Drake had withdrawn from his uncomfortable bivouac, carrying with
him his nightcap and slippers, and hastening to his toilet in the
pleasant town of Saxton, where, no doubt, Miss Letty cross-questioned
him minutely upon the occurrences of the night.
I have said before that the resources of Gilroyd were nothing very
remarkable; still there was the Saxton Cricket Club, who practised
zealously, and always welcomed William, whose hit to leg was famous, and
even recorded as commendable in the annual volume of the great Mr.
Lillywhite; where he was noted, in terms that perplexed Aunt Dinah, as a
promising young bat, with a good defence. He fished a little; and he
played at fives with young Trevor of Revington, whom nobody very much
liked—the squire of Saxton, who assumed territorial and other airs that
were oppressive, although Revington was only two thousand five hundred
pounds a year; but in that modest neighbourhood, he was a very important
person, and knew that fact very well.
He had of late distinguished Violet with a slight admiration, that ought
to have been gratifying. Once or twice he paid old Miss Perfect a little
neighbourly, condescending visit, and loitered a good deal about the
garden, and that acre and a half of shrubbery, which she called “the
grounds.” He sometimes joined in the walk home from church, and
sometimes in other walks; and Aunt Perfect was pleased and favourable,
and many of the Saxton mothers and daughters were moved to envy and
malice.
“I played to-day,” said William, giving an account of his hours at tea
to the ladies, “two rubbers of fives; with whom do you think?”
He stopped, smiling slily on Violet, who was steadfastly looking down on
Miss Perfect’s crest on her tea-spoon.
“Well, I’m sure you know by that unerring instinct which poets speak
of,” said William, “but it is hardly fair to ask you to name him.”
Violet looked up, having blushed very prettily, but not very well
pleased.
“Of course I mean Trevor—Vane Trevor—of Revington. It sounds very well.
Trevor was two years my senior at school; he left at the end of the
third half after I came; that makes him nearly twenty-five now. How old
are you, Vi?—you’d make a very pretty mistress of Revington; yes,
indeed, Vi, or anywhere else. Don’t be vexed, but tell me exactly how
old you are.”
He tapped with his pencil on the table to hasten her answer, as he
looked at her, smiling a little sadly.
“How old?” she repeated.
“Well?”
“Past seventeen. Why do you want to know?” she added laughing.
“Well, he’s not quite five-and-twenty yet; only twenty-four to your
seventeen. Seven years is a very pretty difference.”
“What _are_ you talking about, William? This kind of thing is thought
very funny: it is very disagreeable. If people will talk nonsense, do
let it be amusing. You used to be sometimes amusing.”
“That was long ago, when I told you ‘Sinbad the Sailor,’ and ‘The
Romance of the Forest;’ before the romance of the shrubbery commenced.”
“Folly!” exclaimed Violet.
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