Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

“ Lowe was mightily taken with him. There was little warmth or veneration in that hard justice's nature. But Mr. Dangerfield had a way with him that few men with any sort of taste for the knowledge of evil could resist; and the cold-eyed justice of the peace hung on his words with an attentive rapture, and felt that he was drinking deep and pleasant draughts from the sparkling fountains of knowledge; and was really sorry, and shook him admiringly by the hand, when Dangerfield, who had special business at home, rose up in his brisk way, and flashed a farewell over the company from his spectacles. ”

“ He hated to think that a clever fellow was ever absolutely beggared in the world's great game. He turned his eye quickly from the Gazette, as it lay with other papers on the club table; for its grim pages seemed to look in his face with a sort of significance, as if they might some day or other have a small official duty to perform by him; and when an unexpected bankruptcy was announced by Cluffe or Toole in the club-room, it made his ear ring like a slap, and he felt sickish for half an hour after. ”

“ Dr. Walsingham, who had just been to see poor Mrs. Sturk—now grown into the habit of hoping, and sustained by the intense quiet fuss of the sick room—stopped for a moment at the door of the Phœnix, to answer the cronies there assembled, who had seen him emerge from the murdered man's house.
'He is in a profound lethargy,' said the worthy divine. ''Tis a subsidence—his life, Sir, stealing away like the fluid from the clepsydra—less and less left every hour—a little time will measure all out.'
'What the plague's a clepsydra?' asked Cluffe of Toole, as they walked side by side into the club-room. ”

“ Devereux could not help seeing pretty Lilias over the way, who was listening to handsome Mervyn, as it seemed, with interest, and talking also her pleasant little share. He was no dunce, that Mervyn, nor much of a coxcomb, and certainly no clown, Devereux thought; but as fine a gentleman, to speak honestly, and as handsome, as well dressed, and as pleasant to listen to, with that sweet low voice and piquant smile, as any. Besides he could draw, and had more yards of French and English verses by rote than Aunt Becky owned of Venetian lace and satin ribbons, and was more of a scholar than he. ”

“ Mervyn, in the meantime, had had his solitary meal in the famous back parlour of the Phœnix, where the newspapers lay, and all comers were welcome. He was by no means a bad hero to look at, if such a thing were needed. His face was pale, melancholy, statuesque—and his large enthusiastic eyes, suggested a story and a secret—perhaps a horror. Most men, had they known all, would have wondered with good Doctor Walsingham, why, of all places in the world, he should have chosen the little town where he now stood for even a temporary residence. ”

“ So up stairs went Mrs. Sturk in a fuss.
'That's it,' said Toole so soon as they were alone, nodding two or three times dejectedly, and looking very glum. 'It's set in—the inflammation—it's set in, Sir. He's gone. That's the rigor.'
'Poor gentleman,' said Lowe, after a short pause, 'I'm much concerned for him, and for his family.'
''Tis a bad business,' said Toole, gloomily, like a man that's frightened. And he followed Mrs. Sturk, leaving Lowe adjusting his papers in the parlour.
Toole found his patient laden with blankets, and shivering like a man in an ague, with blue sunken face. ”

“ I've done with life—I hate it. I'll volunteer. 'Tis my first thought in the morning, and my last at night, how well I'd like a bullet through my brain or heart. D—— the world, d—— feeling, d—— memory. I'm not a man that can always be putting prudential restraints upon myself. I've none of those plodding ways. The cursed fools that spoiled me in my childhood, and forsake me now, have all to answer for—I charge them with my ruin.' And he launched a curse at them (meaning his aunt) which startled the plump soul of honest little Puddock. ”

“ I can't describe how I pity that poor soul, his wife—what's to become of her and her helpless brood I know not.'
Slowe grunted a dismal assent, and the major, with a dolorous gaze, blew a thin stream of tobacco-smoke into the night air, which floated off like the ghost of a sigh towards the glimmering window of Sturk's bed-room. So they all grew silent. It seemed they had no more to say, and that, in their minds, the dark curtain had come down upon the drama of which the 'noble Barney,' as poor Mrs. Sturk called him, was hero. ”

“ The knowledge of good is all yours: you see nothing but the good that men have; you see it—and, I dare say, truly—where I can't. The darker knowledge is mine.'
Puddock, who thought he thoroughly understood King John, Shylock, and Richard III., was a good deal taken aback by Devereux's estimate of his penetration.
'Well, I don't think you know me, Devereux,' resumed he with a thoughtful lisp. 'I'm much mistaken, or I could sound the depths of a villain's soul as well as most men.'
'And if you did you'd find it full of noble qualities,' said Dick Devereux. ”

