The Lady of the Shroud by Bram Stoker (book series for 10 year olds .txt) 📕
"Sorry. But, of course, you don't understand such things." Then he went on talking before father had time to say a word.
"Let us get back to business. As you do not seem to follow me, let me explain that it is BECAUSE I do not forget that I wish to do this. I remember my dear mother's wish to make Aunt Janet happy, and would like to do as she did."
"AUNT Janet?" said father, very properly sneering at his ignorance. "She is not your aunt. Why, even her sister, who was married to your uncle, was only your aunt by courtesy." I could not help feeling that Rupert meant to be rude to my father, though his words were quite polite. If I had been as much bigger than him as he was than me, I should have flown at him; but he was a very big boy for his age. I am myself rather thin. Mother says thinness is an "appanage of birth."
"My Aunt Janet, sir, is an aunt by love. Courtesy is a small word to use in connection with such devoti
Read free book «The Lady of the Shroud by Bram Stoker (book series for 10 year olds .txt) 📕» - read online or download for free at americanlibrarybooks.com
- Author: Bram Stoker
- Performer: -
Read book online «The Lady of the Shroud by Bram Stoker (book series for 10 year olds .txt) 📕». Author - Bram Stoker
Locks and bars, even the very seal of death itself, seemed unable to
make for her a prison-house. With such freedom of action and
movement, going when she would into secret places, what might she not
know that was known to others? How could anyone keep secret from
such an one even an ill intent? Such thoughts, such surmises, had
often flashed through my mind in moments of excitement rather than of
reflection, but never long enough to become fixed into belief. But
yet the consequences, the convictions, of them were with me, though
unconsciously, though the thoughts themselves were perhaps forgotten
or withered before development.
“And you?” I asked her earnestly. “What about danger to you?” She
smiled, her little pearl-white teeth gleaming in the moonlight, as
she spoke:
“There is no danger for me. I am safe. I am the safest person,
perhaps the only safe person, in all this land.” The full
significance of her words did not seem to come to me all at once.
Some base for understanding such an assertion seemed to be wanting.
It was not that I did not trust or believe her, but that I thought
she might be mistaken. I wanted to reassure myself, so in my
distress I asked unthinkingly:
“How the safest? What is your protection?” For several moments that
spun themselves out endlessly she looked me straight in the face, the
stars in her eyes seeming to glow like fire; then, lowering her head,
she took a fold of her shroud and held it up to me.
“This!”
The meaning was complete and understandable now. I could not speak
at once for the wave of emotion which choked me. I dropped on my
knees, and taking her in my arms, held her close to me. She saw that
I was moved, and tenderly stroked my hair, and with delicate touch
pressed down my head on her bosom, as a mother might have done to
comfort a frightened child.
Presently we got back to the realities of life again. I murmured:
“Your safety, your life, your happiness are all-in-all to me. When
will you let them be my care?” She trembled in my arms, nestling
even closer to me. Her own arms seemed to quiver with delight as she
said:
“Would you indeed like me to be always with you? To me it would be a
happiness unspeakable; and to you, what would it be?”
I thought that she wished to hear me speak my love to her, and that,
woman-like, she had led me to the utterance, and so I spoke again of
the passion that now raged in me, she listening eagerly as we
strained each other tight in our arms. At last there came a pause, a
long, long pause, and our hearts beat consciously in unison as we
stood together. Presently she said in a sweet, low, intense whisper,
as soft as the sighing of summer wind:
“It shall be as you wish; but oh, my dear, you will have to first go
through an ordeal which may try you terribly! Do not ask me
anything! You must not ask, because I may not answer, and it would
be pain to me to deny you anything. Marriage with such an one as I
am has its own ritual, which may not be foregone. It may … ” I
broke passionately into her speaking:
“There is no ritual that I fear, so long as it be that it is for your
good, and your lasting happiness. And if the end of it be that I may
call you mine, there is no horror in life or death that I shall not
gladly face. Dear, I ask you nothing. I am content to leave myself
in your hands. You shall advise me when the time comes, and I shall
be satisfied, content to obey. Content! It is but a poor word to
express what I long for! I shall shirk nothing which may come to me
from this or any other world, so long as it is to make you mine!”
Once again her murmured happiness was music to my ears:
“Oh, how you love me! how you love me, dear, dear!” She took me in
her arms, and for a few seconds we hung together. Suddenly she tore
herself apart from me, and stood drawn up to the full height, with a
dignity I cannot describe or express. Her voice had a new dominance,
as with firm utterance and in staccato manner she said:
“Rupert Sent Leger, before we go a step further I must say something
to you, ask you something, and I charge you, on your most sacred
honour and belief, to answer me truly. Do you believe me to be one
of those unhappy beings who may not die, but have to live in shameful
existence between earth and the nether world, and whose hellish
mission is to destroy, body and soul, those who love them till they
fall to their level? You are a gentleman, and a brave one. I have
found you fearless. Answer me in sternest truth, no matter what the
issue may be!”
