"THE MYSTERY OF CLOOMBER\n\nBy Arthur Conan Doyle\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\nI THE HEGIRA OF THE WESTS FROM EDINBURGH\n\nII OF THE STRANGE MANNER IN WHICH A TENANT CAME TO CLOOMBER\n\nIII OF OUR FURTHER ACQUAINTANCE WITH MAJOR-GENERAL J. B. HEATHERSTONE\n\nIV OF A YOUNG MAN WITH A GREY HEAD\n\nV HOW FOUR OF US CAME TO BE UNDER THE SHADOW OF CLOOMBER\n\nVI HOW I CAME TO BE ENLISTED AS ONE OF THE GARRISON OF CLOOMBER\n\nVII OF CORPORAL RUFUS SMITH AND HIS COMING TO CLOOMBER\n\nVIII STATEMENT OF ISRAEL STAKES\n\nIX NARRATIVE OF JOHN EASTERLING, F.R.C.P. EDIN.\n\nX OF THE LETTER WHICH CAME FROM THE HALL\n\nXI OF THE CASTING AWAY OF THE BARQUE \"BELINDA\"\n\nXII OF THE THREE FOREIGN MEN UPON THE COAST\n\nXIII IN WHICH I SEE THAT WHICH HAS BEEN SEEN BY FEW\n\nXIV OF THE VISITOR WHO RAN DOWN THE ROAD IN THE NIGHT-TIME\n\nXV THE DAY-BOOK OF JOHN BERTHIER HEATHERSTONE\n\nXVI AT THE HOLE OF CREE\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I. THE HEGIRA OF THE WESTS FROM EDINBURGH\n\nI John Fothergill West, student of law in the University of St. Andrews,\nhave endeavoured in the ensuing pages to lay my statement before the\npublic in a concise and business-like fashion.\n\nIt is not my wish to achieve literary success, nor have I any desire by\nthe graces of my style, or by the artistic ordering of my incidents, to\nthrow a deeper shadow over the strange passages of which I shall have\nto speak. My highest ambition is that those who know something of the\nmatter should, after reading my account, be able to conscientiously\nindorse it without finding a single paragraph in which I have either\nadded to or detracted from the truth.\n\nShould I attain this result, I shall rest amply satisfied with the\noutcome of my first, and probably my last, venture in literature.\n\nIt was my intention to write out the sequence of events in due order,\ndepending on trustworthy hearsay when I was describing that which was\nbeyond my own personal knowledge. I have now, however, through the\nkind cooperation of friends, hit upon a plan which promises to be less\nonerous to me and more satisfactory to the reader. This is nothing less\nthan to make use of the various manuscripts which I have by me bearing\nupon the subject, and to add to them the first-hand evidence contributed\nby those who had the best opportunities of knowing Major-General J. B.\nHeatherstone.\n\nIn pursuance of this design I shall lay before the public the testimony\nof Israel Stakes, formerly coachman at Cloomber Hall, and of\nJohn Easterling, F.R.C.P. Edin., now practising at Stranraer, in\nWigtownshire. To these I shall add a verbatim account extracted from\nthe journal of the late John Berthier Heatherstone, of the events which\noccurred in the Thul Valley in the autumn of '41 towards the end of\nthe first Afghan War, with a description of the skirmish in the Terada\ndefile, and of the death of the man Ghoolab Shah.\n\nTo myself I reserve the duty of filling up all the gaps and chinks which\nmay be left in the narrative. By this arrangement I have sunk from the\nposition of an author to that of a compiler, but on the other hand\nmy work has ceased to be a story and has expanded into a series of\naffidavits.\n\nMy Father, John Hunter West, was a well known Oriental and Sanskrit\nscholar, and his name is still of weight with those who are interested\nin such matters. He it was who first after Sir William Jones called\nattention to the great value of early Persian literature, and his\ntranslations from the Hafiz and from Ferideddin Atar have earned the\nwarmest commendations from the Baron von Hammer-Purgstall, of Vienna,\nand other distinguished Continental critics.\n\nIn the issue of the _Orientalisches Scienzblatt_ for January, 1861,\nhe is described as _\"Der beruhmte und sehr gelhernte Hunter West von\nEdinburgh\"_--a passage which I well remember that he cut out and stowed\naway, with a pardonable vanity, among the most revered family archives.\n\nHe had been brought up to be a solicitor, or Writer to the Signet, as\nit is termed in Scotland, but his learned hobby absorbed so much of his\ntime that he had little to devote to the pursuit of his profession.\n\nWhen his clients were seeking him at his chambers in George Street, he\nwas buried in the recesses of the Advocates' Library, or poring over\nsome mouldy manuscript at the Philosophical Institution, with his brain\nmore exercised over the code which Menu propounded six hundred years\nbefore the birth of Christ than over the knotty problems of Scottish law\nin the nineteenth century. Hence it can hardly be wondered at that\nas his learning accumulated his practice dissolved, until at the very\nmoment when he had attained the zenith of his celebrity he had also\nreached the nadir of his fortunes.\n\nThere being no chair of Sanscrit in any of his native universities, and\nno demand anywhere for the only mental wares which he had to dispose\nof, we should have been forced to retire into genteel poverty, consoling\nourselves with the aphorisms and precepts of Firdousi, Omar Khayyam, and\nothers of his Eastern favourites, had it not been for the kindness\nand liberality of his half-brother William Farintosh, the Laird of\nBranksome, in Wigtownshire.\n\nThis William Farintosh was the proprietor of a landed estate, the\nacreage which bore, unfortunately, a most disproportional relation to\nits value, for it formed the bleakest and most barren tract of land\nin the whole of a bleak and barren shire. As a bachelor, however, his\nexpenses had been small, and he had contrived from the rents of his\nscattered cottages, and the sale of the Galloway nags, which he bred\nupon the moors, not only to live as a laird should, but to put by a\nconsiderable sum in the bank.\n\nWe had heard little from our kinsman during the days of our comparative\nprosperity, but just as we were at our wit's end, there came a letter\nlike a ministering angel, giving us assurance of sympathy and succour.\nIn it the Laird of Branksome told us that one of his lungs had been\ngrowing weaker for some time, and that Dr. Easterling, of Stranraer, had\nstrongly advised him to spend the few years which were left to him in\nsome more genial climate. He had determined, therefore to set out for\nthe South of Italy, and he begged that we should take up our residence\nat Branksome in his absence, and that my father should act as his land\nsteward and agent at a salary which placed us above all fear of want.\n\nOur mother had been dead for some years, so that there were only myself,\nmy father, and my sister Esther to consult, and it may be readily\nimagined that it did not take us long to decide upon the acceptance\nof the laird's generous offer. My father started for Wigtown that very\nnight, while Esther and I followed a few days afterwards, bearing with\nus two potato-sacksful of learned books, and such other of our household\neffects that were worth the trouble and expense of transport.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II. OF THE STRANGE MANNER IN WHICH A TENANT CAME TO CLOOMBER\n\nBranksome might have appeared a poor dwelling-place when compared with\nthe house of an English squire, but to us, after our long residence in\nstuffy apartments, it was of regal magnificence.\n\nThe building was broad-spread and low, with red-tiled roof,\ndiamond-paned windows, and a profusion of dwelling rooms with\nsmoke-blackened ceilings and oaken wainscots. In front was a small lawn,\ngirt round with a thin fringe of haggard and ill grown beeches, all\ngnarled and withered from the effects of the sea-spray. Behind lay the\nscattered hamlet of Branksome-Bere--a dozen cottages at most--inhabited\nby rude fisher-folk who looked upon the laird as their natural\nprotector.\n\nTo the west was the broad, yellow beach and the Irish Sea, while in all\nother directions the desolate moors, greyish-green in the foreground\nand purple in the distance, stretched away in long, low curves to the\nhorizon.\n\nVery bleak and lonely it was upon this Wigtown coast. A man might\nwalk many a weary mile and never see a living thing except the white,\nheavy-flapping kittiwakes, which screamed and cried to each other with\ntheir shrill, sad voices.\n\nVery lonely and very bleak! Once out of sight of Branksome and there\nwas no sign of the works of man save only where the high, white tower of\nCloomber Hall shot up, like a headstone of some giant grave, from amid\nthe firs and larches which girt it round.\n\nThis great house, a mile or more from our dwelling, had been built by a\nwealthy Glasgow merchant of strange tastes and lonely habits, but at\nthe time of our arrival it had been untenanted for many years, and stood\nwith weather-blotched walls and vacant, staring windows looking blankly\nout over the hill side.\n\nEmpty and mildewed, it served only as a landmark to the fishermen, for\nthey had found by experience that by keeping the laird's chimney and the\nwhite tower of Cloomber in a line they could steer their way through\nthe ugly reef which raises its jagged back, like that of some sleeping\nmonster, above the troubled waters of the wind-swept bay.\n\nTo this wild spot it was that Fate had brought my father, my sister,\nand myself. For us its loneliness had no terrors. After the hubbub and\nbustle of a great city, and the weary task of upholding appearances upon\na slender income, there was a grand, soul-soothing serenity in the long\nsky-line and the eager air. Here at least there was no neighbour to pry\nand chatter.\n\nThe laird had left his phaeton and two ponies behind him, with the aid\nof which my father and I would go the round of the estate doing such\nlight duties as fall to an agent, or \"factor\" as it was there called,\nwhile our gentle Esther looked to our household needs, and brightened\nthe dark old building.\n\nSuch was our simple, uneventful existence, until the summer night when\nan unlooked-for incident occurred which proved to be the herald of those\nstrange doings which I have taken up my pen to describe.\n\nIt had been my habit to pull out of an evening in the laird's skiff\nand to catch a few whiting which might serve for our supper. On this\nwell-remembered occasion my sister came with me, sitting with her book\nin the stern-sheets of the boat, while I hung my lines over the bows.\n\nThe sun had sunk down behind the rugged Irish coast, but a long bank of\nflushed cloud still marked the spot, and cast a glory upon the waters.\nThe whole broad ocean was seamed and scarred with crimson streaks. I had\nrisen in the boat, and was gazing round in delight at the broad panorama\nof shore and sea and sky, when my sister plucked at my sleeve with a\nlittle, sharp cry of surprise.\n\n\"See, John,\" she cried, \"there is a light in Cloomber Tower!\"\n\nI turned my head and stared back at the tall, white turret which peeped\nout above the belt of trees. As I gazed I distinctly saw at one of the\nwindows the glint of a light, which suddenly vanished, and then shone\nout once more from another higher up. There it flickered for some time,\nand finally flashed past two successive windows underneath before the\ntrees obscured our view of it. It was clear that some one bearing a lamp\nor a candle had climbed up the tower stairs and had then returned into\nthe body of the house.\n\n\"Who in the world can it be?\" I exclaimed, speaking rather to myself\nthan to Esther, for I could see by the surprise upon her face that she\nhad no solution to offer. \"Maybe some of the folk from Branksome-Bere\nhave wanted to look over the place.\"\n\nMy sister shook her head.\n\n\"There is not one of them would dare to set foot within the avenue\ngates,\" she said. \"Besides, John, the keys are kept by the house-agent\nat Wigtown. Were they ever so curious, none of our people could find\ntheir way in.\"\n\nWhen I reflected upon the massive door and ponderous shutters which\nguarded the lower storey of Cloomber, I could not but admit the force\nof my sister's objection. The untimely visitor must either have used\nconsiderable violence in order to force his way in, or he must have\nobtained possession of the keys.\n\nPiqued by the little mystery, I pulled for the beach, with the\ndetermination to see for myself who the intruder might be, and what\nwere his intentions. Leaving my sister at Branksome, and summoning\nSeth Jamieson, an old man-o'-war's-man and one of the stoutest of the\nfishermen, I set off across the moor with him through the gathering\ndarkness.\n\n\"It hasna a guid name after dark, yon hoose,\" remarked my companion,\nslackening his pace perceptibly as I explained to him the nature of our\nerrand. \"It's no for naething that him wha owns it wunna gang within a\nScotch mile o't.\"\n\n\"Well, Seth, there is some one who has no fears about going into it,\"\nsaid I, pointing to the great, white building which flickered up in\nfront of us through the gloom.\n\nThe light which I had observed from the sea was moving backwards and\nforward past the lower floor windows, the shutters of which had been\nremoved. I could now see that a second fainter light followed a few\npaces behind the other. Evidently two individuals, the one with a\nlamp and the other with a candle or rushlight, were making a careful\nexamination of the building.\n\n\"Let ilka man blaw his ain parritch,\" said Seth Jamieson doggedly,\ncoming to a dead stop. \"What is it tae us if a wraith or a bogle\nminds tae tak' a fancy tae Cloomber? It's no canny tae meddle wi' such\nthings.\"\n\n\"Why, man,\" I cried, \"you don't suppose a wraith came here in a gig?\nWhat are those lights away yonder by the avenue gates?\"\n\n\"The lamps o' a gig, sure enough!\" exclaimed my companion in a less\nlugubrious voice. \"Let's steer for it, Master West, and speer where she\nhails frae.\"\n\nBy this time night had closed in save for a single long, narrow slit in\nthe westward. Stumbling across the moor together, we made our way into\nthe Wigtown Road, at the point where the high stone pillars mark the\nentrance to the Cloomber avenue. A tall dog-cart stood in front of the\ngateway, the horse browsing upon the thin border of grass which skirted\nthe road.\n\n\"It's a' richt!\" said Jamieson, taking a close look at the deserted\nvehicle. \"I ken it weel. It belongs tae Maister McNeil, the factor body\nfrae Wigtown--him wha keeps the keys.\"\n\n\"Then we may as well have speech with him now that we are here,\" I\nanswered. \"They are coming down, if I am not mistaken.\"\n\nAs I spoke we heard the slam of the heavy door and within a few minutes\ntwo figures, the one tall and angular, the other short and thick came\ntowards us through the darkness. They were talking so earnestly that\nthey did not observe us until they had passed through the avenue gate.\n\n\"Good evening, Mr. McNeil,\" said I, stepping forward and addressing the\nWigtown factor, with whom I had some slight acquaintance.\n\nThe smaller of the two turned his face towards me as I spoke, and showed\nme that I was not mistaken in his identity, but his taller companion\nsprang back and showed every sign of violent agitation.\n\n\"What is this, McNeil?\" I heard him say, in a gasping, choking voice.\n\"Is this your promise? What is the meaning of it?\"\n\n\"Don't be alarmed, General! Don't be alarmed!\" said the little fat\nfactor in a soothing fashion, as one might speak to a frightened child.\n\"This is young Mr. Fothergill West, of Branksome, though what brings him\nup here tonight is more than I can understand. However, as you are to be\nneighbours, I can't do better than take the opportunity to introduce you\nto each other. Mr. West, this is General Heatherstone, who is about to\ntake a lease of Cloomber Hall.\"\n\nI held out my hand to the tall man, who took it in a hesitating,\nhalf-reluctant fashion.\n\n\"I came up,\" I explained, \"because I saw your lights in the windows, and\nI thought that something might be wrong. I am very glad I did so, since\nit has given me the chance of making the general's acquaintance.\"\n\nWhilst I was talking, I was conscious that the new tenant of Cloomber\nHall was peering at me very closely through the darkness. As I\nconcluded, he stretched out a long, tremulous arm, and turned the\ngig-lamp in such a way as to throw a flood of light upon my face.\n\n\"Good Heavens, McNeil!\" he cried, in the same quivering voice as before,\n\"the fellow's as brown as chocolate. He's not an Englishman. You're not\nan Englishman--you, sir?\"\n\n\"I'm a Scotchman, born and bred,\" said I, with an inclination to laugh,\nwhich was only checked by my new acquaintance's obvious terror.\n\n\"A Scotchman, eh?\" said he, with a sigh of relief. \"It's all one\nnowadays. You must excuse me, Mr.--Mr. West. I'm nervous, infernally\nnervous. Come along, McNeil, we must be back in Wigtown in less than an\nhour. Good-night, gentlemen, good-night!\"\n\nThe two clambered into their places; the factor cracked his whip,\nand the high dog-cart clattered away through the darkness, casting a\nbrilliant tunnel of yellow light on either side of it, until the rumble\nof its wheels died away in the distance.\n\n\"What do you think of our new neighbour, Jamieson?\" I asked, after a\nlong silence.\n\n\"'Deed, Mr. West, he seems, as he says himsel', to be vera nervous.\nMaybe his conscience is oot o' order.\"\n\n\"His liver, more likely,\" said I. \"He looks as if he had tried his\nconstitution a bit. But it's blowing chill, Seth, my lad, and it's time\nboth of us were indoors.\"\n\nI bade my companion good-night, and struck off across the moors for the\ncheery, ruddy light which marked the parlour windows of Branksome.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III. OF OUR FURTHER ACQUAINTANCE WITH MAJOR-GENERAL J. B. HEATHERSTONE\n\nThere was, as may well be imagined, much stir amongst our small\ncommunity at the news that the Hall was to be inhabited once more, and\nconsiderable speculation as to the new tenants, and their object in\nchoosing this particular part of the country for their residence.\n\nIt speedily became apparent that, whatever their motives might be, they\nhad definitely determined upon a lengthy stay, for relays of plumbers\nand of joiners came down from Wigtown, and there was hammering and\nrepairing going on from morning till night.\n\nIt was surprising how quickly the signs of the wind and weather were\neffaced, until the great, square-set house was all as spick-and-span\nas though it had been erected yesterday. There were abundant signs that\nmoney was no consideration to General Heatherstone, and that it was not\non the score of retrenchment that he had taken up his abode among us.\n\n\"It may be that he is devoted to study,\" suggested my father, as we\ndiscussed the question round the breakfast table. \"Perhaps he has chosen\nthis secluded spot to finish some magnum opus upon which he is engaged.\nIf that is the case I should be happy to let him have the run of my\nlibrary.\"\n\nEsther and I laughed at the grandiloquent manner in which he spoke of\nthe two potato-sacksful of books.\n\n\"It may be as you say,\" said I, \"but the general did not strike me\nduring our short interview as being a man who was likely to have any\nvery pronounced literary tastes. If I might hazard a guess, I should say\nthat he is here upon medical advice, in the hope that the complete quiet\nand fresh air may restore his shattered nervous system. If you had seen\nhow he glared at me, and the twitching of his fingers, you would have\nthought it needed some restoring.\"\n\n\"I do wonder whether he has a wife and a family,\" said my sister. \"Poor\nsouls, how lonely they will be! Why, excepting ourselves, there is not a\nfamily that they could speak to for seven miles and more.\"\n\n\"General Heatherstone is a very distinguished soldier,\" remarked my\nfather.\n\n\"Why, papa, however came you to know anything about him?\"\n\n\"Ah, my dears,\" said my father, smiling at us over his coffee-cup, \"you\nwere laughing at my library just now, but you see it may be very useful\nat times.\" As he spoke he took a red-covered volume from a shelf and\nturned over the pages. \"This is an Indian Army List of three\nyears back,\" he explained, \"and here is the very gentleman we\nwant-'Heatherstone, J. B., Commander of the Bath,' my dears, and 'V.C.',\nthink of that, 'V.C.'--'formerly colonel in the Indian Infantry, 41st\nBengal Foot, but now retired with the rank of major-general.' In this\nother column is a record of his services--'capture of Ghuznee and\ndefence of Jellalabad, Sobraon 1848, Indian Mutiny and reduction of\nOudh. Five times mentioned in dispatches.' I think, my dears, that we\nhave cause to be proud of our new neighbour.\"\n\n\"It doesn't mention there whether he is married or not, I suppose?\"\nasked Esther.\n\n\"No,\" said my father, wagging his white head with a keen appreciation\nof his own humour. \"It doesn't include that under the heading of 'daring\nactions'--though it very well might, my dear, it very well might.\"\n\nAll our doubts, however, upon this head were very soon set at rest, for\non the very day that the repairing and the furnishing had been completed\nI had occasion to ride into Wigtown, and I met upon the way a carriage\nwhich was bearing General Heatherstone and his family to their new home.\nAn elderly lady, worn and sickly-looking, was by his side, and opposite\nhim sat a young fellow about my own age and a girl who appeared to be a\ncouple of years younger.\n\nI raised my hat, and was about to pass them, when the general shouted to\nhis coachman to pull up, and held out his hand to me. I could see now\nin the daylight that his face, although harsh and stern, was capable of\nassuming a not unkindly expression.\n\n\"How are you, Mr. Fothergill West?\" he cried. \"I must apologise to\nyou if I was a little brusque the other night--you will excuse an old\nsoldier who has spent the best part of his life in harness--All\nthe same, you must confess that you are rather dark-skinned for a\nScotchman.\"\n\n\"We have a Spanish strain in our blood,\" said I, wondering at his\nrecurrence to the topic.\n\n\"That would, of course, account for it,\" he remarked. \"My dear,\" to his\nwife, \"allow me to introduce Mr. Fothergill West to you. This is my son\nand my daughter. We have come here in search of rest, Mr. West--complete\nrest.\"\n\n\"And you could not possibly have come to a better place,\" said I.