Bram Stoker

“ In the time that elapsed between that one momentary glimpse of Knockcalltecrore and our arrival at the foot of the boreen a whole lifetime seemed to me to have elapsed, and in my thoughts and harrowing anxieties I recalled—as drowning men are said to do before death—every moment, every experience since I had first come within sight of the western sea. The blackness of my fears seemed only a carrying inward of the surrounding darkness, which was made more pronounced by the flickering of our lanterns, and more dread by the sounds of the tempest with which it was laden. ”

“ Norah threw herself backward with her feet against a projecting piece of the rock, and I felt that if we could both hold out long enough I was saved.
Little by little I gained! I drew closer and closer to the rock! Closer! closer still! till with one hand I grasped the rock itself, and hung on, breathless, in blind desperation. I was only just able to support myself, for there was a strange dragging power in the viscous mass that held me, and greatly taxed my strength, already exhausted in the terrible struggle for life. The bog was beginning to move! ”

“ Murdock took his spade and began to remove the filth and rubbish from the mass. And in a very few moments his discovery proclaimed itself.
There lay before us a rusty iron gun-carriage! This was what we had dragged with so much effort from the bottom of the bog; and beside it Murdock sat down with a scowl of black disappointment.
"Come away!" said Dick. "Poor devil, I pity him! It is hard to find even a god of that kind worthless!" And so we turned and left Murdock sitting beside the gun-carriage and the slime, with a look of baffled greed which I hope never to see on any face again. ”

“ Murtagh Murdock, I have a word to say to you—a solemn word of warning. Ye have to-day acted the part of Ahab towards Naboth the Jezreelite; beware of his fate! You have coveted your neighbour's goods—you have used your power without mercy; you have made the law an engine of oppression. Mark me! It was said of old that what measure men meted should be meted out to them again. God is very just. 'Be not deceived, God is not mocked. For what things a man shall sow, those also shall he reap.' Ye have sowed the wind this day—beware lest you reap the whirlwind! ”

“ I heard the steps on the plateau, and a voice came:—
“Och! an’ isn’t it a purty view, yer ’an’r?” I leaped to my feet with a feeling that was positively murderous. The revulsion was too great, and I broke into a burst of semi-hysterical laughter. There stood Andy—with ragged red head and sun-scorched face—in his garb of eternal patches, bleached and discoloured by sun and rain into a veritable coat of many colours—gazing at the view with a rapt expression, and yet with one eye half-closed in a fixed but unmistakable wink, as though taking the whole majesty of nature into his confidence. ”

“ I thought the opportunity was a fair one, and I lifted it to my lips and said:—
“Norah! I think I may say a word before your father and my friend. This hand—this beautiful hand,” and I kissed it again, “is dearer to me a thousand times, because it can do, and has done, honest work; and I only hope that in all my life I may be worthy of it.” I was about to kiss it yet again, but Norah drew it gently away. Then she shifted her stool a little, and came closer to me. Her father saw the movement, and said simply:—
“Go to him, daughter. He is worth it!—he sthruck a good blow for ye this night.” ”

“ The night was now well on, and there were signs of the storm abating; occasionally the wind would fall off a little, and the rain beat with less dreadful violence. In such moments some kind of light would be seen in the sky—or, to speak more correctly, the darkness would be less complete—and then the new squall which followed would seem by contrast with the calm to smite us with renewed violence. In one of these lulls we saw for an instant the mountain rise before us, its bold outline being shown darkly against a sky less black. ”

“ I suppose I must have shown something of my brooding fear in my face, for Dick, looking round at me after a period of silence, said suddenly:—
"Cheer up Art, old chap! Surely you, at any rate, have no cause to be down on your luck! Of all men that live, I should think you ought to be about the very happiest!"
"That's it, old fellow," I answered. "I fear that there must be something terrible coming. I shall never be quite happy till Norah and all of us are quite away from the Hill." ”

