CHAPTER CLXX.
[Chapter 188]
THE VAMPYRE. —THE FLIGHT. —THE WATCHMAN IN THE VALE OF HEALTH.
A death-like stillness now was over the whole scene, and those who had
partially exhumed the body stood as still as statues, waiting the event which
they looked forward to as certain to ensue.
The clear beauty and intensity of the moonbeams increased each moment,
and the whole surrounding landscape was lit up with a perfect flood of soft,
silvery light. The old church stood out in fine relief, and every tree, and
every wild flower, and every blade of grass in the churchyard, could be seen
in its finest and most delicate proportions and construction.
The lid of the coffin was wrenched up on one side to about six inches in
height, and that side faced the moon, so that some rays, it was quite clearly
to be seen, found their way into that sad receptacle for the dead. A quarter
of an hour, however, passed away, and nothing happened.
"Are you certain he is one of us?" whispered Varney.
"Quite, I have known it years past. He had the mark upon him."
"Enough. Behold."
A deep and dreadful groan came from the grave, and yet it could hardly be
called a groan; it was more like a howl, and the lid which was partially open,
was visibly agitated.
"He comes," whispered one.
"Hush," said another, "hush; our duty will be done when he stands upon
the level ground. Hush, let him hear nothing, let him know nothing, since we
will not aid him. Behold, behold."
They all looked down into the grave, but they betrayed no signs of
emotion, and the sight they saw there was such as one would have supposed
would have created emotion in the breast of any one at all capable of
feeling. But then we must not reason upon these strange frightful existences
as we reason upon human nature such as we usually know it.
The coffin lid was each moment more and more agitated. The deep
frightful groans increased in number and sound, and then the corpse stretched
out one ghastly hand from the open crevice and grasped despairingly and
frantically at the damp earth that was around.
There was still towards one side of the coffin sufficient weight of mould
that it would require some strenght to turn it off, but as the dead man
struggled within his narrow house it kept falling aside in lumps, so that his
task of exhumation became each moment an easier one.
At length he uttered a strange wailing shriek, and by a great effort
succeeded in throwing the coffin lid quite open, and then he sat up, looking
so horrible and ghastly in the grave clothes, that even the vampyres that were
around that grave recoiled a little.
"Is it done?" said Varney.
"Not yet," said he who had summoned the to the fearful rite, and so
assumed a sort of direction over them, "not yet; we will not assist him, but
we may not leave him before telling him who and what he is."
"Do so now."
The corpse stood up in the coffin, and the moonlight fell full upon him.
"Vampyre arise," said he who had just spoken to Varney. "Vampyre arise,
and do your work in the world until your doom shall be accomplished. Vampyre
arise—arise. Pursue your victims in the mansion and in the cottage. Be a
terror and a desolation, go you where you may, and if the hand of death strike
you down, the cold beams of the moon shall restore you to new life. Vampyre
arise, arise!"
"I come, I come!" shrieked the corpse.
In another moment the five vampyres who had dug him from the grave were
gone.
Moaning, shrieking, and groaning he made some further attempts to get out
of the deep grave. He clutched at it in vain, the earth crumbled beneath him,
and it was only at last by dint of reaching up and dragging in the displaced
material that lay in a heap at the sides, so that in a few minutes it formed a
mound for him to stand upon in the grave, and he was at length able to get
out.
Then, although he sighed, and now and then uttered a wailing shriek as he
went about his work, he with a strange kind of instinct, began to carefully
fill up the grave from which he had but just emerged, nor did he cease from
his occupation until he had finished it, and so carefully shaped the mound of
mould and turf over it that no one would have thought it had been disturbed.
When this work was done a kind of madness seemed to seize him, and he
walked to the gate of the grave yard, which opens upon Church-street, and
placing his hands upon the sides of his mouth he produced such an appalling
shriek that it must have awakened everybody in Hampstead.
Then, turning, he fled like a hunted hare in the other direction, and
taking the first turning to the right ran up a lane called Frognal-lane, and
which is parallel to the town, for a town Hampstead may be fairly called now,
although it was not then.
By pursuing this lane, he got upon the outskirts of the heath, and then
turning to the right again, for, with a strange pertinacity he always kept, as
far as he could, his face towards the light of the moon, he rushed down a deep
hollow, where there was a cluster of little cottages, enjoying such repose
that one would have thought the flutter of an awakened bird upon the wing
would have been heard.