\n\n\"Oh, you think so?\" he answered. \"I suppose it is very quiet indeed, and\nvery lonely. You might walk through these country lanes at night, I dare\nsay, and never meet a soul, eh?\"\n\n\"Well, there are not many about after dark,\" I said.\n\n\"And you are not much troubled with vagrants or wandering beggars, eh?\nNot many tinkers or tramps or rascally gipsies--no vermin of that sort\nabout?\"\n\n\"I find it rather cold,\" said Mrs. Heatherstone, drawing her thick\nsealskin mantle tighter round her figure. \"We are detaining Mr. West,\ntoo.\"\n\n\"So we are, my dear, so we are. Drive on, coachman. Good-day, Mr. West.\"\n\nThe carriage rattled away towards the Hall, and I trotted thoughtfully\nonwards to the little country metropolis.\n\nAs I passed up the High Street, Mr. McNeil ran out from his office and\nbeckoned to me to stop.\n\n\"Our new tenants have gone out,\" he said. \"They drove over this\nmorning.\"\n\n\"I met them on the way,\" I answered.\n\nAs I looked down at the little factor, I could see that his face was\nflushed and that he bore every appearance of having had an extra glass.\n\n\"Give me a real gentleman to do business with,\" he said, with a burst of\nlaughter. \"They understand me and I understand them. 'What shall I fill\nit up for?' says the general, taking a blank cheque out o' his pouch and\nlaying it on the table. 'Two hundred,' says I, leaving a bit o' a margin\nfor my own time and trouble.\"\n\n\"I thought that the landlord had paid you for that,\" I remarked.\n\n\"Aye, aye, but it's well to have a bit margin. He filled it up and threw\nit over to me as if it had been an auld postage stamp. That's the way\nbusiness should be done between honest men--though it wouldna do if one\nwas inclined to take an advantage. Will ye not come in, Mr. West, and\nhave a taste of my whisky?\"\n\n\"No, thank you,\" said I, \"I have business to do.\"\n\n\"Well, well, business is the chief thing. It's well not to drink in the\nmorning, too. For my own part, except a drop before breakfast to give\nme an appetite, and maybe a glass, or even twa, afterwards to promote\ndigestion, I never touch spirits before noon. What d'ye think o' the\ngeneral, Mr. West?\"\n\n\"Why, I have hardly had an opportunity of judging,\" I answered.\n\nMr. McNeil tapped his forehead with his forefinger.\n\n\"That's what I think of him,\" he said in a confidential whisper, shaking\nhis head at me. \"He's gone, sir, gone, in my estimation. Now what would\nyou take to be a proof of madness, Mr. West?\"\n\n\"Why, offering a blank cheque to a Wigtown house-agent,\" said I.\n\n\"Ah, you're aye at your jokes. But between oorsel's now, if a man asked\nye how many miles it was frae a seaport, and whether ships come there\nfrom the East, and whether there were tramps on the road, and whether\nit was against the lease for him to build a high wall round the grounds,\nwhat would ye make of it, eh?\"\n\n\"I should certainly think him eccentric,\" said I.\n\n\"If every man had his due, our friend would find himsel' in a house with\na high wall round the grounds, and that without costing him a farthing,\"\nsaid the agent.\n\n\"Where then?\" I asked, humouring his joke.\n\n\"Why, in the Wigtown County Lunatic Asylum,\" cried the little man, with\na bubble of laughter, in the midst of which I rode on my way, leaving\nhim still chuckling over his own facetiousness.\n\nThe arrival of the new family at Cloomber Hall had no perceptible effect\nin relieving the monotony of our secluded district, for instead of\nentering into such simple pleasures as the country had to offer, or\ninteresting themselves, as we had hoped, in our attempts to improve\nthe lot of our poor crofters and fisherfolk, they seemed to shun all\nobservation, and hardly ever to venture beyond the avenue gates.\n\nWe soon found, too, that the factor's words as to the inclosing of the\ngrounds were founded upon fact, for gangs of workmen were kept hard at\nwork from early in the morning until late at night in erecting a high,\nwooden fence round the whole estate.\n\nWhen this was finished and topped with spikes, Cloomber Park became\nimpregnable to any one but an exceptionally daring climber. It was as\nif the old soldier had been so imbued with military ideas that, like my\nUncle Toby, he could not refrain even in times of peace from standing\nupon the defensive.\n\nStranger still, he had victualled the house as if for a siege, for\nBegbie, the chief grocer of Wigtown, told me himself in a rapture\nof delight and amazement that the general had sent him an order for\nhundreds of dozens of every imaginable potted meat and vegetable.\n\nIt may be imagined that all these unusual incidents were not allowed to\npass without malicious comment. Over the whole countryside and as far\naway as the English border there was nothing but gossip about the new\ntenants of Cloomber Hall and the reasons which had led them to come\namong us.\n\nThe only hypothesis, however, which the bucolic mind could evolve, was\nthat which had already occurred to Mr. McNeil, the factor--namely, that\nthe old general and his family were one and all afflicted with madness,\nor, as an alternative conclusion, that he had committed some heinous\noffence and was endeavouring to escape the consequences of his misdeeds.\n\nThese were both natural suppositions under the circumstances, but\nneither of them appeared to me to commend itself as a true explanation\nof the facts.\n\nIt is true that General Heatherstone's behaviour on the occasion of our\nfirst interview was such as to suggest some suspicion of mental disease,\nbut no man could have been more reasonable or more courteous than he had\nafterwards shown himself to be.\n\nThen, again, his wife and children led the same secluded life that he\ndid himself, so that the reason could not be one peculiar to his own\nhealth.\n\nAs to the possibility of his being a fugitive from justice, that theory\nwas even more untenable. Wigtownshire was bleak and lonely, but it was\nnot such an obscure corner of the world that a well-known soldier could\nhope to conceal himself there, nor would a man who feared publicity set\nevery one's tongue wagging as the general had done.\n\nOn the whole, I was inclined to believe that the true solution of the\nenigma lay in his own allusion to the love of quiet, and that they\nhad taken shelter here with an almost morbid craving for solitude and\nrepose. We very soon had an instance of the great lengths to which this\ndesire for isolation would carry them.\n\nMy father had come down one morning with the weight of a great\ndetermination upon his brow.\n\n\"You must put on your pink frock to-day, Esther,\" said he, \"and you,\nJohn, you must make yourself smart, for I have determined that the three\nof us shall drive round this afternoon and pay our respects to Mrs.\nHeatherstone and the general.\"\n\n\"A visit to Cloomber,\" cried Esther, clapping her hands.\n\n\"I am here,\" said my father, with dignity, \"not only as the laird's\nfactor, but also as his kinsman. In that capacity I am convinced that he\nwould wish me to call upon these newcomers and offer them any politeness\nwhich is in our power. At present they must feel lonely and friendless.\nWhat says the great Firdousi? 'The choicest ornaments to a man's house\nare his friends.'\"\n\nMy sister and I knew by experience that when the old man began to\njustify his resolution by quotations from the Persian poets there was no\nchance of shaking it. Sure enough that afternoon saw the phaeton at the\ndoor, with my father perched upon the seat, with his second-best coat on\nand a pair of new driving-gloves.\n\n\"Jump in, my dears,\" he cried, cracking his whip briskly, \"we shall show\nthe general that he has no cause to be ashamed of his neighbours.\"\n\nAlas! pride always goes before a fall. Our well-fed ponies and shining\nharness were not destined that day to impress the tenants of Cloomber\nwith a sense of our importance.\n\nWe had reached the avenue gate, and I was about to get out and open it,\nwhen our attention was arrested by a very large wooden placard, which\nwas attached to one of the trees in such a manner that no one could\npossibly pass without seeing it. On the white surface of this board was\nprinted in big, black letters the following hospitable inscription:\n\n GENERAL AND MRS. HEATHERSTONE\n HAVE NO WISH\n TO INCREASE\n THE CIRCLE OF THEIR ACQUAINTANCE.\n\nWe all sat gazing at this announcement for some moments in silent\nastonishment. Then Esther and I, tickled by the absurdity of the thing,\nburst out laughing, but my father pulled the ponies' heads round, and\ndrove home with compressed lips and the cloud of much wrath upon his\nbrow. I have never seen the good man so thoroughly moved, and I am\nconvinced that his anger did not arise from any petty feeling of injured\nvanity upon his own part, but from the thought that a slight had been\noffered to the Laird of Branksome, whose dignity he represented.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV. OF A YOUNG MAN WITH A GREY HEAD\n\nIf I had any personal soreness on account of this family snub, it was a\nvery passing emotion, and one which was soon effaced from my mind.\n\nIt chanced that on the very next day after the episode I had occasion\nto pass that way, and stopped to have another look at the obnoxious\nplacard. I was standing staring at it and wondering what could have\ninduced our neighbours to take such an outrageous step, when I became\nsuddenly aware of a sweet, girlish face which peeped out at me from\nbetween the bars of the gate, and of a white hand which eagerly beckoned\nme to approach. As I advanced to her I saw that it was the same young\nlady whom I had seen in the carriage.\n\n\"Mr. West,\" she said, in a quick whisper, glancing from side to side as\nshe spoke in a nervous, hasty manner, \"I wish to apologise to you for\nthe indignity to which you and your family were subjected yesterday.\nMy brother was in the avenue and saw it all, but he is powerless to\ninterfere. I assure you, Mr. West, that if that hateful thing,\" pointing\nup at the placard, \"has given you any annoyance, it has given my brother\nand myself far more.\"\n\n\"Why, Miss Heatherstone,\" said I, putting the matter off with a laugh,\n\"Britain is a free country, and if a man chooses to warn off visitors\nfrom his premises there is no reason why he should not.\"\n\n\"It is nothing less than brutal,\" she broke out, with a petulant\nstamp of the foot. \"To think that your sister, too, should have such an\nunprovoked insult offered to her! I am ready to sink with shame at the\nvery thought.\"\n\n\"Pray do not give yourself one moment's uneasiness upon the subject,\"\nsaid I earnestly, for I was grieved at her evident distress. \"I am sure\nthat your father has some reason unknown to us for taking this step.\"\n\n\"Heaven knows he has!\" she answered, with ineffable sadness in her\nvoice, \"and yet I think it would be more manly to face a danger than\nto fly from it. However, he knows best, and it is impossible for us to\njudge. But who is this?\" she exclaimed, anxiously, peering up the dark\navenue. \"Oh, it is my brother Mordaunt. Mordaunt,\" she said, as the\nyoung man approached us, \"I have been apologising to Mr. West for what\nhappened yesterday, in your name as well as my own.\"\n\n\"I am very, very glad to have the opportunity of doing it in person,\"\nsaid he courteously. \"I only wish that I could see your sister and your\nfather as well as yourself, to tell them how sorry I am. I think you\nhad better run up to the house, little one, for it's getting near\ntiffin-time. No--don't you go Mr. West. I want to have a word with you.\"\n\nMiss Heatherstone waved her hand to me with a bright smile, and tripped\nup the avenue, while her brother unbolted the gate, and, passing\nthrough, closed it again, locking it upon the outside.\n\n\"I'll have a stroll down the road with you, if you have no objection.\nHave a manilla.\" He drew a couple of cheroots from his pocket and\nhanded one to me. \"You'll find they are not bad,\" he said. \"I became a\nconnoisseur in tobacco when I was in India. I hope I am not interfering\nwith your business in coming along with you?\"\n\n\"Not at all,\" I answered, \"I am very glad to have your company.\"\n\n\"I'll tell you a secret,\" said my companion. \"This is the first time\nthat I have been outside the grounds since we have been down here.\"\n\n\"And your sister?\"\n\n\"She has never been out, either,\" he answered. \"I have given the\ngovernor the slip to-day, but he wouldn't half like it if he knew. It's\na whim of his that we should keep ourselves entirely to ourselves. At\nleast, some people would call it a whim, for my own part I have reason\nto believe that he has solid grounds for all that he does--though\nperhaps in this matter he may be a little too exacting.\"\n\n\"You must surely find it very lonely,\" said I. \"Couldn't you manage to\nslip down at times and have a smoke with me? That house over yonder is\nBranksome.\"\n\n\"Indeed, you are very kind,\" he answered, with sparkling eyes. \"I should\ndearly like to run over now and again. With the exception of Israel\nStakes, our old coachman and gardener, I have not a soul that I can\nspeak to.\"\n\n\"And your sister--she must feel it even more,\" said I, thinking in my\nheart that my new acquaintance made rather too much of his own troubles\nand too little of those of his companion.\n\n\"Yes; poor Gabriel feels it, no doubt,\" he answered carelessly, \"but\nit's a more unnatural thing for a young man of my age to be cooped up in\nthis way than for a woman. Look at me, now. I am three-and-twenty next\nMarch, and yet I have never been to a university, nor to a school for\nthat matter. I am as complete an ignoramus as any of these clodhoppers.\nIt seems strange to you, no doubt, and yet it is so. Now, don't you\nthink I deserve a better fate?\"\n\nHe stopped as he spoke, and faced round to me, throwing his palms\nforward in appeal.\n\nAs I looked at him, with the sun shining upon his face, he certainly did\nseem a strange bird to be cooped up in such a cage. Tall and muscular,\nwith a keen, dark face, and sharp, finely cut features, he might have\nstepped out of a canvas of Murillo or Velasquez. There were latent\nenergy and power in his firm-set mouth, his square eyebrows, and the\nwhole pose of his elastic, well-knit figure.\n\n\"There is the learning to be got from books and the learning to be got\nfrom experience,\" said I sententiously. \"If you have less of your share\nof the one, perhaps you have more of the other. I cannot believe you\nhave spent all your life in mere idleness and pleasure.\"\n\n\"Pleasure!\" he cried. \"Pleasure! Look at this!\" He pulled off his hat,\nand I saw that his black hair was all decked and dashed with streaks of\ngrey. \"Do you imagine that this came from pleasure?\" he asked, with a\nbitter laugh.\n\n\"You must have had some great shock,\" I said, astonished at the sight,\n\"some terrible illness in your youth. Or perhaps it arises from a more\nchronic cause--a constant gnawing anxiety. I have known men as young as\nyou whose hair was as grey.\"\n\n\"Poor brutes!\" he muttered. \"I pity them.\"\n\n\"If you can manage to slip down to Branksome at times,\" I said, \"perhaps\nyou could bring Miss Heatherstone with you. I know that my father and my\nsister would be delighted to see her, and a change, if only for an hour\nor two, might do her good.\"\n\n\"It would be rather hard for us both to get away together,\" he answered.\n\"However, if I see a chance I shall bring her down. It might be\nmanaged some afternoon perhaps, for the old man indulges in a siesta\noccasionally.\"\n\nWe had reached the head of the winding lane which branches off from the\nhigh road and leads to the laird's house, so my companion pulled up.\n\n\"I must go back,\" he said abruptly, \"or they will miss me. It's very\nkind of you, West, to take this interest in us. I am very grateful to\nyou, and so will Gabriel be when she hears of your kind invitation.\nIt's a real heaping of coals of fire after that infernal placard of my\nfather's.\"\n\nHe shook my hand and set off down the road, but he came running after me\npresently, calling me to stop.\n\n\"I was just thinking,\" he said, \"that you must consider us a great\nmystery up there at Cloomber. I dare say you have come to look upon\nit as a private lunatic asylum, and I can't blame you. If you are\ninterested in the matter, I feel it is unfriendly upon my part not to\nsatisfy your curiosity, but I have promised my father to be silent about\nit. And indeed if I were to tell you all that I know you might not\nbe very much the wiser after all. I would have you understand this,\nhowever--that my father is as sane as you or I, and that he has very\ngood reasons for living the life which he does. I may add that his wish\nto remain secluded does not arise from any unworthy or dishonourable\nmotives, but merely from the instinct of self-preservation.\"\n\n\"He is in danger, then?\" I ejaculated.\n\n\"Yes; he is in constant danger.\"\n\n\"But why does he not apply to the magistrates for protection?\" I asked.\n\"If he is afraid of any one, he has only to name him and they will bind\nhim over to keep the peace.\"\n\n\"My dear West,\" said young Heatherstone, \"the danger with which\nmy father is threatened is one that cannot be averted by any human\nintervention. It is none the less very real, and possibly very\nimminent.\"\n\n\"You don't mean to assert that it is supernatural,\" I said\nincredulously.\n\n\"Well, hardly that, either,\" he answered with hesitation. \"There,\" he\ncontinued, \"I have said rather more than I should, but I know that you\nwill not abuse my confidence. Good-bye!\"\n\nHe took to his heels and was soon out of sight round a curve in the\ncountry road.\n\nA danger which was real and imminent, not to be averted by human means,\nand yet hardly supernatural--here was a conundrum indeed!\n\nI had come to look upon the inhabitants of the Hall as mere eccentrics,\nbut after what young Mordaunt Heatherstone had just told me, I could\nno longer doubt that some dark and sinister meaning underlay all their\nactions. The more I pondered over the problem, the more unanswerable did\nit appear, and yet I could not get the matter out of my thoughts.\n\nThe lonely, isolated Hall, and the strange, impending catastrophe which\nhung over its inmates, appealed forcibly to my imagination. All that\nevening, and late into the night, I sat moodily by the fire, pondering\nover what I had heard, and revolving in my mind the various incidents\nwhich might furnish me with some clue to the mystery.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V. HOW FOUR OF US CAME TO BE UNDER THE SHADOW OF CLOOMBER\n\nI trust that my readers will not set me down as an inquisitive busybody\nwhen I say that as the days and weeks went by I found my attention and\nmy thoughts more and more attracted to General Heatherstone and the\nmystery which surrounded him.\n\nIt was in vain that I endeavoured by hard work and a strict attention to\nthe laird's affairs to direct my mind into some more healthy channel.\nDo what I would, on land or on the water, I would still find myself\npuzzling over this one question, until it obtained such a hold upon me\nthat I felt it was useless for me to attempt to apply myself to anything\nuntil I had come to some satisfactory solution of it.\n\nI could never pass the dark line of five-foot fencing, and the great\niron gate, with its massive lock, without pausing and racking my brain\nas to what the secret might be which was shut in by that inscrutable\nbarrier. Yet, with all my conjectures and all my observations, I could\nnever come to any conclusion which could for a moment be accepted as an\nexplanation of the facts.\n\nMy sister had been out for a stroll one night, visiting a sick peasant\nor performing some other of the numerous acts of charity by which she\nhad made herself beloved by the whole countryside.\n\n\"John,\" she said when she returned, \"have you seen Cloomber Hall at\nnight?\"\n\n\"No,\" I answered, laying down the book which I was reading. \"Not since\nthat memorable evening when the general and Mr. McNeil came over to make\nan inspection.\"\n\n\"Well, John, will you put your hat on and come a little walk with me?\"\n\nI could see by her manner that something had agitated or frightened her.\n\n\"Why, bless the girl!\" cried I boisterously, \"what is the matter? The\nold Hall is not on fire, surely? You look as grave as if all Wigtown\nwere in a blaze.\"\n\n\"Not quite so bad as that,\" she said, smiling. \"But do come out, Jack. I\nshould very much like you to see it.\"\n\nI had always refrained from saying anything which might alarm my sister,\nso that she knew nothing of the interest which our neighbours' doings\nhad for me. At her request I took my hat and followed her out into the\ndarkness. She led the way along a little footpath over the moor, which\nbrought us to some rising ground, from which we could look down upon the\nHall without our view being obstructed by any of the fir-trees which had\nbeen planted round it.\n\n\"Look at that!\" said my sister, pausing at the summit of this little\neminence.\n\nCloomber lay beneath us in a blaze of light. In the lower floors the\nshutters obscured the illumination, but above, from the broad windows\nof the second storey to the thin slits at the summit of the tower, there\nwas not a chink or an aperture which did not send forth a stream of\nradiance. So dazzling was the effect that for a moment I was persuaded\nthat the house was on fire, but the steadiness and clearness of the\nlight soon freed me from that apprehension. It was clearly the result of\nmany lamps placed systematically all over the building.\n\nIt added to the strange effect that all these brilliantly illuminated\nrooms were apparently untenanted, and some of them, so far as we could\njudge, were not even furnished. Through the whole great house there was\nno sign of movement or of life--nothing but the clear, unwinking flood\nof yellow light.\n\nI was still lost in wonder at the sight when I heard a short, quick sob\nat my side.\n\n\"What is it, Esther, dear?\" I asked, looking down at my companion.\n\n\"I feel so frightened. Oh, John, John, take me home, I feel so\nfrightened!