“ And yet, stay! who but Andy persisted in turning my thoughts to Norah, and more than once suggested my paying a visit to Shleenanaher to see her? No! Andy must be acquitted at all points: common justice demanded that. Who, then, was I to blame? Not Andy—not Dick, who was too noble and too loyal a friend to give any cause for such a thought. Had he not asked me at the first if the woman of my fancy was not this very woman; and had he not confessed his own love only when I answered him that it was not? No! Dick must be acquitted from blame! ”

“ The shuddering surface of the bog began to extend on every side to even the solid ground which curbed it, and with relief we saw that Dick and Joyce stood high up on a rock. All things on its surface seemed to melt away and disappear, as though swallowed up. This silent change or demoralization spread down in the direction of Murdock's house—but when it got to the edge of the hollow in which the house stood, it seemed to move as swiftly forward as water leaps down a cataract. ”

“ I found the bog here so swollen with rain that I had to make a long detour so as to get round to the western side. High up on the hill there was, I knew, a rough shelter for the cattle; and as it struck me that Joyce might have gone here to look after his stock, and that Norah had gone hither to search for him, I ran up to it. The cattle were there, huddled together in a solid mass behind the sheltering wall of sods and stones. I cried out as loudly as I could from the windward side, so that my voice would carry:—
"Norah! Norah! Joyce! Joyce! Are you there? Is anyone there?" ”

“ When we lifted and pulled the mass on the rock bank, Murdock rushed forward in a frenzied manner, and shouted to us:—
“Kape back! Hands off! It’s mine, I say, all mine! Don’t dar even to touch it, or I’ll do ye a harrum! Here, clear off! this is my land! Go!” and he turned on us with the energy of a madman and the look of a murderer.
I was so overcome with my physical exertions that I had not a word to say, but simply in utter weariness threw myself upon the ground; but Dick, with what voice he could command, said:—
“You’re a nice grateful fellow to men who have helped you! ”

“ And then I too arose, and took my way across the plateau, and climbed the rock, and walked down the boreen on my way for Carnaclif.
And then, and for the first time, did a thought strike me—one which for a moment made my blood run cold—Dick!
Aye—Dick! What about him? It came to me with a shudder, that my happiness—if it should be my happiness—must be based on the pain of my friend. Here, then, there was perhaps a clue to Norah's strange gravity! Could Dick have made a proposal to her? He admitted having spoken to her—why should he, too, not have been impulsive? ”

“ At such a moment a house in the track of the movement—unless it were built on the rock—would go down like a ship in a storm. Go down solid and in a moment, without warning and without hope!"
"Then with such a neighbour as a shifting bog, the only safe place for a house would be on a rock."—Before my eyes, as I spoke, rose the vision of Murdock's house, resting on its knoll of rock, and I was glad for one reason that there, at least, would be safety for Joyce—and his daughter. ”

“ Somehow the view seemed to tranquillize me in some degree. It may have been that there was some unconscious working of the mind which told me in some imperfect way that in a region quite within my range of vision, nothing could long remain hidden or unknown. Perhaps it was the stilly silence of the place. There was hardly a sound—the country people were all within doors at dinner, and even the sounds of their toil were lacking. From the west came a very faint breeze, just enough to bring the far-off, eternal roar of the surf. There was scarcely a sign of life. ”

“ We all went back together as fast as we could; and the sun that rose that morning rose on no happier group—despite the terror and the trouble of the night. Norah walked between her father and me, holding us both tightly, and Dick walked on my other side with his arm in mine. As we came within sight of the house, we met Miss Joyce—her face grey with anxiety. She rushed towards us, and flung her arms round Norah, and the two women rocked each other in their arms; and then we all kissed her—even Dick, to her surprise. ”