It was quite clear that the new vampyre had as yet no notion of what he
was about, or where he was going, and that he was with mere frantic haste
speeding along, from the first impulse of his frightful nature.
The place into which he had now plunged, is called the Vale of Health:
now a place of very favourite resort, but then a mere collection of white
faced cottages, with a couple of places that might be called villas. A
watchman went his nightly rounds in that place. And it so happened that the
guardian of the Vale had just roused himself up at this juncture, and made up
his mind to make his walk of observation, when he saw the terrific figure of a
man attired in grave clothes coming along with dreadful speed towards him, as
if to take the Vale of Health by storm.
The watchman was so paralysed by fear that he could not find strength
enough to spring his rattle, although he made the attempt, and held it out at
arm's length, while his eyes glared with perfect ferocity, and his mouth was
wide enough open to nourish the idea, that after all he had a hope of being
able to swallow the spectre.
But, nothing heeding him, the vampyre came wildly on.
Fain now would the petrified watchman have got out of the way, but he
could not, and in another moment he was dashed down to the earth, and trodden
on by the horrible existence that knew not what it did.
A cloud came over the moon, and the vampyre sunk down, exhausted, by a
garden-wall, and there lay as if dead, while the watchman, who had fairly
fainted away, lay in a picturesque attitude on his back, not very far off.
Half an hour passed, and a slight mist-like rain began to fall.
The vampyre slowly rose to his feet, and commenced wringing his hands and
moaning, but his former violence of demeanour had passed away. That was but
the first flush of new life, and now he seemed to be more fully aware of who
and what he was.
He shivered as he tottered slowly on, until he came to where the watchman
lay, and then he divested that guardian of the Vale of his greatcoat, his hat,
and some other portions of his apparel, all of which he put on himself, still
slightly moaning as he did so, and ever and anon stopping to make a gesture of
despair.
When this operation was completed, he slunk off into a narrow path which
led on to the heath again, and there he seemed to waver a little, whether he
would go towards London, or the country. At length it seemed that he decided
upon the former course, and he walked on at a rapid pace right through
Hampstead, and down the hill towards London, the lights of which would be seen
gleaming in the distance.
When the watchman did recover himself, the first thing he did was, to be
kind enough to rouse every body up from their sleep in the Vale of Health, by
springing his rattle at a prodigious rate, and by the time he had roused up
the whole neighbourhood, he felt almost ready to faint again at the bare
recollection of the terrible apparition that had knocked him down.
The story in the morning was told all over the place, with many additions
to it of course, and it was long afterwards before the inhabitants of the Vale
could induce another watchman, for that one gave up the post, to run the risk
of such a visitation.
And the oddest thing of all was, that the watchman declared that he
caught a glance at the countenance, and that it was like that of a Mr. Brooks,
who had only been buried the day previous, that if he had not known that
gentleman to be dead and buried, he should have thought it was he himself gone
mad.
But there was the grave of Mr. Brooks, with its circular mound of earth,
all right enough; and then Mr. B. was known to have been such a respectable
man. He went to the city every day, and used to do so just for the purpose of
granting audiences to ladies and gentlemen who might be labouring under any
little pecuniary difficulties, and accommodating them. Kind Mr. Brooks. He
only took one hundred pounds per cent. Why should he be a Vampyre? Bless
him! Too severe, really!
There were people who called him a bloodsucker while he lived, and now he
was one practically, and yet he had his own pew at the church, and subscribed
a whole guinea a year to a hospital —he did, although people did say it was
in order that he might pack off any of his servants at once to it in case of
illness. But then the world is so censorious.
To this day the watchman's story of the apparition that visited the Vale
of Health is talked of by the old women who make what they call tea for Sunday
parties at nine pence a head. But it is time now that we go back to London,
and see what is taking place at the hotel where the Lakes are staying, and how
the villany of the uncle thrives —that villany of which he actually had the
face to give such an exposition to Mr. Lee the clerk of the attorney.
Let us hope that the right will still overcome the injustice that is
armed against it, and that Lord Lake and his beautiful child may not fall
victims to the machinations that are brought into play agianst them, by those
who ought to have been their best friends.
—