\"\n\nShe clung to my arm, and pulled at my coat in a perfect frenzy of fear.\n\n\"It's all safe, darling,\" I said soothingly. \"There is nothing to fear.\nWhat has upset you so?\"\n\n\"I am afraid of them, John; I am afraid of the Heatherstones. Why is\ntheir house lit up like this every night? I have heard from others that\nit is always so. And why does the old man run like a frightened hare if\nany one comes upon him. There is something wrong about it, John, and it\nfrightens me.\"\n\nI pacified her as well as I could, and led her home with me, where I\ntook care that she should have some hot port negus before going to bed.\nI avoided the subject of the Heatherstones for fear of exciting her,\nand she did not recur to it of her own accord. I was convinced, however,\nfrom what I had heard from her, that she had for some time back been\nmaking her own observations upon our neighbours, and that in doing so\nshe had put a considerable strain upon her nerves.\n\nI could see that the mere fact of the Hall being illuminated at night\nwas not enough to account for her extreme agitation, and that it must\nhave derived its importance in her eyes from being one in a chain of\nincidents, all of which had left a weird or unpleasant impression upon\nher mind.\n\nThat was the conclusion which I came to at the time, and I have reason\nto know now that I was right, and that my sister had even more cause\nthan I had myself for believing that there was something uncanny about\nthe tenants of Cloomber.\n\nOur interest in the matter may have arisen at first from nothing higher\nthan curiosity, but events soon look a turn which associated us more\nclosely with the fortunes of the Heatherstone family.\n\nMordaunt had taken advantage of my invitation to come down to the\nlaird's house, and on several occasions he brought with him his\nbeautiful sister. The four of us would wander over the moors together,\nor perhaps if the day were fine set sail upon our little skiff and stand\noff into the Irish Sea.\n\nOn such excursions the brother and sister would be as merry and as happy\nas two children. It was a keen pleasure to them to escape from their\ndull fortress, and to see, if only for a few hours, friendly and\nsympathetic faces round them.\n\nThere could be but one result when four young people were brought\ntogether in sweet, forbidden intercourse. Acquaintance-ship warmed into\nfriendship, and friendship flamed suddenly into love.\n\nGabriel sits beside me now as I write, and she agrees with me that, dear\nas is the subject to ourselves, the whole story of our mutual affection\nis of too personal a nature to be more than touched upon in this\nstatement. Suffice it to say that, within a few weeks of our first\nmeeting Mordaunt Heatherstone had won the heart of my dear sister, and\nGabriel had given me that pledge which death itself will not be able to\nbreak.\n\nI have alluded in this brief way to the double tie which sprang up\nbetween the two families, because I have no wish that this narrative\nshould degenerate into anything approaching to romance, or that I should\nlose the thread of the facts which I have set myself to chronicle. These\nare connected with General Heatherstone, and only indirectly with my own\npersonal history.\n\nIt is enough if I say that after our engagement the visits to Branksome\nbecame more frequent, and that our friends were able sometimes to spend\na whole day with us when business had called the general to Wigtown, or\nwhen his gout confined him to his room.\n\nAs to our good father, he was ever ready to greet us with many small\njests and tags of Oriental poems appropriate to the occasion, for we had\nno secrets from him, and he already looked upon us all as his children.\n\nThere were times when on account of some peculiarly dark or restless fit\nof the general's it was impossible for weeks on end for either Gabriel\nor Mordaunt to get away from the grounds. The old man would even stand\non guard, a gloomy and silent sentinel, at the avenue gate, or pace up\nand down the drive as though he suspected that attempts had been made to\npenetrate his seclusion.\n\nPassing of an evening I have seen his dark, grim figure flitting about\nin the shadow of the trees, or caught a glimpse of his hard, angular,\nswarthy face peering out suspiciously at me from behind the bars.\n\nMy heart would often sadden for him as I noticed his uncouth, nervous\nmovements, his furtive glances and twitching features. Who would have\nbelieved that this slinking, cowering creature had once been a dashing\nofficer, who had fought the battles of his country and had won the palm\nof bravery among the host of brave men around him?\n\nIn spite of the old soldier's vigilance, we managed to hold\ncommunication with our friends.\n\nImmediately behind the Hall there was a spot where the fencing had been\nso carelessly erected that two of the rails could be removed without\ndifficulty, leaving a broad gap, which gave us the opportunity for\nmany a stolen interview, though they were necessarily short, for the\ngeneral's movements were erratic, and no part of the grounds was secure\nfrom his visitations.\n\nHow vividly one of these hurried meetings rises before me! It stands out\nclear, peaceful, and distinct amid the wild, mysterious incidents which\nwere destined to lead up to the terrible catastrophe which has cast a\nshade over our lives.\n\nI can remember that as I walked through the fields the grass was damp\nwith the rain of the morning, and the air was heavy with the smell of\nthe fresh-turned earth. Gabriel was waiting for me under the hawthorn\ntree outside the gap, and we stood hand-in-hand looking down at the long\nsweep of moorland and at the broad blue channel which encircled it with\nits fringe of foam.\n\nFar away in the north-west the sun glinted upon the high peak of Mount\nThroston. From where we stood we could see the smoke of the steamers as\nthey ploughed along the busy water-way which leads to Belfast.\n\n\"Is it not magnificent?\" Gabriel cried, clasping her hands round my arm.\n\"Ah, John, why are we not free to sail away over these waves together,\nand leave all our troubles behind us on the shore?\"\n\n\"And what are the troubles which you would leave behind you, dear one?\"\nI asked. \"May I not know them, and help you to bear them?\"\n\n\"I have no secrets from you, John,\" she answered. \"Our chief trouble is,\nas you may guess, our poor father's strange behaviour. Is it not a sad\nthing for all of us that a man who has played such a distinguished part\nin the world should skulk from one obscure corner of the country to\nanother, and should defend himself with locks and barriers as though he\nwere a common thief flying from justice? This is a trouble, John, which\nit is out of your power to alleviate.\"\n\n\"But why does he do it, Gabriel?\" I asked.\n\n\"I cannot tell,\" she answered frankly. \"I only know that he imagines\nsome deadly danger to be hanging over his head, and that this danger was\nincurred by him during his stay in India. What its nature may be I have\nno more idea than you have.\"\n\n\"Then your brother has,\" I remarked. \"I am sure from the way in which he\nspoke to me about it one day that he knows what it is, and that he looks\nupon it as real.\"\n\n\"Yes, he knows, and so does my mother,\" she answered, \"but they have\nalways kept it secret from me. My poor father is very excited at\npresent. Day and night he is in an agony of apprehension, but it will\nsoon be the fifth of October, and after that he will be at peace.\"\n\n\"How do you know that?\" I asked in surprise.\n\n\"By experience,\" she answered gravely. \"On the fifth of October these\nfears of his come to a crisis. For years back he has been in the habit\nof locking Mordaunt and myself up in our rooms on that date, so that we\nhave no idea what occurs, but we have always found that he has been\nmuch relieved afterwards, and has continued to be comparatively in peace\nuntil that day begins to draw round again.\"\n\n\"Then you have only ten days or so to wait,\" I remarked, for September\nwas drawing to a close. \"By the way, dearest, why is it that you light\nup all your rooms at night?\"\n\n\"You have noticed it, then?\" she said. \"It comes also from my father's\nfears. He does not like to have one dark corner in the whole house.\nHe walks about a good deal at night, and inspects everything, from the\nattics right down to the cellars. He has large lamps in every room and\ncorridor, even the empty ones, and he orders the servants to light them\nall at dusk.\"\n\n\"I am rather surprised that you manage to keep your servants,\" I said,\nlaughing. \"The maids in these parts are a superstitious class, and\ntheir imaginations are easily excited by anything which they don't\nunderstand.\"\n\n\"The cook and both housemaids are from London, and are used to our\nways. We pay them on a very high scale to make up for any inconvenience to\nwhich they may be put. Israel Stakes, the coachman, is the only one who\ncomes from this part of the country, and he seems to be a stolid, honest\nfellow, who is not easily scared.\"\n\n\"Poor little girl,\" I exclaimed, looking down at the slim, graceful\nfigure by my side. \"This is no atmosphere for you to live in. Why will\nyou not let me rescue you from it? Why won't you allow me to go straight\nand ask the general for your hand? At the worst he could only refuse.\"\n\nShe turned quite haggard and pale at the very thought.\n\n\"For Heaven's sake, John,\" she cried earnestly, \"do nothing of the kind.\nHe would whip us all away in the dead of the night, and within a week\nwe should be settling down again in some wilderness where we might never\nhave a chance of seeing or hearing from you again. Besides, he never\nwould forgive us for venturing out of the grounds.\"\n\n\"I don't think that he is a hard-hearted man,\" I remarked. \"I have seen\na kindly look in his eyes, for all his stern face.\"\n\n\"He can be the kindest of fathers,\" she answered. \"But he is terrible\nwhen opposed or thwarted. You have never seen him so, and I trust you\nnever will. It was that strength of will and impatience of opposition\nwhich made him such a splendid officer. I assure you that in India every\none thought a great deal of him. The soldiers were afraid of him, but\nthey would have followed him anywhere.\"\n\n\"And had he these nervous attacks then?\"\n\n\"Occasionally, but not nearly so acutely. He seems to think that the\ndanger--whatever it may be--becomes more imminent every year. Oh, John,\nit is terrible to be waiting like this with a sword over our heads--and\nall the more terrible to me since I have no idea where the blow is to\ncome from.\"\n\n\"Dear Gabriel,\" I said, taking her hand and drawing her to my side,\n\"look over all this pleasant countryside and the broad blue sea. Is it\nnot all peaceful and beautiful? In these cottages, with their red-tiled\nroofs peeping out from the grey moor, there live none but simple,\nGod-fearing men, who toil hard at their crafts and bear enmity to no\nman. Within seven miles of us is a large town, with every civilised\nappliance for the preservation of order. Ten miles farther there is\na garrison quartered, and a telegram would at any time bring down a\ncompany of soldiers. Now, I ask you, dear, in the name of common-sense,\nwhat conceivable danger could threaten you in this secluded\nneighbourhood, with the means of help so near? You assure me that the\nperil is not connected with your father's health?\"\n\n\"No, I am sure of that. It is true that Dr. Easterling, of Stranraer,\nhas been over to see him once or twice, but that was merely for some\nsmall indisposition. I can assure you that the danger is not to be\nlooked for in that direction.\"\n\n\"Then I can assure you,\" said I, laughing, \"that there is no danger\nat all. It must be some strange monomania or hallucination. No other\nhypothesis will cover the facts.\"\n\n\"Would my father's monomania account for the fact of my brother's hair\nturning grey and my mother wasting away to a mere shadow?\"\n\n\"Undoubtedly,\" I answered. \"The long continued worry of the general's\nrestlessness and irritability would produce those effects on sensitive\nnatures.\"\n\n\"No, no!\" said she, shaking her head sadly, \"I have been exposed to his\nrestlessness and irritability, but they have had no such effect upon\nme. The difference between us lies in the fact that they know this awful\nsecret and I do not.\"\n\n\"My dear girl,\" said I, \"the days of family apparitions and that kind\nof thing are gone. Nobody is haunted nowadays, so we can put that\nsupposition out of the question. Having done so, what remains? There is\nabsolutely no other theory which could even be suggested. Believe me,\nthe whole mystery is that the heat of India has been too much for your\npoor father's brain.\"\n\nWhat she would have answered I cannot tell, for at that moment she gave\na start as if some sound had fallen upon her ear. As she looked round\napprehensively, I suddenly saw her features become rigid and her eyes\nfixed and dilated.\n\nFollowing the direction of her gaze, I felt a sudden thrill of fear pass\nthrough me as I perceived a human face surveying us from behind one of\nthe trees--a man's face, every feature of which was distorted by the\nmost malignant hatred and anger. Finding himself observed, he stepped\nout and advanced towards us, when I saw that it was none other than the\ngeneral himself. His beard was all a-bristle with fury, and his deepset\neyes glowed from under their heavily veined lids with a most sinister\nand demoniacal brightness.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI. HOW I CAME TO BE ENLISTED AS ONE OF THE GARRISON OF CLOOMBER\n\n\"To your room, girl!\" he cried in a hoarse, harsh voice, stepping in\nbetween us and pointing authoritatively towards the house.\n\nHe waited until Gabriel, with a last frightened glance at me, had\npassed through the gap, and then he turned upon me with an expression so\nmurderous that I stepped back a pace or two, and tightened my grasp upon\nmy oak stick.\n\n\"You-you--\" he spluttered, with his hand twitching at his throat, as\nthough his fury were choking him. \"You have dared to intrude upon my\nprivacy! Do you think I built this fence that all the vermin in the\ncountry might congregate round it? Oh, you have been very near your\ndeath, my fine fellow! You will never be nearer until your time comes.\nLook at this!\" He pulled a squat, thick pistol out of his bosom. \"If\nyou had passed through that gap and set foot on my land I'd have let\ndaylight into you. I'll have no vagabonds here. I know how to treat\ngentry of that sort, whether their faces are black or white.\"\n\n\"Sir,\" said I, \"I meant no harm by coming here, and I do not know how I\nhave deserved this extraordinary outburst. Allow me to observe, however,\nthat you are still covering me with your pistol, and that, as your hand\nis rather tremulous, it is more than possible that it may go off. If\nyou don't turn the muzzle down I shall be compelled in self-defence to\nstrike you over the wrist with my stick.\"\n\n\"What the deuce brought you here, then?\" he asked, in a more composed\nvoice, putting his weapon back into his bosom. \"Can't a gentleman live\nquietly without your coming to peep and pry? Have you no business\nof your own to look after, eh? And my daughter? how came you to know\nanything of her? and what have you been trying to squeeze out of her? It\nwasn't chance that brought you here.\"\n\n\"No,\" said I boldly, \"it was not chance which brought me here. I have\nhad several opportunities of seeing your daughter and of appreciating\nher many noble qualities. We are engaged to be married to each other,\nand I came up with the express intention of seeing her.\"\n\nInstead of blazing into a fury, as I had expected, the general gave a\nlong whistle of astonishment, and then leant up against the railings,\nlaughing softly to himself.\n\n\"English terriers are fond of nosing worms,\" he remarked at last. \"When\nwe brought them out to India they used to trot off into the jungle and\nbegin sniffing at what they imagined to be worms there. But the worm\nturned out to be a venomous snake, and so poor doggy played no more. I\nthink you'll find yourself in a somewhat analogous position if you don't\nlook out.\"\n\n\"You surely don't mean to cast an aspersion upon your own daughter?\" I\nsaid, flushing with indignation.\n\n\"Oh, Gabriel is all right,\" he answered carelessly. \"Our family is not\nexactly one, however, which I should recommend a young fellow to marry\ninto. And pray how is it that I was not informed of this snug little\narrangement of yours?\"\n\n\"We were afraid, sir, that you might separate us,\" I replied, feeling\nthat perfect candour was the best policy under the circumstances. \"It is\npossible that we were mistaken. Before coming to any final decision, I\nimplore you to remember that the happiness of both of us is at stake. It\nis in your power to divide our bodies, but our souls shall be for ever\nunited.\"\n\n\"My good fellow,\" said the general, in a not unkindly tone, \"you don't\nknow what you are asking for. There is a gulf between you and any one of\nthe blood of Heatherstone which can never be bridged over.\"\n\nAll trace of anger had vanished now from his manner, and given place to\nan air of somewhat contemptuous amusement.\n\nMy family pride took fire at his words. \"The gulf may be less than you\nimagine,\" I said coldly. \"We are not clodhoppers because we live in this\nout-of-the-way place. I am of noble descent on one side, and my mother\nwas a Buchan of Buchan. I assure you that there is no such disparity\nbetween us as you seem to imagine.\"\n\n\"You misunderstand me,\" the general answered. \"It is on our side that\nthe disparity lies. There are reasons why my daughter Gabriel should\nlive and die single. It would not be to your advantage to marry her.\"\n\n\"But surely, sir,\" I persisted, \"I am the best judge of my own interests\nand advantages. Since you take this ground all becomes easy, for I do\nassure you that the one interest which overrides all others is that I\nshould have the woman I love for my wife. If this is your only objection\nto our match you may surely give us your consent, for any danger or\ntrial which I may incur in marrying Gabriel will not weigh with me one\nfeatherweight.\"\n\n\"Here's a young bantam!\" exclaimed the old soldier, smiling at my\nwarmth. \"It's easy to defy danger when you don't know what the danger\nis.\"\n\n\"What is it, then?\" I asked, hotly. \"There is no earthly peril which\nwill drive me from Gabriel's side. Let me know what it is and test me.\"\n\n\"No, no. That would never do,\" he answered with a sigh, and then,\nthoughtfully, as if speaking his mind aloud: \"He has plenty of pluck and\nis a well-grown lad, too. We might do worse than make use of him.\"\n\nHe went on mumbling to himself with a vacant stare in his eyes as if he\nhad forgotten my presence.\n\n\"Look here, West,\" he said presently. \"You'll excuse me if I spoke\nhastily a little time ago. It is the second time that I have had\noccasion to apologise to you for the same offence. It shan't occur\nagain. I am rather over-particular, no doubt, in my desire for complete\nisolation, but I have good reasons for insisting on the point. Rightly\nor wrongly, I have got it into my head that some day there might be an\norganised raid upon my grounds. If anything of the sort should occur I\nsuppose I might reckon upon your assistance?\"\n\n\"With all my heart.\"\n\n\"So that if ever you got a message such as 'Come up,' or even\n'Cloomber,' you would know that it was an appeal for help, and would\nhurry up immediately, even if it were in the dead of the night?\"\n\n\"Most certainly I should,\" I answered. \"But might I ask you what the\nnature of the danger is which you apprehend?\"\n\n\"There would be nothing gained by your knowing. Indeed, you would hardly\nunderstand it if I told you. I must bid you good day now, for I have\nstayed with you too long. Remember, I count upon you as one of the\nCloomber garrison now.\"\n\n\"One other thing, sir,\" I said hurriedly, for he was turning away, \"I\nhope that you will not be angry with your daughter for anything which I\nhave told you. It was for my sake that she kept it all secret from you.\"\n\n\"All right,\" he said, with his cold, inscrutable smile. \"I am not such\nan ogre in the bosom of my family as you seem to think. As to this\nmarriage question, I should advise you as a friend to let it drop\naltogether, but if that is impossible I must insist that it stand over\ncompletely for the present. It is impossible to say what unexpected turn\nevents may take. Good-bye.\"\n\nHe plunged into the wood and was quickly out of sight among the dense\nplantation.\n\nThus ended this extraordinary interview, in which this strange man\nhad begun by pointing a loaded pistol at my breast and had ended,\nby partially acknowledging the possibility of my becoming his future\nson-in-law. I hardly knew whether to be cast down or elated over it.\n\nOn the one hand he was likely, by keeping a closer watch over his\ndaughter, to prevent us from communicating as freely as we had done\nhitherto. Against this there was the advantage of having obtained an\nimplied consent to the renewal of my suit at some future date. On the\nwhole, I came to the conclusion as I walked thoughtfully home that I had\nimproved my position by the incident.\n\nBut this danger--this shadowy, unspeakable danger--which appeared to\nrise up at every turn, and to hang day and night over the towers of\nCloomber! Rack my brain as I would, I could not conjure up any solution\nto the problem which was not puerile and inadequate.\n\nOne fact struck me as being significant. Both the father and the son had\nassured me, independently of each other, that if I were told what the\nperil was, I would hardly realise its significance. How strange and\nbizarre must the fear be which can scarcely be expressed in intelligible\nlanguage!\n\nI held up my hand in the darkness before I turned to sleep that night,\nand I swore that no power of man or devil should ever weaken my love for\nthe woman whose pure heart I had had the good fortune to win.