University of Virginia Library

7. CHAPTER VII.

The last strokes of the house-clock, telling the solemn hour of
midnight, awoke the old man from his uneasy slumbers. The
lamp had gone out, and all was dark and silent. In a moment,
however, the same prolonged, sepulchral groan, that heralded
the apparition of the preceding night, resounded through the
room; and the next instant, the same fearful figure was dimly
seen standing in the middle of the floor, looking grimly down on
its affrighted victim.

“Obdurate mortal!” it at length said, in low, deep, accents,—
“thinkest thou to elude the spirit thy misdeeds have called up,
by guarding thyself with bolts and doors? Twice hast thou
disregarded my coming;—now I am permitted to speak to thee
and utter my last warning. Know then, guilty wretch, that yet
forty days are allowed thee to cause the wrong to be righted—
the stricken heart to be restored to happiness. Heed the condition
of mercy, else I then come again to take thee hence!”

The apparition then gradually fell back towards the door, the
grating bolt flew back, the door opened and the figure vanished
in the entrance, leaving the old man, sitting mute on the bed,
with his eyes starting from their sockets, his hair bristling up
on his head, and his hands desperately clutching the bed clothes,
in the overpowering fear that had seized him; nor did the disappearance
of the dreadful object this time bring the accustomed
relief. His spirit, at the thought of what he had seen and
heard, died within him, his strength was gone, and for some
time all power of utterance was denied him. After a while,
however, feeble and distressed cries began to break from his lips,
and he shrieked out the names of his servant and the other
members of the family by turns. But all slept too soundly or
were too far distant to hear him. And the poor wretch was
compelled to remain alone, sprawling helplessly on his bed and

moaning in his fear and distress, or crying in vain for help, till
the long and eagerly desired morning light appeared and ended
his night of horrors.

Shack was the first one to discover the situation of his master.
As the former rose and came out from his bed room, his
attention was arrested by the sounds of moans and deep sighs,
coming from the apartment of the latter; and he at once turned
in that direction, and perceiving the door standing open, concluded
he would go in to see what was the matter. But he stopped
short at the very entrance, in surprise and alarm, at the spectacle
that there met his eyes. The old man sat crouching on the
bed amidst the deranged and twisted bed clothes, with a cold
sweat standing in drops on his haggard face, and with a countenance
exhibiting the very picture of misery and despair. His
grizzled hair, during the night, had changed to milky whiteness,
his strained eye-balls were bloodshot, his cheeks sunken, and
his whole appearance, indeed, so altered, that his servant, in
any other place would have scarcely recognized him.

“Oh, Shack!” exclaimed the old man, piteously.

“What is the matter, Mr. Hosmer, what has happened?” asked
the other, in evident concern, as he approached the bedside.

The old man made no reply, but attempted to adjust the bed
clothes around him.

“Master is sick,” resumed Shack, after awaiting a moment for
an answer,

“Shan't I call the folks up, and then go for the doctor?”

“No, no,” said the old man, feebly, resuming his wonted caution
and making an effort to arouse himself, “no, don't do it, nor
ask any questions, nor say anything to any body about what
you have seen. I have had a bad night, but shall be better soon.
Help me on with my clothes that I may get out of this accursed
room.”

Shack then assisted him to dress, supported him down stairs,
and placed him in an armed chair in the common sitting room,
where the family soon assembled around him, with manifestations
of wonder and alarm at his strangely altered appearance.
He, however, carefully concealed from them the true cause of
his condition, and pretending to attribute all to a sudden fit of
illness, of which he was now better, sunk into his usual reserve.

But common observation taught them, that something extraordinary
had happened to him, and his appearance through the
day, during which he continued feeble, nervous and dejected,
confirmed their opinion, and convinced all who saw him, that,
in some mysterious way, the old man had received a shock, both
in body and mind, from which he would not speedily recover.
And they were right in their conjectures: From that night Old
Jude Hosmer was an altered man. The impossibility that his
door could have been unlocked by any one from the out side,
and the equal impossibility, he conceived, after his close examination
of his room, that aught of flesh and blood could have got
there in any other way, had, from the first sight of the apparition,
destroyed all his hopes that his nocturnal visitant might be
an earthly one; and yielding to the dreadful thought, which, in
spite of the warnings of conscience, he had twice rejected, that
his monitor was the shade of an injured brother from the grave,
he listened to the supernatural message as to a doom that was
neither to be questioned nor avoided.

“All that a man hath will he give for his life:”—Old Jude
Hosmer, as well he might be, was always afraid to die; and as
he had gone on increasing in years and crimes, the fear of death
had been sinking deeper and deeper in his heart. From the first
of his three fearful warnings, conscience, as before intimated, had
secretly interpreted the Mene Tekel of the mystery to mean the
relinquishment of his ill gotten possessions to the rightful owner,
but he had tried hard to blind himself to the interpretation and
struggled fearfully to avoid the sacrifice. Now, however, when
he had, at last, been smitten and humbled to the dust, in view
of the dreadful alternative, which was placed before him, and
which he was made to feel there was no way of escaping, every
motive and feeling, even the great ruling passion of his life, gave
way before this controlling terror. And goaded by his fears,
rather than any sincere penitence, he now, although he neither
received, or looked for, any further visitations, at present, from
his supernatural monitor,—he now, every day and hour, grew
more and more anxious to fulfill the condition which alone could
relieve him from his agonizing apprehensions of the menaced
doom.

