"Fritz," he said briefly1, "I am come to fetch you." I rose without answering and followed him. Scarcely were we out of the hut when he took me by the arm and drew me on to the castle.
"Mademoiselle Odile wants to see you," he whispered.
"What! is she ill?"
"No, she is much better, but something or other that is strange is going on. This morning about one o'clock, thinking that the count was nearly breathing his last, I went to wake the countess; with my hand on the bell my heart failed me. 'Why should I break her heart?' I said to myself, 'She will learn her misfortune only too soon; and then to wake her up in the middle of the night, weak and frail2 as she is, after such shocks, might kill her at a stroke.' I took a few minutes to consider, and then I resolved I would take it all on myself. I returned to the count's room. I looked in—not a soul was there! Impossible! the man was in the last agonies of death. I ran into the corridor like a madman. No one was there! Into the long gallery—no one! Then I lost my presence of mind, and rushing again into the young countess's room, I rang again. This time she appeared, crying out—'Is my father dead?' 'No.' 'Has he disappeared?' 'Yes, madam. I had gone out for a minute—when I came in again—' 'And Doctor Fritz, where is he?' 'In Hugh Lupus's tower.' 'In that tower?' She started. She threw a dressing-gown around her, took her lamp, and went out. I stayed behind. A quarter of an hour after she came back, her feet covered with snow, and so pale and so cold! She set her lamp upon the chimney-piece, and looking at me fixedly4, said—'Was it you who put the doctor into that tower?' 'Yes, madam.' 'Unhappy man! you will never know the extent of the harm you have done.' I was about to answer, but she interrupted me—'No more; go and fasten every door and lie down. I will sit up. To-morrow morning you will find Doctor Fritz at Knapwurst's, and bring him to me. Make no noise, and mind, you have seen nothing and know nothing!'"
"Is that all, Sperver?" I asked.
He nodded gravely.
"And about the count?"
"He is in again. He is better."
We had got to the antechamber. Gideon knocked at the door gently, then he opened it, announcing—"Doctor Fritz."
A strange impression crossed my mind at the sight of the young countess standing6 pale and still, leaning upon the back of an arm-chair, her eyes of feverish7 brightness, and robed in a long dress of rich black velvet8. But she stood calm and firm.
"Doctor," she said, motioning me to a chair, "pray sit down; I have a very serious matter to speak to you about."
I obeyed in silence.
In her turn she sat down and seemed to be collecting her thoughts.
"Providence9 or an evil destiny, I know not which, has made you witness of a mystery in which lies involved the honour of my family."
So she knew it all!
I sat confounded and astonished.
"Madam, believe me, it was but by chance—"
Then, in a heartrending appealing voice, she cried—
"My father is not a guilty man!"
"Madam, I know it; I know that the life of your father has been one of the noblest and loveliest."
Odile had half-risen from her seat, as if to protest, by anticipation14, against any supposition that might be injurious to her father. Hearing me myself taking up his defence, she sank back again, and covering her face with her hands, the tears began to flow.
"God bless you, sir!" she exclaimed. "I should have died with the very thought that a breath of suspicion was harboured against him."
"Ah! madam, who could possibly attach any reality to the action of a somnambulist?"
"That is quite true, sir; I had had that thought myself, but appearances—pardon me—yet I feared—still I knew Doctor Fritz was a man of honour."
"Pray, madam, be calm."
"No," she cried, "let me weep on. It is such a relief; for ten years I have suffered in secret. Oh, how I suffered! That secret, so long shut up in my breast, was killing15 me. I should soon have died, like my dear mother. God has had pity upon me, and has sent you, and made you share it with me. Let me tell you all, sir, do let me!"
She could speak no more. Sobs16 and tears broke her voice. So it always is with proud and lofty natures. After having conquered grief, and imprisoned17 it, buried, and, as it were, crushed down in the secret depths of the mind, they seem happy, or, at any rate, indifferent to the eyes of the uninformed around, and the eye of the most watchful18 observer might be mistaken; but let a sudden shock break the seal, an unexpected rending11 of a portion of the veil, then, as with the crash of a thunderstorm, the tower in which the sufferer hid his sorrow falls in ruins to the ground. The conquered foe19 rises more fierce than before his defeat and captivity20; he shakes with fury the prison doors, the frame trembles with long shudderings, sobs and sighs heave the breast, the tears, too long contained within bounds, overflow21 their swollen22 banks, bounding and rushing as if after the heavy rain of a thunderstorm.