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII. OF CORPORAL RUFUS SMITH AND HIS COMING TO CLOOMBER\n\nIn making this statement I have purposely couched it in bald and simple\nlanguage, for fear I should be accused of colouring my narrative for the\nsake of effect. If, however, I have told my story with any approach to\nrealism, the reader will understand me when I say that by this time\nthe succession of dramatic incidents which had occurred had arrested\nmy attention and excited my imagination to the exclusion of all minor\ntopics.\n\nHow could I plod through the dull routine of an agent's work, or\ninterest myself in the thatch of this tenant's bothy or the sails of\nthat one's boat, when my mind was taken up by the chain of events which\nI have described, and was still busy seeking an explanation for them.\n\nGo where I would over the countryside, I could see the square, white\ntower shooting out from among the trees, and beneath that tower this\nill-fated family were watching and waiting, waiting and watching--and\nfor what? That was still the question which stood like an impassable\nbarrier at the end of every train of thought.\n\nRegarded merely as an abstract problem, this mystery of the Heatherstone\nfamily had a lurid fascination about it, but when the woman whom I\nloved a thousandfold better than I did myself proved to be so deeply\ninterested in the solution, I felt that it was impossible to turn my\nthoughts to anything else until it had been finally cleared up.\n\nMy good father had received a letter from the laird, dated from Naples,\nwhich told us that he had derived much benefit from the change, and that\nhe had no intention of returning to Scotland for some time. This was\nsatisfactory to all of us, for my father had found Branksome such an\nexcellent place for study that it would have been a sore trial to him\nto return to the noise and tumult of a city. As to my dear sister and\nmyself, there were, as I have shown, stronger reasons still to make us\nlove the Wigtownshire moors.\n\nIn spite of my interview with the general--or perhaps I might say on\naccount of it--I took occasion at least twice a day to walk towards\nCloomber and satisfy myself that all was well there. He had begun by\nresenting my intrusion, but he had ended by taking me into a sort of\nhalf-confidence, and even by asking my assistance, so I felt that I\nstood upon a different footing with him than I had done formerly, and\nthat he was less likely to be annoyed by my presence. Indeed, I met him\npacing round the inclosure a few days afterwards, and his manner towards\nme was civil, though he made no allusion to our former conversation.\n\nHe appeared to be still in an extreme state of nervousness, starting\nfrom time to time, and gazing furtively about him, with little\nfrightened, darting glances to the right and the left. I hoped that his\ndaughter was right in naming the fifth of October as the turning point\nof his complaint, for it was evident to me as I looked at his gleaming\neyes and quivering hands, that a man could not live long in such a state\nof nervous tension.\n\nI found on examination that he had had the loose rails securely fastened\nso as to block up our former trysting-place, and though I prowled round\nthe whole long line of fencing, I was unable to find any other place\nwhere an entrance could be effected.\n\nHere and there between the few chinks left in the barrier I could catch\nglimpses of the Hall, and once I saw a rough-looking, middle-aged man\nstanding at a window on the lower floor, whom I supposed to be Israel\nStakes, the coachman. There was no sign, however, of Gabriel or of\nMordaunt, and their absence alarmed me. I was convinced that, unless\nthey were under some restraint, they would have managed to communicate\nwith my sister or myself. My fears became more and more acute as day\nfollowed day without our seeing or hearing anything of them.\n\nOne morning--it was the second day of October--I was walking towards the\nHall, hoping that I might be fortunate enough to learn some news of my\ndarling, when I observed a man perched upon a stone at the side of the\nroad.\n\nAs I came nearer to him I could see that he was a stranger, and from his\ndusty clothes and dilapidated appearance he seemed to have come from a\ndistance. He had a great hunch of bread on his knee and a clasp-knife\nin his hand, but he had apparently just finished his breakfast, for he\nbrushed the crumbs off his lap and rose to his feet when he perceived\nme.\n\nNoticing the great height of the fellow and that he still held his\nweapon, I kept well to the other side of the road, for I knew that\ndestitution makes men desperate and that the chain that glittered on\nmy waistcoat might be too great a temptation to him upon this lonely\nhighway. I was confirmed in my fears when I saw him step out into the\ncentre of the road and bar my progress.\n\n\"Well, my lad,\" I said, affecting an ease which I by no means felt,\n\"what can I do for you this morning?\"\n\nThe fellow's face was the colour of mahogany with exposure to the\nweather, and he had a deep scar from the corner of his mouth to his ear,\nwhich by no means improved his appearance. His hair was grizzled, but\nhis figure was stalwart, and his fur cap was cocked on one side so as to\ngive him a rakish, semi-military appearance. Altogether he gave me the\nimpression of being one of the most dangerous types of tramp that I had\never fallen in with.\n\nInstead of replying to my question, he eyed me for some time in silence\nwith sullen, yellow-shot eyes, and then closed his knife with a loud\nsnick.\n\n\"You're not a beak,\" he said, \"too young for that, I guess. They had me\nin chokey at Paisley and they had me in chokey at Wigtown, but by\nthe living thunder if another of them lays a hand on me I'll make him\nremember Corporal Rufus Smith! It's a darned fine country this, where\nthey won't give a man work, and then lay him by the heels for having no\nvisible means of subsistence.\"\n\n\"I am sorry to see an old soldier so reduced,\" said I. \"What corps did\nyou serve in?\"\n\n\"H Battery, Royal Horse Artillery. Bad cess to the Service and every\none in it! Here I am nigh sixty years of age, with a beggarly pension of\nthirty-eight pound ten--not enough to keep me in beer and baccy.\"\n\n\"I should have thought thirty-eight pound ten a year would have been a\nnice help to you in your old age,\" I remarked.\n\n\"Would you, though?\" he answered with a sneer, pushing his\nweather-beaten face forward until it was within a foot of my own.\n\n\"How much d'ye think that slash with a tulwar is worth? And my foot with\nall the bones rattling about like a bagful of dice where the trail\nof the gun went across it. What's that worth, eh? And a liver like a\nsponge, and ague whenever the wind comes round to the east--what's the\nmarket value of that? Would you take the lot for a dirty forty pound a\nyear--would you now?\"\n\n\"We are poor folk in this part of the country,\" I answered. \"You would\npass for a rich man down here.\"\n\n\"They are fool folk and they have fool tastes,\" said he, drawing a black\npipe from his pocket and stuffing it with tobacco. \"I know what good\nliving is, and, by cripes! while I have a shilling in my pocket I like\nto spend it as a shilling should be spent. I've fought for my country\nand my country has done darned little for me. I'll go to the Rooshians,\nso help me! I could show them how to cross the Himalayas so that it\nwould puzzle either Afghans or British to stop 'em. What's that secret\nworth in St. Petersburg, eh, mister?\"\n\n\"I am ashamed to hear an old soldier speak so, even in jest,\" said I\nsternly.\n\n\"Jest, indeed!\" he cried, with a great, roaring oath. \"I'd have done it\nyears ago if the Rooshians had been game to take it up. Skobeloff\nwas the best of the bunch, but he's been snuffed out. However, that's\nneither here nor there. What I want to ask you is whether you've ever\nheard anything in this quarter of a man called Heatherstone, the same\nwho used to be colonel of the 41st Bengalis? They told me at Wigtown\nthat he lived somewhere down this way.\"\n\n\"He lives in that large house over yonder,\" said I, pointing to Cloomber\nTower. \"You'll find the avenue gate a little way down the road, but the\ngeneral isn't over fond of visitors.\"\n\nThe last part of my speech was lost upon Corporal Rufus Smith; for the\ninstant that I pointed out the gate he set off hopping down the road.\n\nHis mode of progression was the most singular I have ever seen, for he\nwould only put his right foot to the ground once in every half-dozen\nstrides, while he worked so hard and attained such a momentum with the\nother limb that he got over the ground at an astonishing speed.\n\nI was so surprised that I stood in the roadway gazing after this hulking\nfigure until the thought suddenly struck me that some serious result\nmight come from a meeting between a man of such blunt speech and the\ncholeric, hot-headed general. I therefore followed him as he hopped\nalong like some great, clumsy bird, and overtook him at the avenue gate,\nwhere he stood grasping the ironwork and peering through at the dark\ncarriage-drive beyond.\n\n\"He's a sly old jackal,\" he said, looking round at me and nodding his\nhead in the direction of the Hall. \"He's a deep old dog. And that's his\nbungalow, is it, among the trees?\"\n\n\"That is his house,\" I answered; \"but I should advise you to keep a more\ncivil tongue in your head if you intend to speak with the general. He is\nnot a man to stand any nonsense.\"\n\n\"Right you are. He was always a hard nut to crack. But isn't this him\ncoming down the avenue?\"\n\nI looked through the gate and saw that it was indeed the general, who,\nhaving either seen us or been attracted by our voices, was hurrying down\ntowards us. As he advanced he would stop from time to time and peer at\nus through the dark shadow thrown by the trees, as if he were irresolute\nwhether to come on or no.\n\n\"He's reconnoitering!\" whispered my companion with a hoarse chuckle.\n\"He's afraid--and I know what he's afraid of. He won't be caught in a\ntrap if he can help it, the old 'un. He's about as fly as they make 'em,\nyou bet!\"\n\nThen suddenly standing on his tip-toes and waving his hand through the\nbars of the gate, he shouted at the top of his voice:\n\n\"Come on, my gallant commandant! Come on! The coast's clear, and no\nenemy in sight.\"\n\nThis familiar address had the effect of reassuring the general, for he\ncame right for us, though I could tell by his heightened colour that his\ntemper was at boiling point.\n\n\"What, you here, Mr. West?\" he said, as his eye fell upon me. \"What is\nit you want, and why have you brought this fellow with you?\"\n\n\"I have not brought him with me, sir,\" I answered, feeling rather\ndisgusted at being made responsible for the presence of the\ndisreputable-looking vagabond beside me. \"I found him on the road here,\nand he desired to be directed to you, so I showed him the way. I know\nnothing of him myself.\"\n\n\"What do you want with me, then?\" the general asked sternly, turning to\nmy companion.\n\n\"If you please, sir,\" said the ex-corporal, speaking in a whining voice,\nand touching his moleskin cap with a humility which contrasted strangely\nwith the previous rough independence of his bearing, \"I'm an old gunner\nin the Queen's service, sir, and knowing your name by hearing it in\nIndia I thought that maybe you would take me as your groom or gardener,\nor give me any other place as happened to be vacant.\"\n\n\"I am sorry that I cannot do anything for you, my man,\" the old soldier\nanswered impressively.\n\n\"Then you'll give me a little just to help me on my way, sir,\" said the\ncringing mendicant. \"You won't see an old comrade go to the bad for the\nsake of a few rupees? I was with Sale's brigade in the Passes, sir, and\nI was at the second taking of Cabul.\"\n\nGeneral Heatherstone looked keenly at the supplicant, but was silent\nto his appeal.\n\n\"I was in Ghuznee with you when the walls were all shook down by an\nearthquake, and when we found forty thousand Afghans within gunshot of\nus. You ask me about it, and you'll see whether I'm lying or not. We\nwent through all this when we were young, and now that we are old you\nare to live in a fine bungalow, and I am to starve by the roadside. It\ndon't seem to me to be fair.\"\n\n\"You are an impertinent scoundrel,\" said the general. \"If you had been a\ngood soldier you would never need to ask for help. I shall not give you\na farthing.\"\n\n\"One word more, sir,\" cried the tramp, for the other was turning away,\n\"I've been in the Tarada Pass.\"\n\nThe old soldier sprang round as if the words had been a pistol-shot.\n\n\"What--what d'ye mean?\" he stammered.\n\n\"I've been in the Tarada Pass, sir, and I knew a man there called\nGhoolab Shah.\"\n\nThese last were hissed out in an undertone, and a malicious grin\noverspread the face of the speaker.\n\nTheir effect upon the general was extraordinary. He fairly staggered\nback from the gateway, and his yellow countenance blanched to a livid,\nmottled grey. For a moment he was too overcome to speak. At last he\ngasped out:\n\n\"Ghoolab Shah? Who are you who know Ghoolab Shah?\"\n\n\"Take another look,\" said the tramp, \"your sight is not as keen as it\nwas forty years ago.\"\n\nThe general took a long, earnest look at the unkempt wanderer in front\nof him, and as he gazed I saw the light of recognition spring up in his\neyes.\n\n\"God bless my soul!\" he cried. \"Why, it's Corporal Rufus Smith.\"\n\n\"You've come on it at last,\" said the other, chuckling to himself. \"I\nwas wondering how long it would be before you knew me. And, first\nof all, just unlock this gate, will you? It's hard to talk through a\ngrating. It's too much like ten minutes with a visitor in the cells.\"\n\nThe general, whose face still bore evidences of his agitation, undid the\nbolts with nervous, trembling fingers. The recognition of Corporal Rufus\nSmith had, I fancied, been a relief to him, and yet he plainly showed\nby his manner that he regarded his presence as by no means an unmixed\nblessing.\n\n\"Why, Corporal,\" he said, as the gate swung open, \"I have often wondered\nwhether you were dead or alive, but I never expected to see you again.\nHow have you been all these long years?\"\n\n\"How have I been?\" the corporal answered gruffly. \"Why, I have been\ndrunk for the most part. When I draw my money I lay it out in liquor,\nand as long as that lasts I get some peace in life. When I'm cleaned out\nI go upon tramp, partly in the hope of picking up the price of a dram,\nand partly in order to look for you.\"\n\n\"You'll excuse us talking about these private matters, West,\" the\ngeneral said, looking round at me, for I was beginning to move away.\n\"Don't leave us. You know something of this matter already, and may find\nyourself entirely in the swim with us some of these days.\"\n\nCorporal Rufus Smith looked round at me in blank astonishment.\n\n\"In the swim with us?\" he said. \"However did he get there?\"\n\n\"Voluntarily, voluntarily,\" the general explained, hurriedly sinking his\nvoice. \"He is a neighbour of mine, and he has volunteered his help in\ncase I should ever need it.\"\n\nThis explanation seemed, if anything, to increase the big stranger's\nsurprise.\n\n\"Well, if that don't lick cock-fighting!\" he exclaimed, contemplating me\nwith admiration. \"I never heard tell of such a thing.\"\n\n\"And now you have found me, Corporal Smith,\" said the tenant of\nCloomber, \"what is it that you want of me?\"\n\n\"Why, everything. I want a roof to cover me, and clothes to wear, and\nfood to eat, and, above all, brandy to drink.\"\n\n\"Well, I'll take you in and do what I can for you,\" said the general\nslowly. \"But look here, Smith, we must have discipline. I'm the general\nand you are the corporal; I am the master and you are the man. Now,\ndon't let me have to remind you of that again.\"\n\nThe tramp drew himself up to his full height and raised his right hand\nwith the palm forward in a military salute.\n\n\"I can take you on as gardener and get rid of the fellow I have got.\nAs to brandy, you shall have an allowance and no more. We are not deep\ndrinkers at the Hall.\"\n\n\"Don't you take opium, or brandy, or nothing yourself, sir?\" asked\nCorporal Rufus Smith.\n\n\"Nothing,\" the general said firmly.\n\n\"Well, all I can say is, that you've got more nerve and pluck than I\nshall ever have. I don't wonder now at your winning that Cross in the\nMutiny. If I was to go on listening night after night to them things\nwithout ever taking a drop of something to cheer my heart--why, it would\ndrive me silly.\"\n\nGeneral Heatherstone put his hand up, as though afraid that his\ncompanion might say too much.\n\n\"I must thank you, Mr. West,\" he said, \"for having shown this man my\ndoor. I would not willingly allow an old comrade, however humble, to go\nto the bad, and if I did not acknowledge his claim more readily it\nwas simply because I had my doubts as to whether he was really what he\nrepresented himself to be. Just walk up to the Hall, Corporal, and I\nshall follow you in a minute.\"\n\n\"Poor fellow!\" he continued, as he watched the newcomer hobbling up the\navenue in the ungainly manner which I have described. \"He got a gun over\nhis foot, and it crushed the bones, but the obstinate fool would not let\nthe doctors take it off. I remember him now as a smart young soldier in\nAfghanistan. He and I were associated in some queer adventures, which I\nmay tell you of some day, and I naturally feel sympathy towards him, and\nwould befriend him. Did he tell you anything about me before I came?\"\n\n\"Not a word,\" I replied.\n\n\"Oh,\" said the general carelessly, but with an evident expression of\nrelief, \"I thought perhaps he might have said something of old times.\nWell, I must go and look after him, or the servants will be frightened,\nfor he isn't a beauty to look at. Good-bye!\"\n\nWith a wave of the hand the old man turned away from me and hurried\nup the drive after this unexpected addition to his household, while I\nstrolled on round the high, black paling, peering through every chink\nbetween the planks, but without seeing a trace either of Mordaunt or of\nhis sister.\n\nI have now brought this statement down to the coming of Corporal Rufus\nSmith, which will prove to be the beginning of the end.\n\nI have set down soberly and in order the events which brought us to\nWigtownshire, the arrival of the Heatherstones at Cloomber, the many\nstrange incidents which excited first our curiosity and finally our\nintense interest in that family, and I have briefly touched upon the\ncircumstances which brought my sister and myself into a closer and more\npersonal relationship with them. I think that there cannot be a better\nmoment than this to hand the narrative over to those who had means of\nknowing something of what was going on inside Cloomber during the months\nthat I was observing it from without.\n\nIsrael Stakes, the coachman, proved to be unable to read or write, but\nMr. Mathew Clark, the Presbyterian Minister of Stoneykirk, has copied\ndown his deposition, duly attested by the cross set opposite to his\nname. The good clergyman has, I fancy, put some slight polish upon the\nnarrator's story, which I rather regret, as it might have been more\ninteresting, if less intelligible, when reported verbatim. It still\npreserves, however, considerable traces of Israel's individuality,\nand may be regarded as an exact record of what he saw and did while in\nGeneral Heatherstone's service.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII. STATEMENT OF ISRAEL STAKES\n\n\n(Copied and authenticated by the Reverend Mathew Clark, Presbyterian\nMinister of Stoneykirk, in Wigtownshire)\n\nMaister Fothergill West and the meenister say that I maun tell all I can\naboot General Heatherstone and his hoose, but that I maunna say muckle\naboot mysel' because the readers wouldna care to hear aboot me or my\naffairs. I am na sae sure o' that, for the Stakes is a family weel\nkenned and respecked on baith sides o' the Border, and there's mony in\nNithsdale and Annandale as would be gey pleased to hear news o' the son\no' Archie Stakes, o' Ecclefechan.\n\nI maun e'en do as I'm tauld, however, for Mr. West's sake, hoping he'll\nno forget me when I chance to hae a favour tae ask.(1) I'm no able tae\nwrite mysel' because my feyther sent me oot to scare craws instead o'\nsendin' me tae school, but on the ither hond he brought me up in the\npreenciples and practice o' the real kirk o' the Covenant, for which may\nthe Lord be praised!\n\nIt way last May twel'month that the factor body, Maister McNeil, cam\nower tae me in the street and speered whether I was in want o' a place\nas a coachman and gairdner. As it fell oot I chanced tae be on the look\noot for something o' the sort mysel' at the time, but I wasna ower quick\nto let him see that I wanted it.\n\n\"Ye can tak it or leave it,\" says he sharp like. \"It's a guid place,\nand there's mony would be glad o't. If ye want it ye can come up tae my\noffice at twa the morn and put your ain questions tae the gentleman.\"\n\nThat was a' I could get frae him, for he's a close man and a hard one at\na bargain--which shall profit him leetle in the next life, though he lay\nby a store o' siller in this. When the day comes there'll be a hantle o'\nfactors on the left hand o' the throne, and I shouldna be surprised if\nMaister McNeil found himsel' amang them.\n\nWeel, on the morn I gaed up to the office and there I foond the factor\nand a lang, thin, dour man wi' grey hair and a face as brown and\ncrinkled as a walnut. He looked hard at me wi' a pair o' een that glowed\nlike twa spunks, and then he says, says he:\n\n\"You've been born in these pairts, I understan'?\"\n\n\"Aye,\" says I, \"and never left them neither.\"\n\n\"Never been oot o' Scotland?\" he speers.\n\n\"Twice to Carlisle fair,\" says I, for I am a man wha loves the truth;\nand besides I kenned that the factor would mind my gaeing there, for I\nbargained fur twa steers and a stirk that he wanted for the stockin' o'\nthe Drumleugh Fairm.\n\n\"I learn frae Maister McNeil,\" says General Heatherstone--for him it was\nand nane ither--\"that ye canna write.\"\n\n\"Na,\" says I.\n\n\"Nor read?\"\n\n\"Na,\" says I.