As soon, therefore, as his strength, and the shattered condition

of his nerves would permit, which was not until several days
had elapsed, he commenced, in earnest, the work of unraveling
the web of iniquity, which had cost him so much time and plotting
to weave. And, as the first step, he sought out his niece
when alone, and gave up to her the acquittance he had obtained
from her in the manner before described, merely telling her, he
had discovered an error in his reckoning, much in her favor,
which, as he had concluded to make a new arrangement of his
affairs, would now soon be adjusted to her satisfaction.

With this deceptive announcement, for he could not be frank,
even in good work, he left her, greatly surprised, as well as
puzzled to comprehend the true reason, (the alleged one not being
fully credited by her) of the unexpected act, though she could
not help believing it in some way connected with the late mysterious
occurrences, which had so much disturbed him. Having
effected this first, and, as he conceived, the most important step
in righting the wronged one, without any exposure of his former
wickedness, which he seemed nearly as anxious as ever to
conceal, his mind became a little more tranquil; for the papers
having always been carefully kept in his own hands, he could
now complete the restoration of the embezzled property, by transfers
and conveyances, very easily, and with all the secrecy he
desired. But though he could thus easily restore the wronged
one to her rights of property, yet there was another part of the
requirement,—that of restoring her to the happiness he had destroyed—which
he had more difficulty in deciding how to perform.
He believed that Lucy would hold no communications with her
lover, even if she was requested, so long as she was under her
present impressions; and he could think of no way of removing
those impressions from her mind without confessing, or at least
betraying, his own agency in causing them. This he could not
bring himself to do. And in the dilemma, he soon resolved, that,
without consulting her at all on the subject, he would himself
write directly to Fisher such a letter as would naturally bring
him to the house, trusting, that when the lovers were brought
together, explanations would follow and a reconciliation soon be
effected. Accordingly he wrote a respectful note to the young
man, apologizing for his late treatment, which arose, he falsely
affirmed, wholly out of a misapprehension of the character of
the other, who, now that all objection was removed, was at full

liberty to resume his visits. Having thus written, Old Jude
secretly dispatched the letter to its destination, and awaited the
result with as much trembling solicitude as he ever did the
event of a lawsuit in which he had thousands at stake.

Lot, in the mean while, totally ignorant of all that had occurred
at Hosmer's, began to grow very uneasy at the failure of his
accustomed letters from Lucy, from whom he had not received
a syllable for nearly a fortnight; and he was meditating a trip
to the village of her residence to ascertain, if possible, whether
anything had there happened to cause the delinquency; when,
one morning, the newspaper-carrier, who had returned from that
section, late the evening before, handed him a double sealed
letter. Not remembering the hand writing, and supposing it
some message on professional matters, he threw it by, to be taken
up in the order of business. In the course of the forenoon, however,
it came up; when, carelessly breaking the seals, he read
and re-read, with feelings of mingled astonishment, and doubtfully
admitted delight, the unexpected contents. In twenty
minutes his fleet-footed poney stood saddled and pawing at his
door; while the master was seen within hastily plying his
brushes on coat, hat and boots, which, it seemed to him, in his
impatience, were never before so reluctant of polish. Within
three hours more, he dismounted his reeking horse at the office
door of his old friend and patron.

“Do you own that horse, Lot?” asked Stacy, poking his sarcastic
phiz from the window.

“Yes—how do you do?”

“Well—but if the beast is your own, who, in your village lies
at the point of death whom, it is supposed, one of our doctors
can save?”

“Do be serious, Squire,” said Lot now entering the office. “I
have called to consult you, before going somewhere else,—
There,” he added, taking out and handing the other Old Jude's
letter—“read that, and tell me whether it is genuine, and if so,
what has produced the unexpected change.”

“Genuine enough,” answered Stacy, after musing over the
letter a few moments—“It is his, clearly, and I rather guess,
under the circumstances, he is acting in earnest and without
trick, this time.”

“Why, what hold have you got of him?” asked Lot, eagerly—
“done any thing by way of legal proceedings?”

“Nothing,” replied the other, “nothing at all, since I saw you.
I have been worsted by the old fox, who doubtless overheard our
conversation from the back window there—completely worsted,
at every point; and, to crown all, he has settled off with Lucy,
already of age, I find, and coaxed her to give him a strong and
absolute discharge, on his giving her his note for the paltry sum
of two or three hundred dollars, and even that payable in cats
and dogs—Old Jude all over!”

“Outrageous! but has he contented himself with doing that?
Lucy has discontinued her letters to me wholly, and without
explanation, and yet I receive this letter from him inviting me
to resume my visits! What can it all mean?”

“I won't decide now. But something unusual has certainly
happened over there. It is reported in town, that the old man
has been haunted by a ghost. Some say—among whom is our
good old deacon, who has visited him, that he has been converted,
or is about to be—others have it, that he has had fits; and
all agree, that he is feeble, and has grown old, in appearance, ten
years within the last week.”

“This sounds very strangely—what is your version?”

“I have none to give you—I am waiting myself to see what
it will result in. But there is probably a relenting in the old
man towards you, Lot; and I would go and improve the advantage
he has given you to the utmost, lest it prove, as I fear, a
temporary one.