Such was Odile.
At length she lifted her beautiful head; she wiped her tear-stained cheeks, and with her arm on the elbow of her chair, her cheek resting on her hand, and her eyes tenderly fixed3 on a picture on the wall, she resumed in slow and melancholy23 tones:—
"When I go back into the past, sir, when I return to my first impressions, my mother's is the picture before me. She was a tall, pale, and silent woman. She was still young at the period to which I am referring. She was scarcely thirty, and yet you would have thought her fifty. Her brow was silvered round with hair white as snow; her thin, hollow cheeks, her sharp, clear profile—her lips ever closed together with an expression of pain—gave to her features a strange character in which pride and pain seemed to contend for the mastery. There was nothing left of the elasticity24 of youth in that aged25 woman of thirty—nothing but her tall, upright figure, her brilliant eyes, and her voice, which was always as gentle and as sweet as a dream of childhood. She often walked up and down for hours in this very room, with her head hanging down, and I, an unthinking child, ran happily along by her side, never aware that my mother was sad, never understanding the meaning of the deep melancholy revealed by those furrows26 that traversed her fair brow. I knew nothing of the past, to me the present was joy and happiness, and oh! the future!—the dark, miserable27 future!—there was none! My only future was to-morrow's play!"
Odile smiled bitterly and went on:—
"Sometimes I would happen, in my noisy play, to disturb my mother in her silent walk; then she would stop, look down, and, seeing me at her feet, would slowly bend, kiss me with an absent smile, and then again resume her interrupted walk and her sad gait. Since then, sir, whenever I have desired to search back in my memory for remembrances of my early days that tall, pale woman has risen before me, the image of melancholy. There she is," pointing to a picture on the wall—"there she is!—not such as illness made her as my father supposes, but that fatal and terrible secret. See!"
It was a long, pale, thin face, cold and rigid29 as death, and only luridly30 lighted up by two dark, deep-set eyes, fixed, burning, and of a terrible intensity31.
There was a moment's silence.
"How much that woman must have suffered!" I said to myself with a pain striking at my heart.
"I know not how my mother made that terrible discovery," added Odile, "but she became aware of the mysterious attraction of the Black Pest and their meetings in Hugh Lupus's tower; she knew it all—all! She never suspected my father—ah no!—but she perished away by slow degrees under this consuming influence! and I myself am dying."
I bowed my head into my hands and wept in silence.
"One night," she went on, "one night—I was only ten—and my mother, with the remains32 of her superhuman energy, for she was near her end that night, came to me when I lay asleep. It was in winter; a stony33 cold hand caught me by the wrist. I looked up. Before me stood a tall woman; in one hand she held a flaming torch, with the other she held me by the arm. Her robe was sprinkled with snow. There was a convulsive movement in all her limbs and her eyes were fired with a gloomy light through the long locks of white hair which hung in disorder34 round her face. It was my mother; and she said, 'Odile, my child, get up and dress! You must know it all!' Then taking me to Hugh Lupus's tower she showed me the open subterranean35 passage. 'Your father will come out that way,' she said, pointing to the tower; 'he will come out with the she-wolf; don't be frightened, he won't see you.' And presently my father, bearing his funereal36 burden, came out with the old woman. My mother took me in her arms and followed; she showed me the dismal37 scene on the Altenberg of which you know. 'Look, my child,' she said; 'you must for I—am going to die soon. You will have to keep that secret. You alone are to sit up with your father,' she said impressively—'you alone. The honour of your family depends upon you!' And so we returned. A fortnight after my mother died, leaving me her will to accomplish and her example to follow. I have scrupulously38 obeyed her injunctions as a sacred command, but oh, at what a sacrifice! You have seen it all. I have been obliged to disobey my father and to rend12 his heart. If I had married I should have brought a stranger into the house and betrayed the secret of our race. I resisted. No one in this castle knows of the somnambulism of my father, and but for yesterday's crisis, which broke down my strength completely and prevented me from sitting up with my father, I should still have been its sole depositary. God has decreed otherwise, and has placed the honour and reputation of my family in your keeping. I might demand of you, sir, a solemn promise never to reveal what you have seen to-night. I should have a right to do so."