\n\n\"It seems tae me,\" says he, turnin' tae the factor, \"that this is the\nvera man I want. Servants is spoilt noo-a-days,\" says he, \"by ower\nmuckle eddication. I hae nae doobt, Stakes, that ye will suit me well\nenough. Ye'll hae three pund a month and a' foond, but I shall resairve\nthe right o' givin' ye twenty-four hoors' notice at any time. How will\nthat suit ye?\"\n\n\"It's vera different frae my last place,\" says I, discontented-like.\n\nAnd the words were true enough, for auld Fairmer Scott only gave me a\npund a month and parritch twice a day.\n\n\"Weel, weel,\" says he, \"maybe we'll gie ye a rise if ye suit. Meanwhile\nhere's the han'sel shillin' that Maister McNeil tells me it's the custom\ntae give, and I shall expec' tae see ye at Cloomber on Monday.\"\n\nWhen the Monday cam roond I walked oot tae Cloomber, and a great muckle\nhoose it is, wi' a hunderd windows or mair, and space enough tae hide\nawa' half the parish.\n\nAs tae gairdening, there was no gairden for me tae work at, and the\nhorse was never taken oot o' the stables frae week's end tae week's end.\nI was busy enough for a' that, for there was a deal o' fencing tae\nbe put up, and one thing or anither, forbye cleanin' the knives and\nbrushin' the boots and such-like jobs as is mair fit for an auld wife\nthan for a grown man.\n\nThere was twa besides mysel' in the kitchen, the cook Eliza, and Mary\nthe hoosemaid, puir, benighted beings baith o' them, wha had wasted a'\ntheir lives in London, and kenned leetle aboot the warld or the ways o'\nthe flesh.\n\nI hadna muckle tae say to them, for they were simple folk who could\nscarce understand English, and had hardly mair regard for their ain\nsouls than the tods on the moor. When the cook said she didna think\nmuckle o' John Knox, and the ither that she wouldna give saxpence tae\nhear the discourse o' Maister Donald McSnaw o' the true kirk, I kenned\nit was time for me tae leave them tae a higher Judge.\n\nThere was four in family, the general, my leddy, Maister Mordaunt,\nand Miss Gabriel, and it wasna long before I found that a' wasna just\nexactly as it should be. My leddy was as thin and as white as a ghaist,\nand many's the time as I've come on her and found her yammerin' and\ngreetin' all by hersel'. I've watched her walkin' up and doon in the\nwood where she thought nane could see her and wringin' her honds like\none demented.\n\nThere was the young gentleman, tae, and his sister--they baith seemed\nto hae some trouble on their minds, and the general maist of a', for the\nithers were up ane day and down anither; but he was aye the same, wi' a\nface as dour and sad as a felon when he feels the tow roond his neck.\n\nI speered o' the hussies in the kitchen whether they kenned what was\namiss wi' the family, but the cook she answered me back that it wasna\nfor her tae inquire into the affairs o' her superiors, and that it was\nnaething to her as long as she did her work and had her wages. They were\npuir, feckless bodies, the twa o' them, and would scarce gie an answer\ntae a ceevil question, though they could clack lood eneugh when they had\na mind.\n\nWeel, weeks passed into months and a' things grew waur instead o'\nbetter in the Hall. The general he got mair nairvous, and his leddy\nmair melancholy every day, and yet there wasna any quarrel or bickering\nbetween them, for when they've been togither in the breakfast room\nI used often tae gang round and prune the rose-tree alongside o'\nthe window, so that I couldna help hearin' a great pairt o' their\nconversation, though sair against the grain.\n\nWhen the young folk were wi' them they would speak little, but when they\nhad gone they would aye talk as if some waefu' trial ere aboot to fa'\nupon them, though I could never gather from their words what it was that\nthey were afeared o'.\n\nI've heard the general say mair than ance that he wasna frighted o'\ndeath, or any danger that he could face and have done wi', but that it\nwas the lang, weary waitin' and the uncertainty that had taken a' the\nstrength and the mettle oot o' him. Then my leddy would console him and\ntell him that maybe it wasna as bad as he thocht, and that a' would come\nricht in the end--but a' her cheery words were clean throwed away upon\nhim.\n\nAs tae the young folks, I kenned weel that they didna bide in the\ngroonds, and that they were awa' whenever they got a chance wi' Maister\nFothergill West tae Branksome, but the general was too fu' o' his ain\ntroubles tae ken aboot it, and it didna seem tae me that it was pairt\no' my duties either as coachman or as gairdner tae mind the bairns.\nHe should have lairnt that if ye forbid a lassie and a laddie to dae\nanything it's just the surest way o' bringin' it aboot. The Lord foond\nthat oot in the gairden o' Paradise, and there's no muckle change\nbetween the folk in Eden and the folk in Wigtown.\n\nThere's ane thing that I havena spoke aboot yet, but that should be set\ndoon.\n\nThe general didna share his room wi' his wife, but slept a' alane in a\nchamber at the far end o' the hoose, as distant as possible frae every\none else. This room was aye lockit when he wasna in it, and naebody was\never allowed tae gang into it. He would mak' his ain bed, and red it up\nand dust it a' by himsel', but he wouldna so much as allow one o' us to\nset fut on the passage that led tae it.\n\nAt nicht he would walk a' ower the hoose, and he had lamps hung in every\nroom and corner, so that no pairt should be dark.\n\nMany's the time frae my room in the garret I've heard his futsteps\ncomin' and gangin', comin' and gangin' doon one passage and up anither\nfrae midnight till cockcraw. It was weary wark to lie listenin' tae his\nclatter and wonderin' whether he was clean daft, or whether maybe he'd\nlairnt pagan and idolatrous tricks oot in India, and that his conscience\nnoo was like the worm which gnaweth and dieth not. I'd ha' speered frae\nhim whether it wouldna ease him to speak wi' the holy Donald McSnaw, but\nit might ha' been a mistake, and the general wasna a man that you'd care\ntae mak' a mistake wi'.\n\nAne day I was workin' at the grass border when he comes up and he says,\nsays he:\n\n\"Did ye ever have occasion tae fire a pistol, Israel?\"\n\n\"Godsakes!\" says I, \"I never had siccan a thing in my honds in my life.\"\n\n\"Then you'd best not begin noo,\" says he. \"Every man tae his ain\nweepon,\" he says. \"Now I warrant ye could do something wi' a guid\ncrab-tree cudgel!\"\n\n\"Aye, could I,\" I answered blithely, \"as well as ony lad on the Border.\"\n\n\"This is a lonely hoose,\" says he, \"and we might be molested by some\nrascals. It's weel tae be ready for whatever may come. Me and you and my\nson Mordaunt and Mr. Fothergill West of Branksome, who would come if he\nwas required, ought tae be able tae show a bauld face--what think ye?\"\n\n\"'Deed, sir,\" I says, \"feastin' is aye better than fechtin'--but if\nye'll raise me a pund a month, I'll no' shirk my share o' either.\"\n\n\"We won't quarrel ower that,\" says he, and agreed tae the extra twal'\npund a year as easy as though it were as many bawbees. Far be it frae me\ntae think evil, but I couldna help surmisin' at the time that money that\nwas so lightly pairted wi' was maybe no' so very honestly cam by.\n\nI'm no' a curious or a pryin' mun by nature, but I was sair puzzled in\nmy ain mind tae tell why it was that the general walked aboot at nicht\nand what kept him frae his sleep.\n\nWeel, ane day I was cleanin' doon the passages when my e'e fell on a\ngreat muckle heap o' curtains and auld cairpets and sic' like things\nthat were piled away in a corner, no vera far frae the door o' the\ngeneral's room. A' o' a sudden a thocht came intae my heid and I says\ntae mysel':\n\n\"Israel, laddie,\" says I, \"what's tae stop ye frae hidin' behind that\nthis vera nicht and seein' the auld mun when he doesna ken human e'e is\non him?\"\n\nThe mair I thocht o't the mair seemple it appeared, and I made up my\nmind tae put the idea intae instant execution.\n\nWhen the nicht cam roond I tauld the women-folk that I was bad wi' the\njawache, and would gang airly tae my room. I kenned fine when ance I got\nthere that there was na chance o' ony ane disturbin' me, so I waited a\nwee while, and then when a' was quiet, I slippit aff my boots and ran\ndoon the ither stair until I cam tae the heap o' auld clothes, and there\nI lay doon wi' ane e'e peepin' through a kink and a' the rest covered up\nwi' a great, ragged cairpet.\n\nThere I bided as quiet as a mouse until the general passed me on his\nroad tae bed, and a' was still in the hoose.\n\nMy certie! I wouldna gang through wi' it again for a' the siller at the\nUnion Bank of Dumfries, I canna think o't noo withoot feelin' cauld a'\nthe way doon my back.\n\nIt was just awfu' lyin' there in the deid silence, waitin' and waitin'\nwi' never a soond tae break the monotony, except the heavy tickin' o' an\nauld clock somewhere doon the passage.\n\nFirst I would look doon the corridor in the one way, and syne I'd look\ndoon in t'ither, but it aye seemed to me as though there was something\ncoming up frae the side that I wasna lookin' at. I had a cauld sweat on\nmy broo, and my hairt was beatin' twice tae ilka tick o' the clock, and\nwhat feared me most of a' was that the dust frae the curtains and things\nwas aye gettin' doon intae my lungs, and it was a' I could dae tae keep\nmysel' frae coughin'.\n\nGodsakes! I wonder my hair wasna grey wi' a' that I went through. I\nwouldna dae it again to be made Lord Provost o' Glasgie.\n\nWeel, it may have been twa o'clock in the mornin' or maybe a little\nmair, and I was just thinkin' that I wasna tae see onything after\na'--and I wasna very sorry neither--when all o' a sudden a soond cam tae\nmy ears clear and distinct through the stillness o' the nicht.\n\nI've been asked afore noo tae describe that soond, but I've aye foond\nthat it's no' vera easy tae gie a clear idea o't, though it was unlike\nany other soond that ever I hearkened tae. It was a shairp, ringin'\nclang, like what could be caused by flippin' the rim o' a wineglass, but\nit was far higher and thinner than that, and had in it, tae, a kind o'\nsplash, like the tinkle o' a rain-drop intae a water-butt.\n\nIn my fear I sat up amang my cairpets, like a puddock among\ngowan-leaves, and I listened wi' a' my ears. A' was still again noo,\nexcept for the dull tickin' o' the distant clock.\n\nSuddenly the soond cam again, as clear, as shrill, as shairp as ever,\nand this time the general heard it, for I heard him gie a kind o' groan,\nas a tired man might wha has been roosed oot o' his sleep.\n\nHe got up frae his bed, and I could make oot a rustling noise, as though\nhe were dressin' himsel', and presently his footfa' as he began tae walk\nup and doon in his room.\n\nMysakes! it didna tak lang for me tae drap doon amang the cairpets again\nand cover mysel' ower. There I lay tremblin' in every limb, and sayin'\nas mony prayers as I could mind, wi' my e'e still peepin' through the\nkeek-hole, and fixed upon the door o' the general's room.\n\nI heard the rattle o' the handle presently, and the door swung slowly\nopen. There was a licht burnin' in the room beyond, an' I could just\ncatch a glimpse o' what seemed tae me like a row o' swords stuck alang\nthe side o' the wa', when the general stepped oot and shut the door\nbehind him. He was dressed in a dressin' goon, wi' a red smokin'-cap\non his heid, and a pair o' slippers wi' the heels cut off and the taes\nturned up.\n\nFor a moment it cam into my held that maybe he was walkin' in his sleep,\nbut as he cam towards me I could see the glint o' the licht in his e'en,\nand his face was a' twistin', like a man that's in sair distress o'\nmind. On my conscience, it gies me the shakes noo when I think o' his\ntall figure and his yelley face comin' sae solemn and silent doon the\nlang, lone passage.\n\nI haud my breath and lay close watchin' him, but just as he cam tae\nwhere I was my vera hairt stood still in my breast, for \"ting!\"--loud\nand clear, within a yaird o' me cam the ringin', clangin' soond that I\nhad a'ready hairkened tae.\n\nWhere it cam frae is mair than I can tell or what was the cause o't. It\nmight ha' been that the general made it, but I was sair puzzled tae tell\nhoo, for his honds were baith doon by his side as he passed me. It cam\nfrae his direction, certainly, but it appeared tae me tae come frae ower\nhis heid, but it was siccan a thin, eerie, high-pitched, uncanny kind o'\nsoond that it wasna easy tae say just exactly where it did come frae.\n\nThe general tuk nae heed o't, but walked on and was soon oot o' sicht,\nand I didna lose a minute in creepin' oot frae my hidin' place and\nscamperin' awa' back tae my room, and if a' the bogies in the Red Sea\nwere trapesin' up and doon the hale nicht through, I wud never put my\nheid oot again tae hae a glimpse o' them.\n\nI didna say a word tae anybody aboot what I'd seen, but I made up my\nmind that I wudna stay muckle langer at Cloomber Ha'. Four pund a month\nis a good wage, but it isna enough tae pay a man for the loss o' his\npeace o' mind, and maybe the loss o' his soul as weel, for when the deil\nis aboot ye canna tell what sort o' a trap he may lay for ye, and though\nthey say that Providence is stronger than him, it's maybe as weel no' to\nrisk it.\n\nIt was clear tae me that the general and his hoose were baith under some\ncurse, and it was fit that that curse should fa' on them that had earned\nit, and no' on a righteous Presbyterian, wha had ever trod the narrow\npath.\n\nMy hairt was sair for young Miss Gabriel--for she was a bonnie and\nwinsome lassie--but for a' that, I felt that my duty was tae mysel' and\nthat I should gang forth, even as Lot ganged oot o' the wicked cities o'\nthe plain.\n\nThat awfu' cling-clang was aye dingin' in my lugs, and I couldna bear\nto be alane in the passages for fear o' hearin' it ance again. I only\nwanted a chance or an excuse tae gie the general notice, and tae gang\nback to some place where I could see Christian folk, and have the kirk\nwithin a stone-cast tae fa' back upon.\n\nBut it proved tae be ordained that, instead o' my saying the word, it\nshould come frae the general himsel'.\n\nIt was ane day aboot the beginning of October, I was comin' oot o' the\nstable, after giein' its oats tae the horse, when I seed a great muckle\nloon come hoppin' on ane leg up the drive, mair like a big, ill-faured\ncraw than a man.\n\nWhen I clapped my een on him I thocht that maybe this was ane of the\nrascals that the maister had been speakin' aboot, so withoot mair ado\nI fetched oot my bit stick with the intention o' tryin' it upon the\nlimmer's heid. He seed me comin' towards him, and readin' my intention\nfrae my look maybe, or frae the stick in my hand, he pu'ed oot a lang\nknife frae his pocket and swore wi' the most awfu' oaths that if I didna\nstan' back he'd be the death o' me.\n\nMa conscience! the words the chiel used was eneugh tae mak' the hair\nstand straight on your heid. I wonder he wasna struck deid where he\nstood.\n\nWe were still standin' opposite each ither--he wi' his knife and me wi'\nthe stick--when the general he cam up the drive and foond us. Tae my\nsurprise he began tae talk tae the stranger as if he'd kenned him a' his\ndays.\n\n\"Put your knife in your pocket, Corporal,\" says he. \"Your fears have\nturned your brain.\"\n\n\"Blood an' wounds!\" says the other. \"He'd ha' turned my brain tae some\npurpose wi' that muckle stick o' his if I hadna drawn my snickersnee.\nYou shouldna keep siccan an auld savage on your premises.\"\n\nThe maister he frooned and looked black at him, as though he didna\nrelish advice comin' frae such a source. Then turnin' tae me--\"You won't\nbe wanted after to-day, Israel,\" he says; \"you have been a guid servant,\nand I ha' naething tae complain of wi' ye, but circumstances have arisen\nwhich will cause me tae change my arrangements.\"\n\n\"Vera guid, sir,\" says I.\n\n\"You can go this evening,\" says he, \"and you shall have an extra month's\npay tae mak up t'ye for this short notice.\"\n\nWi' that he went intae the hoose, followed by the man that he ca'ed the\ncorporal, and frae that day tae this I have never clapped een either on\nthe ane or the ither. My money was sent oot tae me in an envelope,\nand havin' said a few pairtin' words tae the cook and the wench wi'\nreference tae the wrath tae come and the treasure that is richer than\nrubies, I shook the dust o' Cloomber frae my feet for ever.\n\nMaister Fothergill West says I maunna express an opeenion as tae what\ncam aboot afterwards, but maun confine mysel' tae what I saw mysel'. Nae\ndoubt he has his reasons for this--and far be it frae me tae hint that\nthey are no' guid anes--but I maun say this, that what happened didna\nsurprise me. It was just as I expeckit, and so I said tae Maister Donald\nMcSnaw.\n\nI've tauld ye a' aboot it noo, and I havena a word tae add or tae\nwithdraw. I'm muckle obleeged tae Maister Mathew Clairk for puttin'\nit a' doon in writin' for me, and if there's ony would wish tae speer\nonything mair o' me I'm well kenned and respeckit in Ecclefechan, and\nMaister McNeil, the factor o' Wigtown, can aye tell where I am tae be\nfoond.\n\n\n(1) The old rascal was well paid for his trouble, so he need not have\nmade such a favour of it.--J.F.W.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX. NARRATIVE OF JOHN EASTERLING, F.R.C.P.EDIN.\n\n\nHaving given the statement of Israel Stakes _in extenso_, I shall append\na short memorandum from Dr. Easterling, now practising at Stranraer.\nIt is true that the doctor was only once within the walls of Cloomber\nduring its tenancy by General Heatherstone, but there were some\ncircumstances connected with this visit which made it valuable,\nespecially when considered as a supplement to the experiences which I\nhave just submitted to the reader.\n\nThe doctor has found time amid the calls of a busy country practice\nto jot down his recollections, and I feel that I cannot do better than\nsubjoin them exactly as they stand.\n\nI have very much pleasure in furnishing Mr. Fothergill West with an\naccount of my solitary visit to Cloomber Hall, not only on account\nof the esteem which I have formed for that gentleman ever since his\nresidence at Branksome, but also because it is my conviction that the\nfacts in the case of General Heatherstone are of such a singular nature\nthat it is of the highest importance that they should be placed before\nthe public in a trustworthy manner.\n\nIt was about the beginning of September of last year that I received\na note from Mrs. Heatherstone, of Cloomber Hall, desiring me to make a\nprofessional call upon her husband, whose health, she said, had been for\nsome time in a very unsatisfactory state.\n\nI had heard something of the Heatherstones and of the strange seclusion\nin which they lived, so that I was very much pleased at this opportunity\nof making their closer acquaintance, and lost no time in complying with\nher request.\n\nI had known the Hall in the old days of Mr. McVittie, the original\nproprietor, and I was astonished on arriving at the avenue gate to\nobserve the changes which had taken place.\n\nThe gate itself, which used to yawn so hospitably upon the road, was\nnow barred and locked, and a high wooden fence, with nails upon the\ntop, encircled the whole grounds. The drive itself was leaf-strewn and\nuncared-for, and the whole place had a depressing air of neglect and\ndecay.\n\nI had to knock twice before a servant-maid opened the door and showed me\nthrough a dingy hall into a small room, where sat an elderly, careworn\nlady, who introduced herself as Mrs. Heatherstone. With her pale face,\nher grey hair, her sad, colourless eyes, and her faded silk dress, she\nwas in perfect keeping with her melancholy surroundings.\n\n\"You find us in much trouble, doctor,\" she said, in a quiet, refined\nvoice. \"My poor husband has had a great deal to worry him, and his\nnervous system for a long time has been in a very weak state. We came to\nthis part of the country in the hope that the bracing air and the quiet\nwould have a good effect upon him. Instead of improving, however, he\nhas seemed to grow weaker, and this morning he is in a high fever and a\nlittle inclined to be delirious. The children and I were so frightened\nthat we sent for you at once. If you will follow me I will take you to\nthe general's bedroom.\"\n\nShe led the way down a series of corridors to the chamber of the sick\nman, which was situated in the extreme wing of the building.\n\nIt was a carpetless, bleak-looking room, scantily furnished with a small\ntruckle bed, a campaigning chair, and a plain deal table, on which were\nscattered numerous papers and books. In the centre of this table there\nstood a large object of irregular outline, which was covered over with a\nsheet of linen.\n\nAll round the walls and in the corners were arranged a very choice and\nvaried collection of arms, principally swords, some of which were of\nthe straight pattern in common use in the British Army, while among\nthe others were scimitars, tulwars, cuchurries, and a score of other\nspecimens of Oriental workmanship. Many of these were richly mounted,\nwith inlaid sheaths and hilts sparkling with precious stones, so that\nthere was a piquant contrast between the simplicity of the apartment and\nthe wealth which glittered on the walls.\n\nI had little time, however, to observe the general's collection, since\nthe general himself lay upon the couch and was evidently in sore need of\nmy services.\n\nHe was lying with his head turned half away from us. Breathing heavily,\nand apparently unconscious of our presence. His bright, staring eyes and\nthe deep, hectic flush upon his cheek showed that his fever was at its\nheight.\n\nI advanced to the bedside, and, stooping over him, I placed my fingers\nupon his pulse, when immediately he sprang up into the sitting position\nand struck at me frenziedly with his clenched hands. I have never seen\nsuch intensity of fear and horror stamped upon a human face as appeared\nupon that which was now glaring up at me.\n\n\"Bloodhound!\" he yelled; \"let me go--let me go, I say! Keep your hands\noff me! Is it not enough that my life has been ruined? When is it all to\nend? How long am I to endure it?\"\n\n\"Hush, dear, hush!