“ Did you ever see such a fish? He'd have shot himself or Nutter, to a certainty. But there's a chance yet: we forgot the Nightingale Club; they're still in the Phœnix.'
'Pooh, Sir! they're all tailors and green-grocers,' said Toole, in high dudgeon.
'There are two or three good names among them, however,' answered Devereux; and by this time they were on the threshold of the Phœnix.
'Larry,' he cried to the waiter, 'the Nightingale Club is there, is it not?' glancing at the great back parlour door.
'Be the powers! Captain, you may say that,' said Larry, with a wink, and a grin of exquisite glee. ”

“ Curiosity is an idle minx, and a soul laden like the clerk's has no entertainment for her. But when one of the three gentlemen who sat together—an honest but sad-looking person with a flaxen wig, and a fat, florid face—placing his hand in the breast of his red plush waistcoat, and throwing himself back in his chair, struck up a dismal tune, with a certain character of psalmody in it, the clerk's ear was charmed for a moment, and he glanced on the singer and sipped some punch; and the ballad, rude and almost rhymeless, which he chanted had an undefined and unpleasant fascination for Irons. ”

“ Puddock and Devereux on this eventful night, as we remember, having shaken hands at the door-steps, turned and went up stairs together, very amicably again, to the captain's drawing-room.
So Devereux, when they returned to his lodgings, had lost much of his reserve, and once on the theme of his grief, stormed on in gusts, and lulls, and thunder, and wild upbraidings, and sudden calms; and the good-natured soul of little Puddock was touched, and though he did not speak, he often dried his eyes quietly, for grief is conversant not with self, but with the dead, and whatever is generous moves us. ”

“ At this moment the door opened, and Doctor Dillon's carbuncled visage and glowing eyes appeared.
'Is there a steady woman there—not a child, you know, Ma'am? A—you'll do (to Katty) . Come in here, if you please, and we'll tell you what you're to do.'
So, being nothing loath, she made her courtesy and glided in.
'Oh! doctor,' gasped poor Mrs. Sturk, holding by the hem of his garment, 'do you think it will kill him?'
'No, Ma'am—not to-night, at any rate,' he answered, drawing back; but still she held him. ”

“ Dr. Walsingham, with the aid of his guide, in the meantime, had reached the little garden in front of the old house, and the gay tinkle of a harpsichord and the notes of a sweet contralto suddenly ceased as he did so; and he said—smiling in the dark, in a pleasant soliloquy, for he did not mind John Tracy,—old John was not in the way—'She always hears my step—always—little Lily, no matter how she's employed,' and the hall-door opened, and a voice that was gentle, and yet somehow very spirited and sweet, cried a loving and playful welcome to the old man. ”

“ As Toole touched his pulse, and saw him swallow a spoonful of chicken broth, and parried poor Mrs. Sturk's eager quivering pleadings for his life with kind though cautious evasions, he rightly judged that the figure that lay there was more than half in the land of ghosts already—that the enchanter who met him in the Butcher's Wood, and whose wand had traced those parallel indentures in his skull, had not only exorcised for ever the unquiet spirit of intrigue, but wound up the tale of his days. ”

“ Then he took Puddock under his arm. Puddock had to stoop to pick up his hat which the general had dislodged. And so the general walks him slowly towards the house; sometimes jogging his elbow a little under his ribs; sometimes calling a halt and taking his collar in his finger and thumb, thrusting him out a little, and eyeing him over with a sort of swagger, and laughing and coughing, and whooping, and laughing again, almost to strangulation; and altogether extraordinarily boisterous, and hilarious, and familiar, as Cluffe thought, who viewed this spectacle from the avenue. ”

“ A worthy man was Sturk, and, in some respects, resembled the prophet, Shylock; but you know nothing of him—why the plague don't you read your Bible, Toole?'
'Well,' said Toole, candidly, 'I don't know the Old Testament as well as the New; but certainly, whoever he's like, he's held out wonderfully. 'Tis nine weeks since he met that accident, and there he's still, above ground; but that's all—just above ground, you see.'
'And how's Cluffe?'
'Pooh, Cluffe indeed! Nothing ever wrong with him but occasional over-eating. ”

“ And what is this new business of Doctor Sturk? I am distracted with uncertainties and fears. I hear so little, and imperfectly from you, I cannot tell from your dark hints whether some new danger lurks in those unlooked-for quarters. I know not what magic binds me so to you, to endure the misery of this strange deceitful mystery—but you are all mystery; and yet be not—you cannot be—my evil genius. You will not condemn me longer to a wretchedness that must destroy me. I conjure you, declare yourself. What have we to fear? ”