“ He cursed and blasphemed so outrageously that all were silent, and only the stern voice of the priest was heard:—
"Be silent Murtagh Murdock! Aren't you afraid that the God overhead will strike you dead? With such a storm as is raging as a sign of His power, you are a foolish man to tempt Him."
The man stopped suddenly, and a stern dogged sullenness took the place of his passion. The priest went on:—
"As for you, Phelim Joyce, you ought to be ashamed of yourself; ye're not one of my people, but I speak as your own clergyman would if he were here. ”

“ I do not know if philosophers have ever undertaken to say whether it is possible for a human being to be in love in the abstract—whether the something which the heart has a tendency to send forth needs a concrete objective point! It may be so; the swarm of bees goes from the parent hive with only the impulse of going—its settling is a matter of chance. At any rate I may say that no philosopher, logician, metaphysician, psychologist, or other thinker, of whatsoever shade of opinion, ever held that a man could be in love with a voice.
True that the unknown has a charm—omne ignotum pro magnifico. ”

“ Earth, sea and air all evidenced the triumph of nature, and told of her wild majesty and beauty. The air was still—ominously still. So still was all, that through the silence, that seemed to hedge us in with a sense of oppression, came the booming of the distant sea, as the great Atlantic swell broke in surf on the rocks or stormed the hollow caverns of the shore.
Even Andy, the driver, was for the nonce awed into comparative silence. ”

“ Remember that God has given a great mercy through your hands—and ye both must thank Him all the days of your life! And those poor men that met their death so horribly—poor Moynahan, in his drunken slumber! Men! it's a warning to ye all! Whenever ye may be tempted to take a glass too much, let the fate of that poor soul rise up before ye and forbid ye to go too far. As for that unhappy Murdock, may God forgive him and look lightly on his sins! I told him what he should expect—that the fate of Ahab and Jezebel would be his. ”

“ I waited and waited, and the time truly went on leaden wings. The afternoon sun smote the hill-top with its glare, more oppressive always than even the noontide heat.
I lingered on and lingered still, and hope died within me.
When six o’clock had come I felt that there was no [Pg 144] more chance for me that day; so I went sadly down the hill, and, after a glance for Dick’s sake at the cutting, sought the sheebeen where Andy had the horse ready harnessed in the car. I assumed as cheerful an aspect as I could, and flattered myself that I carried off the occasion very well. ”

“ The place was so near to Folkestone that after the wedding and an informal breakfast we could drive over to catch the mid-day boat. I lived the requisite time in Hythe, and complied with all the formalities.
I did not see my darling until we met in the church-porch, and then I gazed on her with unstinted admiration. Oh! what a peerless beauty she was! Every natural grace and quality seemed developed to the full. Every single grace of womanhood was there—every subtle manifestation of high breeding—every stamp of the highest culture. ”

“ You don't know what a relief it is to me to be able to speak of it to any living soul—how maddening it is to me to work for that scoundrel Murdock. You can understand now why I flared up at him so suddenly ere yesterday. I have a strong conviction on me that his service is devil's service as far as my happiness is concerned—and that I shall pay some terrible penalty for it."
"Nonsense, old fellow," said I, "Norah only wants to see you to know what a fine fellow you are. You won't mind my saying it, but you are the class of man that any woman would be proud of!" ”

“ At least Dick did; for, as to myself, I purposely disarranged my hair—unknown to Dick—in the hope that Norah would take me in hand again, and that I might once more experience the delicious sensation of a toilet aided by her sweet fingers.
Young men's ideas, however, are very crude; no one who knew either the Sex or the World would have fallen into such an absurd hope. When I came in with Dick, Norah—in spite of some marked hints, privately and secretly given to her—did not make either the slightest remark on my appearance, or the faintest suggestion as to improving it. ”

“ I did not even like to tell Dick the full extent of my woes.
Love has a modesty of its own, whose lines are boldly drawn, and whose rules are stern.
On more than one occasion I left the hotel secretly—after having ostensibly retired for the night—and wended my way to Knocknacar. As I passed through the sleeping country I heard the dogs bark in the cottages as I went by, but little other sound I ever heard except the booming of the distant sea. ”