\" said his wife in a soothing voice, passing her\ncool hand over his heated forehead. \"This is Doctor Easterling, from\nStranraer. He has not come to harm you, but to do you good.\"\n\nThe general dropped wearily back upon his pillow, and I could see by the\nchanged expression of his face that his delirium had left him, and that\nhe understood what had been said.\n\nI slipped my clinical thermometer into his armpit and counted his pulse\nrate. It amounted to 120 per minute, and his temperature proved to be\n104 degrees. Clearly it was a case of remittent fever, such as occurs in\nmen who have spent a great part of their lives in the tropics.\n\n\"There is no danger,\" I remarked. \"With a little quinine and arsenic we\nshall very soon overcome the attack and restore his health.\"\n\n\"No danger, eh?\" he said. \"There never is any danger for me. I am as\nhard to kill as the Wandering Jew. I am quite clear in the head now,\nMary; so you may leave me with the doctor.\"\n\nMrs. Heatherstone left the room--rather unwillingly, as I thought--and\nI sat down by the bedside to listen to anything which my patient might\nhave to communicate.\n\n\"I want you to examine my liver,\" he said when the door was closed. \"I\nused to have an abscess there, and Brodie, the staff-surgeon, said that\nit was ten to one that it would carry me off. I have not felt much of it\nsince I left the East. This is where it used to be, just under the angle\nof the ribs.\"\n\n\"I can find the place,\" said I, after making a careful examination;\n\"but I am happy to tell you that the abscess has either been entirely\nabsorbed, or has turned calcareous, as these solitary abscesses will.\nThere is no fear of its doing you any harm now.\"\n\nHe seemed to be by no means overjoyed at the intelligence.\n\n\"Things always happen so with me,\" he said moodily. \"Now, if another\nfellow was feverish and delirious he would surely be in some danger, and\nyet you will tell me that I am in none. Look at this, now.\" He bared\nhis chest and showed me a puckered wound over the region of the heart.\n\"That's where the jezail bullet of a Hillman went in. You would think\nthat was in the right spot to settle a man, and yet what does it do but\nglance upon a rib, and go clean round and out at the back, without so\nmuch as penetrating what you medicos call the pleura. Did ever you hear\nof such a thing?\"\n\n\"You were certainly born under a lucky star,\" I observed, with a smile.\n\n\"That's a matter of opinion,\" he answered, shaking his head. \"Death\nhas no terrors for me, if it will but come in some familiar form, but I\nconfess that the anticipation of some strange, some preternatural form\nof death is very terrible and unnerving.\"\n\n\"You mean,\" said I, rather puzzled at his remark, \"that you would prefer\na natural death to a death by violence?\"\n\n\"No, I don't mean that exactly,\" he answered. \"I am too familiar with\ncold steel and lead to be afraid of either. Do you know anything about\nodyllic force, doctor?\"\n\n\"No, I do not,\" I replied, glancing sharply at him to see if there were\nany signs of his delirium returning. His expression was intelligent,\nhowever, and the feverish flush had faded from his cheeks.\n\n\"Ah, you Western scientific men are very much behind the day in some\nthings,\" he remarked. \"In all that is material and conducive to the\ncomfort of the body you are pre-eminent, but in what concerns the subtle\nforces of Nature and the latent powers of the human spirit your best\nmen are centuries behind the humblest coolies of India. Countless\ngenerations of beef-eating, comfort loving ancestors have given our\nanimal instincts the command over our spiritual ones. The body, which\nshould have been a mere tool for the use of the soul, has now become a\ndegrading prison in which it is confined. The Oriental soul and body are\nnot so welded together as ours are, and there is far less wrench when\nthey part in death.\"\n\n\"They do not appear to derive much benefit from this peculiarity in\ntheir organisation,\" I remarked incredulously.\n\n\"Merely the benefit of superior knowledge,\" the general answered. \"If\nyou were to go to India, probably the very first thing you would see in\nthe way of amusement would be a native doing what is called the mango\ntrick. Of course you have heard or read of it. The fellow plants a mango\nseed, and makes passes over it until it sprouts and bears leaves and\nfruit--all in the space of half-an-hour. It is not really a trick--it\nis a power. These men know more than your Tyndalls or Huxleys do about\nNature's processes, and they can accelerate or retard her workings\nby subtle means of which we have no conception. These low-caste\nconjurers--as they are called--are mere vulgar dabblers, but the men who\nhave trod the higher path are as far superior to us in knowledge as we\nare to the Hottentots or Patagonians.\"\n\n\"You speak as if you were well acquainted with them,\" I remarked.\n\n\"To my cost, I am,\" he answered. \"I have been brought in contact with\nthem in a way in which I trust no other poor chap ever will be. But,\nreally, as regards odyllic force, you ought to know something of it,\nfor it has a great future before it in your profession. You should read\nReichenbach's 'Researches on Magnetism and Vital Force,' and Gregory's\n'Letters on Animal Magnetism.' These, supplemented by the twenty-seven\nAphorisms of Mesmer, and the works of Dr. Justinus Kerner, of Weinsberg,\nwould enlarge your ideas.\"\n\nI did not particularly relish having a course of reading prescribed for\nme on a subject connected with my own profession, so I made no comment,\nbut rose to take my departure. Before doing so I felt his pulse once\nmore, and found that the fever had entirely left him in the sudden,\nunaccountable fashion which is peculiar to these malarious types of\ndisease.\n\nI turned my face towards him to congratulate him upon his improvement,\nand stretched out my hand at the same time to pick my gloves from the\ntable, with the result that I raised not only my own property, but also\nthe linen cloth which was arranged over some object in the centre.\n\nI might not have noticed what I had done had I not seen an angry look\nupon the invalid's face and heard him utter an impatient exclamation.\nI at once turned, and replaced the cloth so promptly that I should\nhave been unable to say what was underneath it, beyond having a general\nimpression that it looked like a bride-cake.\n\n\"All right, doctor,\" the general said good-humouredly, perceiving how\nentirely accidental the incident was. \"There is no reason why you should\nnot see it,\" and stretching out his hand, he pulled away the linen\ncovering for the second time.\n\nI then perceived that what I had taken for a bride-cake was really an\nadmirably executed model of a lofty range of mountains, whose snow-clad\npeaks were not unlike the familiar sugar pinnacles and minarets.\n\n\"These are the Himalayas, or at least the Surinam branch of them,\" he\nremarked, \"showing the principal passes between India and Afghanistan.\nIt is an excellent model. This ground has a special interest for me,\nbecause it is the scene of my first campaign. There is the pass opposite\nKalabagh and the Thul valley, where I was engaged during the summer\nof 1841 in protecting the convoys and keeping the Afridis in order. It\nwasn't a sinecure, I promise you.\"\n\n\"And this,\" said I, indicating a blood-red spot which had been marked\non one side of the pass which he had pointed out--\"this is the scene of\nsome fight in which you were engaged.\"\n\n\"Yes, we had a skirmish there,\" he answered, leaning forward and looking\nat the red mark. \"We were attacked by--\"\n\nAt this moment he fell back upon his pillow as if he had been shot,\nwhile the same look of horror came over his face which I had observed\nwhen I first entered the room. At the same instant there came,\napparently from the air immediately above his bed, a sharp, ringing,\ntinkling sound, which I can only compare with the noise made by a\nbicycle alarm, though it differed from this in having a distinctly\nthrobbing character. I have never, before or since, heard any sound\nwhich could be confounded with it.\n\nI stared round in astonishment, wondering where it could have come from,\nbut without perceiving anything to which it could be ascribed.\n\n\"It's all right, doctor,\" the general said with a ghastly smile. \"It's\nonly my private gong. Perhaps you had better step downstairs and write\nmy prescription in the dining-room.\"\n\nHe was evidently anxious to get rid of me, so I was forced to take my\ndeparture, though I would gladly have stayed a little longer, in the\nhope of learning something as to the origin of the mysterious sound.\n\nI drove away from the house with the full determination of calling again\nupon my interesting patient, and endeavouring to elicit some further\nparticulars as to his past life and his present circumstances. I was\ndestined, however, to be disappointed, for I received that very evening\na note from the general himself, enclosing a handsome fee for my single\nvisit, and informing me that my treatment had done him so much good that\nhe considered himself to be convalescent, and would not trouble me to\nsee him again.\n\nThis was the last and only communication which I ever received from the\ntenant of Cloomber.\n\nI have been asked frequently by neighbours and others who were\ninterested in the matter whether he gave me the impression of insanity.\nTo this I must unhesitatingly answer in the negative. On the contrary,\nhis remarks gave me the idea of a man who had both read and thought\ndeeply.\n\nI observed, however, during our single interview, that his reflexes\nwere feeble, his arcus senilis well marked, and his arteries\natheromatous--all signs that his constitution was in an unsatisfactory\ncondition, and that a sudden crisis might be apprehended.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X. OF THE LETTER WHICH CAME FROM THE HALL\n\nHaving thrown this side-light upon my narrative, I can now resume the\nstatement of my own personal experiences. These I had brought down, as\nthe reader will doubtless remember, to the date of the arrival of the\nsavage-looking wanderer who called himself Corporal Rufus Smith. This\nincident occurred about the beginning of the month of October, and I\nfind upon a comparison of dates that Dr. Easterling's visit to Cloomber\npreceded it by three weeks or more.\n\nDuring all this time I was in sore distress of mind, for I had never\nseen anything either of Gabriel or of her brother since the interview\nin which the general had discovered the communication which was kept up\nbetween us. I had no doubt that some sort of restraint had been placed\nupon them; and the thought that we had brought trouble on their heads\nwas a bitter one both to my sister and myself.\n\nOur anxiety, however, was considerably mitigated by the receipt, a\ncouple of days after my last talk with the general, of a note from\nMordaunt Heatherstone. This was brought us by a little, ragged urchin,\nthe son of one of the fishermen, who informed us that it had been handed\nto him at the avenue gate by an old woman--who, I expect, must have been\nthe Cloomber cook.\n\n\"MY DEAREST FRIENDS,\" it ran, \"Gabriel and I have grieved to think how\nconcerned you must be at having neither heard from nor seen us. The fact\nis that we are compelled to remain in the house. And this compulsion is\nnot physical but moral.\n\n\"Our poor father, who gets more and more nervous every day, has\nentreated us to promise him that we will not go out until after the\nfifth of October, and to allay his fears we have given him the desired\npledge. On the other hand, he has promised us that after the fifth--that\nis, in less than a week--we shall be as free as air to come or go as we\nplease, so we have something to look forward to.\n\n\"Gabriel says that she has explained to you that the governor is always\na changed man after this particular date, on which his fears reach a\ncrisis. He apparently has more reason than usual this year to anticipate\nthat trouble is brewing for this unfortunate family, for I have never\nknown him to take so many elaborate precautions or appear so thoroughly\nunnerved. Who would ever think, to see his bent form and his shaking\nhands, that he is the same man who used some few short years ago to\nshoot tigers on foot among the jungles of the Terai, and would laugh at\nthe more timid sportsmen who sought the protection of their elephant's\nhowdah?\n\n\"You know that he has the Victoria Cross, which he won in the streets\nof Delhi, and yet here he is shivering with terror and starting at every\nnoise, in the most peaceful corner of the world. Oh, the pity of it.\nWest! Remember what I have already told you--that it is no fanciful or\nimaginary peril, but one which we have every reason to suppose to be\nmost real. It is, however, of such a nature that it can neither be\naverted nor can it profitably be expressed in words. If all goes well,\nyou will see us at Branksome on the sixth.\n\n\"With our fondest love to both of you, I am ever, my dear friends, your\nattached\n\n\"MORDAUNT.\"\n\nThis letter was a great relief to us as letting us know that the brother\nand sister were under no physical restraint, but our powerlessness and\ninability even to comprehend what the danger was which threatened those\nwhom we had come to love better than ourselves was little short of\nmaddening.\n\nFifty times a day we asked ourselves and asked each other from what\npossible quarter this peril was to be expected, but the more we thought\nof it the more hopeless did any solution appear.\n\nIn vain we combined our experiences and pieced together every word\nwhich had fallen from the lips of any inmate of Cloomber which might be\nsupposed to bear directly or indirectly upon the subject.\n\nAt last, weary with fruitless speculation, we were fain to try to drive\nthe matter from our thoughts, consoling ourselves with the reflection\nthat in a few more days all restrictions would be removed, and we should\nbe able to learn from our friends' own lips.\n\nThose few intervening days, however, would, we feared, be dreary, long\nones. And so they would have been, had it not been for a new and most\nunexpected incident, which diverted our minds from our own troubles and\ngave them something fresh with which to occupy themselves.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI. OF THE CASTING AWAY OF THE BARQUE \"BELINDA\"\n\nThe third of October had broken auspiciously with a bright sun and a\ncloudless sky. There had in the morning been a slight breeze, and a few\nlittle white wreaths of vapour drifted here and there like the scattered\nfeathers of some gigantic bird, but, as the day wore on, such wind as\nthere was fell completely away, and the air became close and stagnant.\n\nThe sun blazed down with a degree of heat which was remarkable so late\nin the season, and a shimmering haze lay upon the upland moors and\nconcealed the Irish mountains on the other side of the Channel.\n\nThe sea itself rose and fell in a long, heavy, oily roll, sweeping\nslowly landward, and breaking sullenly with a dull, monotonous booming\nupon the rock-girt shore. To the inexperienced all seemed calm and\npeaceful, but to those who are accustomed to read Nature's warnings\nthere was a dark menace in air and sky and sea.\n\nMy sister and I walked out in the afternoon, sauntering slowly along\nthe margin of the great, sandy spit which shoots out into the Irish Sea,\nflanking upon one side the magnificent Bay of Luce, and on the other the\nmore obscure inlet of Kirkmaiden, on the shores of which the Branksome\nproperty is situated.\n\nIt was too sultry to go far, so we soon seated ourselves upon one of the\nsandy hillocks, overgrown with faded grass-tufts, which extend along the\ncoast-line, and which form Nature's dykes against the encroachments of\nthe ocean.\n\nOur rest was soon interrupted by the scrunching of heavy boots upon the\nshingle, and Jamieson, the old man-o'-war's man whom I have already had\noccasion to mention, made his appearance, with the flat, circular net\nupon his back which he used for shrimp-catching. He came towards us upon\nseeing us, and said in his rough, kindly way that he hoped we would\nnot take it amiss if he sent us up a dish of shrimps for our tea at\nBranksome.\n\n\"I aye make a good catch before a storm,\" he remarked.\n\n\"You think there is going to be a storm, then?\" I asked.\n\n\"Why, even a marine could see that,\" he answered, sticking a great wedge\nof tobacco into his cheek. \"The moors over near Cloomber are just white\nwi' gulls and kittiewakes. What d'ye think they come ashore for except\nto escape having all the feathers blown out o' them? I mind a day like\nthis when I was wi' Charlie Napier off Cronstadt. It well-nigh blew us\nunder the guns of the forts, for all our engines and propellers.\"\n\n\"Have you ever known a wreck in these parts?\" I asked.\n\n\"Lord love ye, sir, it's a famous place for wrecks. Why, in that very\nbay down there two o' King Philip's first-rates foundered wi' all hands\nin the days o' the Spanish war. If that sheet o' water and the Bay o'\nLuce round the corner could tell their ain tale they'd have a gey lot\nto speak of. When the Jedgment Day comes round that water will be\njust bubbling wi' the number o' folks that will be coming up frae the\nbottom.\"\n\n\"I trust that there will be no wrecks while we are here,\" said Esther\nearnestly.\n\nThe old man shook his grizzled head and looked distrustfully at the hazy\nhorizon.\n\n\"If it blows from the west,\" he said, \"some o' these sailing ships may\nfind it no joke to be caught without sea-room in the North Channel.\nThere's that barque out yonder--I daresay her maister would be glad\nenough to find himsel' safe in the Clyde.\"\n\n\"She seems to be absolutely motionless,\" I remarked, looking at the\nvessel in question, whose black hull and gleaming sails rose and fell\nslowly with the throbbing of the giant pulse beneath her. \"Perhaps,\nJamieson, we are wrong, and there will be no storm after all.\"\n\nThe old sailor chuckled to himself with an air of superior knowledge,\nand shuffled away with his shrimp-net, while my sister and I walked\nslowly homewards through the hot and stagnant air.\n\nI went up to my father's study to see if the old gentleman had any\ninstructions as to the estate, for he had become engrossed in a new work\nupon Oriental literature, and the practical management of the property\nhad in consequence devolved entirely upon me.\n\nI found him seated at his square library table, which was so heaped with\nbooks and papers that nothing of him was visible from the door except a\ntuft of white hair.\n\n\"My dear son,\" he said to me as I entered, \"it is a great grief to me\nthat you are not more conversant with Sanscrit. When I was your age, I\ncould converse not only in that noble language, but also in the Tamulic,\nLohitic, Gangelic, Taic, and Malaic dialects, which are all offshoots\nfrom the Turanian branch.\"\n\n\"I regret extremely, sir,\" I answered, \"that I have not inherited your\nwonderful talents as a polyglot.\"\n\n\"I have set myself a task,\" he explained, \"which, if it could only be\ncontinued from generation to generation in our own family until it was\ncompleted, would make the name of West immortal. This is nothing less\nthan to publish an English translation of the Buddhist Djarmas, with a\npreface giving an idea of the position of Brahminism before the coming\nof Sakyamuni. With diligence it is possible that I might be able myself\nto complete part of the preface before I die.\"\n\n\"And pray, sir,\" I asked, \"how long would the whole work be when it was\nfinished?\"\n\n\"The abridged edition in the Imperial Library of Pekin,\" said my father,\nrubbing his hands together, \"consists of 325 volumes of an average\nweight of five pounds. Then the preface, which must embrace some\naccount of the Rig-veda, the Sama-veda, the Yagur-veda, and the\nAtharva-veda, with the Brahmanas, could hardly be completed in less\nthan ten volumes. Now, if we apportion one volume to each year, there is\nevery prospect of the family coming to an end of its task about the date\n2250, the twelfth generation completing the work, while the thirteenth\nmight occupy itself upon the index.\"\n\n\"And how are our descendants to live, sir,\" I asked, with a smile,\n\"during the progress of this great undertaking:\"\n\n\"That's the worst of you, Jack,\" my father cried petulantly. \"There is\nnothing practical about you. Instead of confining your attention to the\nworking out of my noble scheme, you begin raising all sorts of absurd\nobjections. It is a mere matter of detail how our descendants live, so\nlong as they stick to the Djarmas. Now, I want you to go up to the bothy\nof Fergus McDonald and see about the thatch, and Willie Fullerton has\nwritten to say that his milk-cow is bad. You might took in upon your way\nand ask after it.\"\n\nI started off upon my errands, but before doing so I took a look at the\nbarometer upon the wall. The mercury had sunk to the phenomenal point\nof twenty-eight inches. Clearly the old sailor had not been wrong in his\ninterpretation of Nature's signs.\n\nAs I returned over the moors in the evening, the wind was blowing in\nshort, angry puffs, and the western horizon was heaped with sombre\nclouds which stretched their long, ragged tentacles right up to the\nzenith.\n\nAgainst their dark background one or two livid, sulphur-coloured\nsplotches showed up malignant and menacing, while the surface of the\nsea had changed from the appearance of burnished quicksilver to that of\nground glass. A low, moaning sound rose up from the ocean as if it knew\nthat trouble was in store for it.\n\nFar out in the Channel I saw a single panting, eager steam vessel making\nits way to Belfast Lough, and the large barque which I had observed in\nthe morning still beating about in the offing, endeavouring to pass to\nthe northward.\n\nAt nine o'clock a sharp breeze was blowing, at ten it had freshened into\na gale, and before midnight the most furious storm was raging which I\ncan remember upon that weather-beaten coast.