“ You need fear no interruption.'
'Ay, I know; the house is haunted, they say, but dead men tell no tales. 'Tis the living I fear, I thought it would be darker—the clouds broke up strangely; 'tis as much as my life's worth to me to be seen near this Tyled House; and never you speak to me nor seem to know me when you chance to meet me, do you mind, Sir? I'm bad enough myself, but there's some that's worse.'
'Tis agreed, there shall be no recognition,' answered Mervyn. ”

“ Dangerfield once or twice attacked Toole rather tartly about Sturk's case.
'Can nothing be done to make him speak? Five minutes' consciousness would unravel the mystery.'
Then Toole would shrug, and say, 'Pooh—pooh! my dear Sir, you know nothing.'
'Why, there's life!'
'Ay, the mechanical functions of life, but the brain's over-powered,' replied Toole, with a wise frown.
'Well, relieve it.'
'By Jupiter, Sir, you make me laugh,' cried Toole with a grin, throwing up his eyebrows. ”

“ I like the fancy,' cried the gay captain, sending half-a-crown down stairs to his 'two-legged ponies,' as people pleasantly called them. 'I'd rather walk with you than jog along in a chair by myself, my gay fellows, any day.'
Most young fellows of spirit, at the eve of a ball, have their heads pretty full. There is always some one bright particular star to whom, even as they look on their own handsome features in the mirror, their adoration is paid.
Puddock's shoe-buckles flashed for Gertrude Chattesworth, as he turned out his toes. ”

“ For Mary Matchwell, at the Mills, the tidings which had thrown the town into commotion had but a solitary and a selfish interest. She was glad that Nutter was exculpated. She had no desire that the king should take his worldly goods to which she intended helping herself: otherwise he might hang or drown for ought she cared. Dirty Davy, too, who had quaked about his costs, was greatly relieved by the turn which things had taken; and the plain truth was that, notwithstanding his escape from the halter, things looked very black and awful for Charles Nutter and his poor little wife, Sally. ”

“ Dangerfield—cunning fellow—went first to Aunt Becky with his proposal; and Aunt Becky liked it—determined it should prosper, and took up and conducted the case with all her intimidating energy and ferocity. But Gertrude's character had begun to show itself of late in new and marvellous lights, and she fought her aunt with cool, but invincible courage; and why should she marry, and above all, why marry that horrid, grim old gentleman, Mr. Dangerfield. No, she had money enough of her own to walk through life in maiden meditation, fancy free, without being beholden to anybody for a sixpence. ”

“ Now it was, 'Fairy, you savage, let that pig alone!' a yell and a scuffle—'Juno, drop it, you slut'—or 'Cæsar, you blackguard, where are you going?'
'Look at Sturk there, with his lordship,' said Toole, to the fair Magnolia, with a wink and a nod, and a sneering grin. 'Good natured dog that—ha! ha! You'll find he'll oust Nutter at last, and get the agency; that's what he's driving at—always undermining somebody.' Doctor Sturk and Lord Castlemallard were talking apart on the high ground, and the artillery surgeon was pointing with his cane at distant objects. ”

“ Now this soliloquy, which broke into an actual mutter every here and there, occurred at about eleven o'clock a.m., in the little low parlour of the Brass Castle, that looked out on the wintry river.
Mr. Dangerfield knew the virtues of tobacco, so he charged his pipe, and sat grim, white, and erect by the fire. It is not everyone that is 'happy thinking,' and the knight of the silver spectacles followed out his solitary discourse, with his pipe between his lips, and saw all sorts of things through the white narcotic smoke. ”

“ Mervyn, had taken that awful old haunted habitation, the Tiled House 'beyant at Ballyfermot,' and was going to stay there, and wondered no one had told him of the mysterious dangers of that desolate mansion.
It stood by a lonely bend of the narrow road. Lilias had often looked upon the short, straight, grass-grown avenue with an awful curiosity at the old house which she had learned in childhood to fear as the abode of shadowy tenants and unearthly dangers.
'There are people, Sally, nowadays, who call themselves free-thinkers, and don't believe in anything—even in ghosts,' said Lilias. ”

“ There's no such delicate waist anywhere.' And she set her two slender little forefingers and thumbs together, as if spanning it. 'You've no chance beside her, Gertie; she'll set all the young fellows a-sighing and simpering.'
'You wicked little rogue! I'll beat you black and blue, for making fun of old Aunt Becky,' cried Miss Rebecca, and ran a little race at her, about two inches to a step; her fan raised in her finger and thumb, and a jolly smile twinkling in her face, for she knew it was true about her waist, and she liked to be quizzed by the daring little girl. ”