University of Virginia Library

10. X.

“They hurried home in consternation. The
thought of Matilda was upon her brother; and she
regarded the events of the evening as ominous
of his fate. But why did the blood stains fall only
upon her husband? Why were her garments untouched?
This was a mystery to her; but not to
Carl. He thought he could explain it, but he forbore
to speak. He dared not. His thoughts
and feelings were not what they should have been.
He was guilty, in his secret soul, of improper feelings,

if not of improper wishes, and he knew it.
Supper was soon served, and, like a good wife,
regardful only of her husband, Matilda urged Carl
to eat, for she beheld his abstractedness. He ate
without knowing that he did so. She, however,
could eat nothing, and as soon as the repast was
over, she retired for the night. But Carl felt that
there was no sleep for him; and a feverish mood,
for which he could not account, prompted him to
sally forth. He would have gone to his wife's
chamber — he tried to do so — for he knew what
were her apprehensions, and he wished to soothe
them — but he could not. Something impelled
his footsteps abroad — a spirit beyond his own
drove him forward; and with a desperate mind
he rapidly hastened to the abbey, as if there, and
there only, he should find a solution of the marvel
which had distressed him. His heart seemed
to grow strong in proportion as his thoughts grew
wilful; and without any of those tremors which
had ever before possessed him when he rambled,
with a purely mental and not a personal feeling,
among the ruins, he boldly plunged into their recesses.

“The night was a clear, but not a bright one.
The stars were not numerous, but they were unclouded.
The air was still, and was only now

and then apparent in a slight breathing, as it came
through some little crevices in the wall. The silence
of the place was complete — was its solitude
complete also? Carl asked of himself the question,
as he walked beneath the massive archway of the
fabric — still solid and strong, though broken and
impending; for, the masons of old, wrought, not
less to make their works live than to live themselves.
They live, like all good workmen, in
their labors. The roof, broken in many places,
let in the scattered starlight, and sufficiently,
though imperfectly, revealed to him the place.
He went forward, full of sad and truant thoughts.
He took his seat upon one end of a dilapidated
stone which had often sustained him before. His
elbows rested upon his knees, and his hands supported
his head. It was in this posture that he
mused with feelings which sometimes brought him
back to impulses and a course of reflection not
unworthy of his better nature. They reproached
him with the heartlessness of his curiosity, as if it
were not the tendency of mind always — great mind,
which overlooks the time, and lives for God, and
for the species — to disregard nice affections, and
the tender blossoms which decay.

“`Herman, Herman!' he exclaimed, `I have
been unworthy of thee. Thou hast loved me
with the love of a brother, while I have thought

of thee even as the ancient augur of the victim,
which he slaughtered for unholy wisdom! I have
prayed in my secret soul — I have prayed for thy
death — that I might have improper knowledge.'

“Again did a slight laugh come to his ears.
He looked up with a shudder. A small blue light
crawled along upon the opposite wall, like some
slimy reptile, and while Carl watched its progress
with solemn interest, the laugh was repeated
almost beside him. He started, and almost at the
same moment he felt one side of him grow chill.
A breath of ice seemed to penetrate him from the
east. He turned his eyes in that quarter, and the
spectacle that then met his gaze paralyzed every
faculty of his body. The form of Herman Ottfried
was there, sitting beside him on the other
end of the grave stone. He could not speak —
he could not move. His eyes were riveted upon
the spectre, and the glare which was sent back
from those of the unearthly visitant, was that of
hell. A scornful leer was in it — a giggling hate
— a venomous but laughing malice.

“`Her — Her — Herman!' Carl tried to speak,
but a monosyllable was all that he could utter.

“`Ha, ha, ha!' The vaulted abbey rang
with the echoes of that infernal laugh.

“`Mercy! mercy!' screamed the unhappy
Carl, as he lifted his hands and strove to close his

eyes against the dreadful presence. But the
elbows refused to bend — he could not raise them.
His knees in the mean time gave way, and he
sank senselessly upon the damp ground of the
abbey.