\n\nI sat for some time in our small, oak-panelled sitting-room listening to\nthe screeching and howling of the blast and to the rattle of the gravel\nand pebbles as they pattered against the window. Nature's grim orchestra\nwas playing its world-old piece with a compass which ranged from\nthe deep diapason of the thundering surge to the thin shriek of the\nscattered shingle and the keen piping of frightened sea birds.\n\nOnce for an instant I opened the lattice window, but a gust of wind and\nrain came blustering through, bearing with it a great sheet of seaweed,\nwhich flapped down upon the table. It was all I could do to close it\nagain with a thrust of my shoulder in the face of the blast.\n\nMy sister and father had retired to their rooms, but my thoughts\nwere too active for sleep, so I continued to sit and to smoke by the\nsmouldering fire.\n\nWhat was going on in the Hall now, I wondered? What did Gabriel think of\nthe storm, and how did it affect the old man who wandered about in the\nnight? Did he welcome these dread forces of Nature as being of the same\norder of things as his own tumultuous thoughts?\n\nIt was only two days now from the date which I had been assured was to\nmark a crisis in his fortunes. Would he regard this sudden tempest as\nbeing in any way connected with the mysterious fate which threatened\nhim?\n\nOver all these things and many more I pondered as I sat by the glowing\nembers until they died gradually out, and the chill night air warned me\nthat it was time to retire.\n\nI may have slept a couple of hours when I was awakened by someone\ntugging furiously at my shoulder. Sitting up in bed, I saw by the dim\nlight that my father was standing half-clad by my bedside, and that it\nwas his grasp which I felt on my night-shirt.\n\n\"Get up, Jack, get up!\" he was crying excitedly. \"There's a great ship\nashore in the bay, and the poor folk will all be drowned. Come down, my\nboy, and let us see what we can do.\"\n\nThe good old man seemed to be nearly beside himself with excitement and\nimpatience. I sprang from my bed, and was huddling on a few clothes,\nwhen a dull, booming sound made itself heard above the howling of the\nwind and the thunder of the breakers.\n\n\"There it is again!\" cried my father. \"It is their signal gun, poor\ncreatures! Jamieson and the fishermen are below. Put your oil-skin coat\non and the Glengarry hat. Come, come, every second may mean a human\nlife!\"\n\nWe hurried down together and made our way to the beach, accompanied by a\ndozen or so of the inhabitants of Branksome.\n\nThe gale had increased rather than moderated, and the wind screamed all\nround us with an infernal clamour. So great was its force that we had\nto put our shoulders against it, and bore our way through it, while the\nsand and gravel tingled up against our faces.\n\nThere was just light enough to make out the scudding clouds and the\nwhite gleam of the breakers, but beyond that all was absolute darkness.\n\nWe stood ankle deep in the shingle and seaweed, shading our eyes with\nour hands and peering out into the inky obscurity.\n\nIt seemed to me as I listened that I could hear human voices loud\nin intreaty and terror, but amid the wild turmoil of Nature it was\ndifficult to distinguish one sound from another.\n\nSuddenly, however, a light glimmered in the heart of the tempest, and\nnext instant the beach and sea and wide, tossing bay were brilliantly\nilluminated by the wild glare of a signal light.\n\nThe ship lay on her beam-ends right in the centre of the terrible Hansel\nreef, hurled over to such an angle that I could see all the planking of\nher deck. I recognised her at once as being the same three-masted barque\nwhich I had observed in the Channel in the morning, and the Union\nJack which was nailed upside down to the jagged slump of her mizzen\nproclaimed her nationality.\n\nEvery spar and rope and writhing piece of cordage showed up hard and\nclear under the vivid light which spluttered and flickered from the\nhighest portion of the forecastle. Beyond the doomed ship, out of the\ngreat darkness came the long, rolling lines of big waves, never ending,\nnever tiring, with a petulant tuft of foam here and there upon their\ncrests. Each as it reached the broad circle of unnatural light appeared\nto gather strength and volume and to hurry on more impetuously until\nwith a roar and a jarring crash it sprang upon its victim.\n\nClinging to the weather shrouds we could distinctly see ten or a dozen\nfrightened seamen who, when the light revealed our presence, turned\ntheir white faces towards us and waved their hands imploringly. The poor\nwretches had evidently taken fresh hope from our presence, though it was\nclear that their own boats had either been washed away or so damaged as\nto render them useless.\n\nThe sailors who clung to the rigging were not, however, the only\nunfortunates on board. On the breaking poop there stood three men who\nappeared to be both of a different race and nature from the cowering\nwretches who implored our assistance.\n\nLeaning upon the shattered taff-rail they seemed to be conversing\ntogether as quietly and unconcernedly as though they were unconscious of\nthe deadly peril which surrounded them.\n\nAs the signal light flickered over them, we could see from the shore\nthat these immutable strangers wore red fezes, and that their faces were\nof a swarthy, large-featured type, which proclaimed an Eastern origin.\n\nThere was little time, however, for us to take note of such details.\nThe ship was breaking rapidly, and some effort must be made to save the\npoor, sodden group of humanity who implored our assistance.\n\nThe nearest lifeboat was in the Bay of Luce, ten long miles away, but\nhere was our own broad, roomy craft upon the shingle, and plenty of\nbrave fisher lads to form a crew. Six of us sprang to the oars, the\nothers pushed us off, and we fought our way through the swirling, raging\nwaters, staggering and recoiling before the great, sweeping billows, but\nstill steadily decreasing the distance between the barque and ourselves.\n\nIt seemed, however, that our efforts were fated to be in vain.\n\nAs we mounted upon a surge I saw a giant wave, topping all the others,\nand coming after them like a driver following a flock, sweep down upon\nthe vessel, curling its great, green arch over the breaking deck.\n\nWith a rending, riving sound the ship split in two where the terrible,\nserrated back of the Hansel reef was sawing into her keel. The\nafter-part, with the broken mizzen and the three Orientals, sank\nbackwards into deep water and vanished, while the fore-half oscillated\nhelplessly about, retaining its precarious balance upon the rocks.\n\nA wail of fear went up from the wreck and was echoed from the beach,\nbut by the blessing of Providence she kept afloat until we made our way\nunder her bowsprit and rescued every man of the crew.\n\nWe had not got half-way upon our return, however, when another great\nwave swept the shattered forecastle off the reef, and, extinguishing the\nsignal light, hid the wild denouement from our view.\n\nOur friends upon the shore were loud in congratulation and praise, nor\nwere they backward in welcoming and comforting the castaways. They were\nthirteen in all, as cold and cowed a set of mortals as ever slipped\nthrough Death's fingers, save, indeed, their captain, who was a hardy,\nrobust man, and who made light of the affair.\n\nSome were taken off to this cottage and some to that, but the greater\npart came back to Branksome with us, where we gave them such dry clothes\nas we could lay our hands on, and served them with beef and beer by the\nkitchen fire. The captain, whose name was Meadows, compressed his bulky\nform into a suit of my own, and came down to the parlour, where he\nmixed himself some grog and gave my father and myself an account of the\ndisaster.\n\n\"If it hadn't been for you, sir, and your brave fellows,\" he said,\nsmiling across at me, \"we should be ten fathoms deep by this time. As to\nthe _Belinda_, she was a leaky old tub and well insured, so neither the\nowners nor I are likely to break our hearts over her.\"\n\n\"I am afraid,\" said my father sadly, \"that we shall never see your three\npassengers again. I have left men upon the beach in case they should be\nwashed up, but I fear it is hopeless. I saw them go down when the vessel\nsplit, and no man could have lived for a moment among that terrible\nsurge.\"\n\n\"Who were they?\" I asked. \"I could not have believed that it was\npossible for men to appear so unconcerned in the face of such imminent\nperil.\"\n\n\"As to who they are or were,\" the captain answered, puffing thoughtfully\nat his pipe, \"that is by no means easy to say. Our last port was\nKurrachee, in the north of India, and there we took them aboard as\npassengers for Glasgow. Ram Singh was the name of the younger, and it is\nonly with him that I have come in contact, but they all appeared to be\nquiet, inoffensive gentlemen. I never inquired their business, but I\nshould judge that they were Parsee merchants from Hyderabad whose trade\ntook them to Europe. I could never see why the crew should fear them,\nand the mate, too, he should have had more sense.\"\n\n\"Fear them!\" I ejaculated in surprise.\n\n\"Yes, they had some preposterous idea that they were dangerous\nshipmates. I have no doubt if you were to go down into the kitchen now\nyou would find that they are all agreed that our passengers were the\ncause of the whole disaster.\"\n\nAs the captain was speaking the parlour door opened and the mate of\nthe barque, a tall, red-bearded sailor, stepped in. He had obtained a\ncomplete rig-out from some kind-hearted fisherman, and looked in his\ncomfortable jersey and well-greased seaboots a very favourable specimen\nof a shipwrecked mariner.\n\nWith a few words of grateful acknowledgment of our hospitality, he drew\na chair up to the fire and warmed his great, brown hands before the\nblaze.\n\n\"What d'ye think now, Captain Meadows?\" he asked presently, glancing up\nat his superior officer. \"Didn't I warn you what would be the upshot of\nhaving those niggers on board the _Belinda_?\"\n\nThe captain leant back in his chair and laughed heartily.\n\n\"Didn't I tell you?\" he cried, appealing to us. \"Didn't I tell you?\"\n\n\"It might have been no laughing matter for us,\" the other remarked\npetulantly. \"I have lost a good sea-kit and nearly my life into the\nbargain.\"\n\n\"Do I understand you to say,\" said I, \"that you attribute your\nmisfortunes to your ill-fated passengers?\"\n\nThe mate opened his eyes at the adjective.\n\n\"Why ill-fated, sir?\" he asked.\n\n\"Because they are most certainly drowned,\" I answered.\n\nHe sniffed incredulously and went on warming his hands.\n\n\"Men of that kind are never drowned,\" he said, after a pause. \"Their\nfather, the devil, looks after them. Did you see them standing on the\npoop and rolling cigarettes at the time when the mizzen was carried away\nand the quarter-boats stove? That was enough for me. I'm not surprised\nat you landsmen not being able to take it in, but the captain here,\nwho's been sailing since he was the height of the binnacle, ought to\nknow by this time that a cat and a priest are the worst cargo you can\ncarry. If a Christian priest is bad, I guess an idolatrous pagan one is\nfifty times worse. I stand by the old religion, and be d--d to it!\"\n\nMy father and I could not help laughing at the rough sailor's very\nunorthodox way of proclaiming his orthodoxy. The mate, however, was\nevidently in deadly earnest, and proceeded to state his case, marking\noff the different points upon the rough, red fingers of his left hand.\n\n\"It was at Kurrachee, directly after they come that I warned ye,\" he\nsaid reproachfully to the captain. \"There was three Buddhist Lascars in\nmy watch, and what did they do when them chaps come aboard? Why, they\ndown on their stomachs and rubbed their noses on the deck--that's what\nthey did. They wouldn't ha' done as much for an admiral of the R'yal\nNavy. They know who's who--these niggers do; and I smelt mischief\nthe moment I saw them on their faces. I asked them afterwards in your\npresence, Captain, why they had done it, and they answered that the\npassengers were holy men. You heard 'em yourself.\"\n\n\"Well, there's no harm in that, Hawkins,\" said Captain Meadows.\n\n\"I don't know that,\" the mate said doubtfully. \"The holiest Christian\nis the one that's nearest God, but the holiest nigger is, in my opinion,\nthe one that's nearest the devil. Then you saw yourself, Captain\nMeadows, how they went on during the voyage, reading books that was\nwrit on wood instead o' paper, and sitting up right through the night to\njabber together on the quarter-deck. What did they want to have a chart\nof their own for and to mark the course of the vessel every day?\"\n\n\"They didn't,\" said the captain.\n\n\"Indeed they did, and if I did not tell you sooner it was because\nyou were always ready to laugh at what I said about them. They had\ninstruments o' their own--when they used them I can't say--but every day\nat noon they worked out the latitude and longitude, and marked out the\nvessel's position on a chart that was pinned on their cabin table. I saw\nthem at it, and so did the steward from his pantry.\"\n\n\"Well, I don't see what you prove from that,\" the captain remarked,\n\"though I confess it is a strange thing.\"\n\n\"I'll tell you another strange thing,\" said the mate impressively. \"Do\nyou know the name of this bay in which we are cast away?\"\n\n\"I have learnt from our kind friends here that we are upon the\nWigtownshire coast,\" the captain answered, \"but I have not heard the\nname of the bay.\"\n\nThe mate leant forward with a grave face.\n\n\"It is the Bay of Kirkmaiden,\" he said.\n\nIf he expected to astonish Captain Meadows he certainly succeeded, for\nthat gentleman was fairly bereft of speech for a minute or more.\n\n\"This is really marvellous,\" he said, after a time, turning to us.\n\"These passengers of ours cross-questioned us early in the voyage as\nto the existence of a bay of that name. Hawkins here and I denied all\nknowledge of one, for on the chart it is included in the Bay of\nLuce. That we should eventually be blown into it and destroyed is an\nextraordinary coincidence.\"\n\n\"Too extraordinary to be a coincidence,\" growled the mate. \"I saw\nthem during the calm yesterday morning, pointing to the land over our\nstarboard quarter. They knew well enough that that was the port they\nwere making for.\"\n\n\"What do you make of it all, then, Hawkins?\" asked the captain, with a\ntroubled face. \"What is your own theory on the matter?\"\n\n\"Why, in my opinion,\" the mate answered, \"them three swabs have no more\ndifficulty in raising a gale o' wind than I should have in swallowing\nthis here grog. They had reasons o' their own for coming to this\nGod-forsaken--saving your presence, sirs--this God-forsaken bay, and\nthey took a short cut to it by arranging to be blown ashore there.\nThat's my idea o' the matter, though what three Buddhist priests could\nfind to do in the Bay of Kirkmaiden is clean past my comprehension.\"\n\nMy father raised his eyebrows to indicate the doubt which his\nhospitality forbade him from putting into words.\n\n\"I think, gentlemen,\" he said, \"that you are both sorely in need of rest\nafter your perilous adventures. If you will follow me I shall lead you\nto your rooms.\"\n\nHe conducted them with old-fashioned ceremony to the laird's best spare\nbedroom, and then, returning to me in the parlour, proposed that we\nshould go down together to the beach and learn whether anything fresh\nhad occurred.\n\nThe first pale light of dawn was just appearing in the east when we made\nour way for the second time to the scene of the shipwreck. The gale had\nblown itself out, but the sea was still very high, and all inside the\nbreakers was a seething, gleaming line of foam, as though the fierce old\nocean were gnashing its white fangs at the victims who had escaped from\nits clutches.\n\nAll along the beach fishermen and crofters were hard at work hauling up\nspars and barrels as fast as they were tossed ashore. None of them had\nseen any bodies, however, and they explained to us that only such things\nas could float had any chance of coming ashore, for the undercurrent was\nso strong that whatever was beneath the surface must infallibly be swept\nout to sea.\n\nAs to the possibility of the unfortunate passengers having been able to\nreach the shore, these practical men would not hear of it for a moment,\nand showed us conclusively that if they had not been drowned they must\nhave been dashed to pieces upon the rocks.\n\n\"We did all that could be done,\" my father said sadly, as we returned\nhome. \"I am afraid that the poor mate has had his reason affected by\nthe suddenness of the disaster. Did you hear what he said about Buddhist\npriests raising a gale?\"\n\n\"Yes, I heard him,\" said I. \"It was very painful to listen to him,\" said\nmy father. \"I wonder if he would object to my putting a small mustard\nplaster under each of his ears. It would relieve any congestion of\nthe brain. Or perhaps it would be best to wake him up and give him two\nantibilious pills. What do you think, Jack?\"\n\n\"I think,\" said I, with a yawn, \"that you had best let him sleep, and go\nto sleep yourself. You can physic him in the morning if he needs it.\"\n\nSo saying I stumbled off to my bedroom, and throwing myself upon the\ncouch was soon in a dreamless slumber.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII. OF THE THREE FOREIGN MEN UPON THE COAST\n\nIt must have been eleven or twelve o'clock before I awoke, and it seemed\nto me in the flood of golden light which streamed into my chamber that\nthe wild, tumultuous episodes of the night before must have formed part\nof some fantastic dream.\n\nIt was hard to believe that the gentle breeze which whispered so softly\namong the ivy-leaves around my window was caused by the same element\nwhich had shaken the very house a few short hours before. It was as if\nNature had repented of her momentary passion and was endeavouring to\nmake amends to an injured world by its warmth and its sunshine. A chorus\nof birds in the garden below filled the whole air with their wonder and\ncongratulations.\n\nDown in the hall I found a number of the shipwrecked sailors, looking\nall the better for their night's repose, who set up a buzz of pleasure\nand gratitude upon seeing me.\n\nArrangements had been made to drive them to Wigtown, whence they were to\nproceed to Glasgow by the evening train, and my father had given orders\nthat each should be served with a packet of sandwiches and hard-boiled\neggs to sustain him on the way.\n\nCaptain Meadows thanked us warmly in the name of his employers for the\nmanner in which we had treated them, and he called for three cheers from\nhis crew, which were very heartily given. He and the mate walked down\nwith us after we had broken our fast to have a last look at the scene of\nthe disaster.\n\nThe great bosom of the bay was still heaving convulsively, and its waves\nwere breaking into sobs against the rocks, but there was none of that\nwild turmoil which we had seen in the early morning. The long, emerald\nridges, with their little, white crests of foam, rolled slowly and\nmajestically in, to break with a regular rhythm--the panting of a tired\nmonster.\n\nA cable length from the shore we could see the mainmast of the barque\nfloating upon the waves, disappearing at times in the trough of the sea,\nand then shooting up towards Heaven like a giant javelin, shining\nand dripping as the rollers tossed it about. Other smaller pieces of\nwreckage dotted the waters, while innumerable spars and packages were\nlittered over the sands. These were being drawn up and collected in\na place of safety by gangs of peasants. I noticed that a couple of\nbroad-winged gulls were hovering and skimming over the scene of the\nshipwreck, as though many strange things were visible to them beneath\nthe waves. At times we could hear their raucous voices as they cried to\none another of what they saw.\n\n\"She was a leaky old craft,\" said the captain, looking sadly out to sea,\n\"but there's always a feeling of sorrow when we see the last of a ship\nwe have sailed in. Well, well, she would have been broken up in any\ncase, and sold for firewood.\"\n\n\"It looks a peaceful scene,\" I remarked. \"Who would imagine that three\nmen lost their lives last night in those very waters?\"\n\n\"Poor fellows,\" said the captain, with feeling. \"Should they be cast\nup after our departure, I am sure, Mr. West, that you will have them\ndecently interred.\"\n\nI was about to make some reply when the mate burst into a loud guffaw,\nslapping his thigh and choking with merriment.\n\n\"If you want to bury them,\" he said, \"you had best look sharp, or they\nmay clear out of the country. You remember what I said last night? Just\nlook at the top of that 'ere hillock, and tell me whether I was in the\nright or not?\"\n\nThere was a high sand dune some little distance along the coast, and\nupon the summit of this the figure was standing which had attracted the\nmate's attention. The captain threw up his hands in astonishment as his\neyes rested upon it.\n\n\"By the eternal,\" he shouted, \"it's Ram Singh himself! Let us overhaul\nhim!\"\n\nTaking to his heels in his excitement he raced along the beach, followed\nby the mate and myself, as well as by one or two of the fishermen who\nhad observed the presence of the stranger.\n\nThe latter, perceiving our approach, came down from his post of\nobservation and walked quietly in our direction, with his head sunk upon\nhis breast, like one who is absorbed in thought.\n\nI could not help contrasting our hurried and tumultuous advance with the\ngravity and dignity of this lonely Oriental, nor was the matter mended\nwhen he raised a pair of steady, thoughtful dark eyes and inclined his\nhead in a graceful, sweeping salutation. It seemed to me that we were\nlike a pack of schoolboys in the presence of a master.\n\nThe stranger's broad, unruffled brow, his clear, searching gaze,\nfirm-set yet sensitive mouth, and clean-cut, resolute expression, all\ncombined to form the most imposing and noble presence which I had ever\nknown. I could not have imagined that such imperturbable calm and at\nthe same time such a consciousness of latent strength could have been\nexpressed by any human face.