"Madam," I said, rising, "I am ready."
"No, sir," she replied with much dignity, "I will not put such an affront39 upon you. Oaths fail to bind40 base men, and honour alone is a sufficient guarantee for the upright. You will keep that secret, sir, I know you will keep it, because it is your duty to do so. But I expect more than this of you, much more, and this is why I consider myself obliged to tell you all!"
She rose slowly from her seat.
"Doctor Fritz," she resumed in a voice which made every nerve within me quiver with deep emotion, "my strength is unequal to my burden; I bend beneath it. I need a helper, a friend. Will you be that friend?"
"Madam," I replied, rising from my seat, "I gratefully accept your offer of friendship. I cannot tell you how proud I am of your confidence; but still, allow me to unite with it one condition."
"Pray speak, sir."
"I mean that I will accept that title of friend with all the duties and obligations which it shall impose upon me."
"What duties do you mean?"
"There is a mystery overhanging your family; that mystery must be discovered and solved at any cost. That Black Pest must be apprehended41. We must find out where she comes from, what she is, and what she wants!"
"Oh, but that is impossible!" she said with a movement of despair.
"Who can tell that, madam? Perhaps Divine Providence may have had a design connected with me in sending Sperver to fetch me here."
"You are right, sir. God never acts without consummate42 wisdom. Do whatever you think right. I give my approval in advance."
I raised to my lips the hand which she tremblingly placed in mine, and went out full of admiration43 for this frail and feeble woman, who was, nevertheless, so strong in the time of trial. Is anything grander than duty nobly accomplished44?
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1
briefly
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| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
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frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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fixedly
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| adv.固定地；不屈地，坚定不移地 | |
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retired
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| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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velvet
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| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
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9
providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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frightful
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| adj.可怕的；讨厌的 | |
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rending
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| v.撕碎( rend的现在分词 )；分裂；（因愤怒、痛苦等而）揪扯（衣服或头发等）；（声音等）刺破 | |
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rend
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| vt.把…撕开，割裂；把…揪下来，强行夺取 | |
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13
shuddered
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| v.战栗( shudder的过去式和过去分词 )；发抖；（机器、车辆等）突然震动；颤动 | |
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anticipation
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| n.预期，预料，期望 | |
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killing
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| n.巨额利润；突然赚大钱，发大财 | |
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sobs
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| 啜泣（声），呜咽（声）( sob的名词复数 ) | |
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imprisoned
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| 下狱，监禁( imprison的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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watchful
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| adj.注意的，警惕的 | |
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foe
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| n.敌人，仇敌 | |
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captivity
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| n.囚禁；被俘；束缚 | |
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overflow
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| v.(使)外溢，(使)溢出；溢出，流出，漫出 | |
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swollen
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| adj.肿大的，水涨的；v.使变大，肿胀 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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elasticity
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| n.弹性，伸缩力 | |
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aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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furrows
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| n.犁沟( furrow的名词复数 )；（脸上的）皱纹v.犁田，开沟( furrow的第三人称单数 ) | |
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miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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luridly
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| adv. 青灰色的(苍白的, 深浓色的, 火焰等火红的) | |
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intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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stony
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| adj.石头的，多石头的，冷酷的，无情的 | |
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disorder
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| n.紊乱，混乱；骚动，骚乱；疾病，失调 | |
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subterranean
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| adj.地下的，地表下的 | |
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funereal
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| adj.悲哀的；送葬的 | |
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dismal
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| adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的 | |
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scrupulously
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| adv.一丝不苟地；小心翼翼地，多顾虑地 | |
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affront
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| n./v.侮辱，触怒 | |
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bind
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| vt.捆，包扎；装订；约束；使凝固；vi.变硬 | |
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apprehended
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| 逮捕，拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 )； 理解 | |
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consummate
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| adj.完美的；v.成婚；使完美 [反]baffle | |
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43
admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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44
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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