She stood there in the glamorous moonlight with a commanding dignity
which seemed more than human. In that mystic light her white shroud
seemed diaphanous, and she appeared like a spirit of power. What was
I to say? How could I admit to such a being that I had actually had
at moments, if not a belief, a passing doubt? It was a conviction
with me that if I spoke wrongly I should lose her for ever. I was in
a desperate strait. In such a case there is but one solid ground
which one may rest on—the Truth.
I really felt I was between the devil and the deep sea. There was no
avoiding the issue, and so, out of this all-embracing, all-compelling
conviction of truth, I spoke.
For a fleeting moment I felt that my tone was truculent, and almost
hesitated; but as I saw no anger or indignation on my Lady’s face,
but rather an eager approval, I was reassured. A woman, after all,
is glad to see a man strong, for all belief in him must be based on
that.
“I shall speak the truth. Remember that I have no wish to hurt your
feelings, but as you conjure me by my honour, you must forgive me if
I pain. It is true that I had at first—ay, and later, when I came
to think matters over after you had gone, when reason came to the aid
of impression—a passing belief that you are a Vampire. How can I
fail to have, even now, though I love you with all my soul, though I
have held you in my arms and kissed you on the mouth, a doubt, when
all the evidences seem to point to one thing? Remember that I have
only seen you at night, except that bitter moment when, in the broad
noonday of the upper world, I saw you, clad as ever in a shroud,
lying seemingly dead in a tomb in the crypt of St. Sava’s Church . .
. But let that pass. Such belief as I have is all in you. Be you
woman or Vampire, it is all the same to me. It is YOU whom I love!
Should it be that you are—you are not woman, which I cannot believe,
then it will be my glory to break your fetters, to open your prison,
and set you free. To that I consecrate my life.” For a few seconds
I stood silent, vibrating with the passion which had been awakened in
me. She had by now lost the measure of her haughty isolation, and
had softened into womanhood again. It was really like a realization
of the old theme of Pygmalion’s statue. It was with rather a
pleading than a commanding voice that she said:
“And shall you always be true to me?”
“Always—so help me, God!” I answered, and I felt that there could be
no lack of conviction in my voice.
Indeed, there was no cause for such lack. She also stood for a
little while stone-still, and I was beginning to expand to the
rapture which was in store for me when she should take me again in
her arms.
But there was no such moment of softness. All at once she started as
if she had suddenly wakened from a dream, and on the spur of the
moment said:
“Now go, go!” I felt the conviction of necessity to obey, and turned
at once. As I moved towards the door by which I had entered, I
asked:
“When shall I see you again?”
“Soon!” came her answer. “I shall let you know soon—when and where.
Oh, go, go!” She almost pushed me from her.
When I had passed through the low doorway and locked and barred it
behind me, I felt a pang that I should have had to shut her out like
that; but I feared lest there should arise some embarrassing
suspicion if the door should be found open. Later came the
comforting thought that, as she had got to the roof though the door
had been shut, she would be able to get away by the same means. She
had evidently knowledge of some secret way into the Castle. The
alternative was that she must have some supernatural quality or
faculty which gave her strange powers. I did not wish to pursue that
train of thought, and so, after an effort, shut it out from my mind.
When I got back to my room I locked the door behind me, and went to
sleep in the dark. I did not want light just then—could not bear
it.
This morning I woke, a little later than usual, with a kind of
apprehension which I could not at once understand. Presently,
however, when my faculties became fully awake and in working order, I
realized that I feared, half expected, that Aunt Janet would come to
me in a worse state of alarm than ever apropos of some new Second-Sight experience of more than usual ferocity.
But, strange to say, I had no such visit. Later on in the morning,
when, after breakfast, we walked together through the garden, I asked
her how she had slept, and if she had dreamt. She answered me that
she had slept without waking, and if she had had any dreams, they
must have been pleasant ones, for she did not remember them. “And
you know, Rupert,” she added, “that if there be anything bad or
fearsome or warning in dreams, I always remember them.”
Later still, when I was by myself on the cliff beyond the creek, I
could not help commenting on the absence of her power of Second Sight
on the occasion. Surely, if ever there was a time when she might
have had cause of apprehension, it might well have been when I asked
the Lady whom she did not know to marry me—the Lady of whose
identity I knew nothing, even whose name I did not know—whom I loved
with all my heart and soul—my Lady of the Shroud.
I have lost faith in Second Sight.
RUPERT’S JOURNAL—Continued.
July 1, 1907.
Another week gone. I have waited patiently, and I am at last
rewarded by another letter. I was preparing for bed a little while
ago, when I heard the same mysterious sound at the door as on the
last two occasions. I hurried to the glass door, and there found
another close-folded letter. But I could see no sign of my Lady,
Comments (0)