\n\nHe was dressed in a brown velveteen coat, loose, dark trousers, with a\nshirt that was cut low in the collar, so as to show the muscular,\nbrown neck, and he still wore the red fez which I had noticed the night\nbefore.\n\nI observed with a feeling of surprise, as we approached him, that none\nof these garments showed the slightest indication of the rough treatment\nand wetting which they must have received during their wearer's\nsubmersion and struggle to the shore.\n\n\"So you are none the worse for your ducking,\" he said in a pleasant,\nmusical voice, looking from the captain to the mate. \"I hope that your\npoor sailors have found pleasant quarters.\"\n\n\"We are all safe,\" the captain answered. \"But we had given you up for\nlost--you and your two friends. Indeed, I was just making arrangements\nfor your burial with Mr. West here.\"\n\nThe stranger looked at me and smiled.\n\n\"We won't give Mr. West that trouble for a little time yet,\" he\nremarked; \"my friends and I came ashore all safe, and we have found\nshelter in a hut a mile or so along the coast. It is lonely down there,\nbut we have everything which we can desire.\"\n\n\"We start for Glasgow this afternoon,\" said the captain; \"I shall be\nvery glad if you will come with us. If you have not been in England\nbefore you may find it awkward travelling alone.\"\n\n\"We are very much indebted to you for your thoughtfulness,\" Ram Singh\nanswered; \"but we will not take advantage of your kind offer. Since\nNature has driven us here we intend to have a look about us before we\nleave.\"\n\n\"As you like,\" the captain said, shrugging his shoulders. \"I don't\nthink you are likely to find very much to interest you in this hole of a\nplace.\"\n\n\"Very possibly not,\" Ram Singh answered with an amused smile. \"You\nremember Milton's lines:\n\n 'The mind is its own place, and in itself\n Can make a hell of Heaven, a heaven of Hell.'\n\nI dare say we can spend a few days here comfortably enough. Indeed, I\nthink you must be wrong in considering this to be a barbarous locality.\nI am much mistaken if this young gentleman's father is not Mr. James\nHunter West, whose name is known and honoured by the pundits of India.\"\n\n\"My father is, indeed, a well-known Sanscrit scholar,\" I answered in\nastonishment.\n\n\"The presence of such a man,\" observed the stranger slowly, \"changes a\nwilderness into a city. One great mind is surely a higher indication of\ncivilisation than are incalculable leagues of bricks and mortar.\n\n\"Your father is hardly so profound as Sir William Jones, or so universal\nas the Baron Von Hammer-Purgstall, but he combines many of the virtues\nof each. You may tell him, however, from me that he is mistaken in\nthe analogy which he has traced between the Samoyede and Tamulic word\nroots.\"\n\n\"If you have determined to honour our neighbourhood by a short stay,\"\nsaid I, \"you will offend my father very much if you do not put up with\nhim. He represents the laird here, and it is the laird's privilege,\naccording to our Scottish custom, to entertain all strangers of repute\nwho visit this parish.\"\n\nMy sense of hospitality prompted me to deliver this invitation, though\nI could feel the mate twitching at my sleeves as if to warn me that\nthe offer was, for some reason, an objectionable one. His fears were,\nhowever, unnecessary, for the stranger signified by a shake of the head\nthat it was impossible for him to accept it.\n\n\"My friends and I are very much obliged to you,\" he said, \"but we have\nour own reasons for remaining where we are. The hut which we occupy is\ndeserted and partly ruined, but we Easterns have trained ourselves to\ndo without most of those things which are looked upon as necessaries in\nEurope, believing firmly in that wise axiom that a man is rich, not in\nproportion to what he has, but in proportion to what he can dispense\nwith. A good fisherman supplies us with bread and with herbs, we have\nclean, dry straw for our couches; what could man wish for more?\"\n\n\"But you must feel the cold at night, coming straight from the tropics,\"\nremarked the captain. \"Perhaps our bodies are cold sometimes. We\nhave not noticed it. We have all three spent many years in the Upper\nHimalayas on the border of the region of eternal snow, so we are not\nvery sensitive to inconveniences of the sort.\"\n\n\"At least,\" said I, \"you must allow me to send you over some fish and\nsome meat from our larder.\"\n\n\"We are not Christians,\" he answered, \"but Buddhists of the higher\nschool. We do not recognise that man has a moral right to slay an ox or\na fish for the gross use of his body. He has not put life into them, and\nhas assuredly no mandate from the Almighty to take life from them save\nunder most pressing need. We could not, therefore, use your gift if you\nwere to send it.\"\n\n\"But, sir,\" I remonstrated, \"if in this changeable and inhospitable\nclimate you refuse all nourishing food your vitality will fail you--you\nwill die.\"\n\n\"We shall die then,\" he answered, with an amused smile. \"And now,\nCaptain Meadows, I must bid you adieu, thanking you for your kindness\nduring the voyage, and you, too, good-bye--you will command a ship of\nyour own before the year is out. I trust, Mr. West, that I may see you\nagain before I leave this part of the country. Farewell!\"\n\nHe raised his red fez, inclined his noble head with the stately grace\nwhich characterised all his actions, and strode away in the direction\nfrom which he had come.\n\n\"Let me congratulate you, Mr. Hawkins,\" said the captain to the mate as\nwe walked homewards. \"You are to command your own ship within the year.\"\n\n\"No such luck!\" the mate answered, with a pleased smile upon his\nmahogany face, \"still, there's no saying how things may come out. What\nd'ye think of him, Mr. West?\"\n\n\"Why,\" said I, \"I am very much interested in him. What a magnificent\nhead and bearing he has for a young man. I suppose he cannot be more\nthan thirty.\"\n\n\"Forty,\" said the mate.\n\n\"Sixty, if he is a day,\" remarked Captain Meadows. \"Why, I have heard\nhim talk quite familiarly of the first Afghan war. He was a man then,\nand that is close on forty years ago.\"\n\n\"Wonderful!\" I ejaculated. \"His skin is as smooth and his eyes are as\nclear as mine are. He is the superior priest of the three, no doubt.\"\n\n\"The inferior,\" said the captain confidently. \"That is why he does all\nthe talking for them. Their minds are too elevated to descend to mere\nworldly chatter.\"\n\n\"They are the strangest pieces of flotsam and jetsam that were ever\nthrown upon this coast,\" I remarked. \"My father will be mightily\ninterested in them.\"\n\n\"Indeed, I think the less you have to do with them the better for you,\"\nsaid the mate. \"If I do command my own ship I'll promise you that I\nnever carry live stock of that sort on board of her. But here we are all\naboard and the anchor tripped, so we must bid you good-bye.\"\n\nThe wagonette had just finished loading up when we arrived, and the\nchief places, on either side of the driver, had been reserved for my two\ncompanions, who speedily sprang into them. With a chorus of cheers the\ngood fellows whirled away down the road, while my father, Esther, and I\nstood upon the lawn and waved our hands to them until they disappeared\nbehind the Cloomber woods, _en route_ for the Wigtown railway station.\nBarque and crew had both vanished now from our little world, the only\nrelic of either being the heaps of _debris_ upon the beach, which were\nto lie there until the arrival of an agent from Lloyd's.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII. IN WHICH I SEE THAT WHICH HAS BEEN SEEN BY FEW\n\nAt dinner that evening I mentioned to my father the episode of the three\nBuddhist priests, and found, as I had expected, that he was very much\ninterested by my account of them.\n\nWhen, however, he heard of the high manner in which Ram Singh had spoken\nof him, and the distinguished position which he had assigned him among\nphilologists, he became so excited that it was all we could do to\nprevent him from setting off then and there to make his acquaintance.\n\nEsther and I were relieved and glad when we at last succeeded in\nabstracting his boots and manoeuvring him to his bedroom, for the\nexciting events of the last twenty-four hours had been too much for his\nweak frame and delicate nerves.\n\nI was sitting at the open porch in the gloaming, turning over in my\nmind the unexpected events which had occurred so rapidly--the gale, the\nwreck, the rescue, and the strange character of the castaways--when my\nsister came quietly over to me and put her hand in mine.\n\n\"Don't you think, Jack,\" she said, in her low, sweet voice, \"that we\nare forgetting our friends over at Cloomber? Hasn't all this excitement\ndriven their fears and their danger out of our heads?\"\n\n\"Out of our heads, but never out of our hearts,\" said I, laughing.\n\"However, you are right, little one, for our attention has certainly\nbeen distracted from them. I shall walk up in the morning and see if I\ncan see anything of them. By the way, to-morrow is the fateful 5th of\nOctober--one more day, and all will be well with us.\"\n\n\"Or ill,\" said my sister gloomily.\n\n\"Why, what a little croaker you are, to be sure!\" I cried. \"What in the\nworld is coming over you?\"\n\n\"I feel nervous and low-spirited,\" she answered, drawing closer to my\nside and shivering. \"I feel as if some great peril were hanging over the\nheads of those we love. Why should these strange men wish to stay upon\nthe coast?\"\n\n\"What, the Buddhists?\" I said lightly. \"Oh, these fellows have continual\nfeast-days and religious rites of all sorts. They have some very good\nreason for staying, you may be sure.\"\n\n\"Don't you think,\" said Esther, in an awe-struck whisper, \"that it is\nvery strange that these priests should arrive here all the way from\nIndia just at the present moment? Have you not gathered from all you\nhave heard that the general's fears are in some way connected with India\nand the Indians?\"\n\nThe remark made me thoughtful.\n\n\"Why, now that you mention it,\" I answered, \"I have some vague\nimpression that the mystery is connected with some incident which\noccurred in that country. I am sure, however, that your fears would\nvanish if you saw Ram Singh. He is the very personification of wisdom\nand benevolence. He was shocked at the idea of our killing a sheep, or\neven a fish for his benefit--said he would rather die than have a hand\nin taking the life of an animal.\"\n\n\"It is very foolish of me to be so nervous,\" said my sister bravely.\n\"But you must promise me one thing, Jack. You will go up to Cloomber in\nthe morning, and if you can see any of them you must tell them of these\nstrange neighbours of ours. They are better able to judge than we are\nwhether their presence has any significance or not.\"\n\n\"All right, little one,\" I answered, as we went indoors. \"You have been\nover-excited by all these wild doings, and you need a sound night's rest\nto compose you. I'll do what you suggest, however, and our friends shall\njudge for themselves whether these poor fellows should be sent about\ntheir business or not.\"\n\nI made the promise to allay my sister's apprehensions, but in the bright\nsunlight of morning it appeared less than absurd to imagine that our\npoor vegetarian castaways could have any sinister intentions, or that\ntheir advent could have any effect upon the tenant of Cloomber.\n\nI was anxious, myself, however, to see whether I could see anything of\nthe Heatherstones, so after breakfast I walked up to the Hall. In their\nseclusion it was impossible for them to have learnt anything of the\nrecent events. I felt, therefore, that even if I should meet the general\nhe could hardly regard me as an intruder while I had so much news to\ncommunicate.\n\nThe place had the same dreary and melancholy appearance which always\ncharacterised it. Looking through between the thick iron bars of the\nmain gateway there was nothing to be seen of any of the occupants. One\nof the great Scotch firs had been blown down in the gale, and its long,\nruddy trunk lay right across the grass-grown avenue; but no attempt had\nbeen made to remove it.\n\nEverything about the property had the same air of desolation and\nneglect, with the solitary exception of the massive and impenetrable\nfencing, which presented as unbroken and formidable an obstacle as ever\nto the would-be trespasser.\n\nI walked round this barrier as far as our old trysting-place without\nfinding any flaw through which I could get a glimpse of the house, for\nthe fence had been repaired with each rail overlapping the last, so\nas to secure absolute privacy for those inside, and to block those\npeep-holes which I had formerly used.\n\nAt the old spot, however, where I had had the memorable interview with\nthe general on the occasion when he surprised me with his daughter, I\nfound that the two loose rails had been refixed in such a manner that\nthere was a gap of two inches or more between them.\n\nThrough this I had a view of the house and of part of the lawn in front\nof it, and, though I could see no signs of life outside or at any of the\nwindows, I settled down with the intention of sticking to my post until\nI had a chance of speaking to one or other of the inmates. Indeed, the\ncold, dead aspect of the house had struck such a chill into my heart\nthat I determined to scale the fence at whatever risk of incurring\nthe general's displeasure rather than return without news of the\nHeatherstones.\n\nHappily there was no need of this extreme expedient, for I had not been\nthere half-an-hour before I heard the harsh sound of an opening lock,\nand the general himself emerged from the main door.\n\nTo my surprise he was dressed in a military uniform, and that not the\nuniform in ordinary use in the British Army. The red coat was strangely\ncut and stained with the weather. The trousers had originally been\nwhite, but had now faded to a dirty yellow. With a red sash across his\nchest and a straight sword hanging from his side, he stood the living\nexample of a bygone type--the John Company's officer of forty years ago.\n\nHe was followed by the ex-tramp, Corporal Rufus Smith, now well-clad and\nprosperous, who limped along beside his master, the two pacing up and\ndown the lawn absorbed in conversation. I observed that from time to\ntime one or other of them would pause and glance furtively all about\nthem, as though guarding keenly against a surprise. I should have\npreferred communicating with the general alone, but since there was no\ndissociating him from his companion, I beat loudly on the fencing with\nmy stick to attract their attention. They both faced round in a moment,\nand I could see from their gestures that they were disturbed and\nalarmed.\n\nI then elevated my stick above the barrier to show them where the sound\nproceeded from. At this the general began to walk in my direction with\nthe air of a man who is bracing himself up for an effort, but the other\ncaught him by the wrist and endeavoured to dissuade him.\n\nIt was only when I shouted out my name and assured them that I was alone\nthat I could prevail upon them to approach. Once assured of my identity\nthe general ran eagerly towards me and greeted me with the utmost\ncordiality.\n\n\"This is truly kind of you, West,\" he said. \"It is only at such times\nas these that one can judge who is a friend and who not. It would not be\nfair to you to ask you to come inside or to stay any time, but I am none\nthe less very glad to see you.\"\n\n\"I have been anxious about you all,\" I said, \"for it is some little\ntime since I have seen or heard from any of you. How have you all been\nkeeping?\"\n\n\"Why, as well as could be expected. But we will be better tomorrow--we\nwill be different men to-morrow, eh, Corporal?\"\n\n\"Yes, sir,\" said the corporal, raising his hand to his forehead in a\nmilitary salute. \"We'll be right as the bank to-morrow.\"\n\n\"The corporal and I are a little disturbed in our minds just now,\" the\ngeneral explained, \"but I have no doubt that all will come right. After\nall, there is nothing higher than Providence, and we are all in His\nhands. And how have you been, eh?\"\n\n\"We have been very busy for one thing,\" said I. \"I suppose you have\nheard nothing of the great shipwreck?\"\n\n\"Not a word,\" the general answered listlessly.\n\n\"I thought the noise of the wind would prevent you hearing the signal\nguns. She came ashore in the bay the night before last--a great barque\nfrom India.\"\n\n\"From India!\" ejaculated the general.\n\n\"Yes. Her crew were saved, fortunately, and have all been sent on to\nGlasgow.\"\n\n\"All sent on!\" cried the general, with a face as bloodless as a corpse.\n\n\"All except three rather strange characters who claim to be Buddhist\npriests. They have decided to remain for a few days upon the coast.\"\n\nThe words were hardly out of my mouth when the general dropped upon his\nknees with his long, thin arms extended to Heaven.\n\n\"Thy will be done!\" he cried in a cracking voice. \"Thy blessed will be\ndone!\"\n\nI could see through the crack that Corporal Rufus Smith's face had\nturned to a sickly yellow shade, and that he was wiping the perspiration\nfrom his brow.\n\n\"It's like my luck!\" he said. \"After all these years, to come when I\nhave got a snug billet.\"\n\n\"Never mind, my lad,\" the general said, rising, and squaring his\nshoulders like a man who braces himself up for an effort. \"Be it what\nit may we'll face it as British soldiers should. D'ye remember at\nChillianwallah, when you had to run from your guns to our square, and\nthe Sikh horse came thundering down on our bayonets? We didn't flinch\nthen, and we won't flinch now. It seems to me that I feel better than I\nhave done for years. It was the uncertainty that was killing me.\"\n\n\"And the infernal jingle-jangle,\" said the corporal. \"Well, we all go\ntogether--that's some consolation.\"\n\n\"Good-bye, West,\" said the general. \"Be a good husband to Gabriel,\nand give my poor wife a home. I don't think she will trouble you long.\nGood-bye! God bless you!\"\n\n\"Look here, General,\" I said, peremptorily breaking off a piece of wood\nto make communication more easy, \"this sort of thing has been going on\ntoo long. What are these hints and allusions and innuendoes? It is time\nwe had a little plain speaking. What is it you fear? Out with it! Are\nyou in dread of these Hindoos? If you are, I am able, on my father's\nauthority, to have them arrested as rogues and vagabonds.\"\n\n\"No, no, that would never do,\" he answered, shaking his head. \"You will\nlearn about the wretched business soon enough. Mordaunt knows where to\nlay his hand upon the papers bearing on the matter. You can consult him\nabout it to-morrow.\"\n\n\"But surely,\" I cried, \"if the peril is so imminent something may be\ndone to avert it. If you would but tell me what you fear I should know\nhow to act.\"\n\n\"My dear friend,\" he said, \"there is nothing to be done, so calm\nyourself, and let things take their course. It has been folly on my part\nto shelter myself behind mere barriers of wood and stone. The fact\nis, that inaction was terrible to me, and I felt that to do anything,\nhowever futile, in the nature of a precaution, was better than passive\nresignation. My humble friend here and I have placed ourselves in a\nposition in which, I trust, no poor fellow will ever find himself\nagain. We can only recommend ourselves to the unfailing goodness of the\nAlmighty, and trust that what we have endured in this world may lessen\nour atonement in the world to come. I must leave you now, for I have\nmany papers to destroy and much to arrange. Good-bye!\"\n\nHe pushed his hand through the hole which I had made, and grasped mine\nin a solemn farewell, after which he walked back to the Hall with a firm\nand decided step, still followed by the crippled and sinister corporal.\n\nI walked back to Branksome much disturbed by this interview, and\nextremely puzzled as to what course I should pursue.\n\nIt was evident now that my sister's suspicions were correct, and that\nthere was some very intimate connection between the presence of the\nthree Orientals and the mysterious peril which hung over the towers of\nCloomber.\n\nIt was difficult for me to associate the noble-faced Ram Singh's gentle,\nrefined manner and words of wisdom with any deed of violence, yet now\nthat I thought of it I could see that a terrible capacity for wrath lay\nbehind his shaggy brows and dark, piercing eyes.\n\nI felt that of all men whom I had ever met he was the one whose\ndispleasure I should least care to face. But how could two men so\nwidely dissociated as the foul-mouthed old corporal of artillery and\nthe distinguished Anglo-Indian general have each earned the ill-will of\nthese strange castaways? And if the danger were a positive physical one,\nwhy should he not consent to my proposal to have the three men placed\nunder custody--though I confess it would have gone much against my grain\nto act in so inhospitable a manner upon such vague and shadowy grounds.\n\nThese questions were absolutely unanswerable, and yet the solemn words\nand the terrible gravity which I had seen in the faces of both the\nold soldiers forbade me from thinking that their fears were entirely\nunfounded.\n\nIt was all a puzzle--an absolutely insoluble puzzle.\n\nOne thing at least was clear to me--and that was that in the present\nstate of my knowledge, and after the general's distinct prohibition,\nit was impossible for me to interfere in any way. I could only wait and\npray that, whatever the danger might be, it might pass over, or at least\nthat my dear Gabriel and her brother might be protected against it.\n\nI was walking down the lane lost in thought, and had got as far as the\nwicket gate which opens upon the Branksome lawn, when I was surprised to\nhear my father's voice raised in most animated and excited converse.\n\nThe old man had been of late so abstracted from the daily affairs of the\nworld, and so absorbed in his own special studies, that it was difficult\nto engage his attention upon any ordinary, mundane topic. Curious to\nknow what it was that had drawn him so far out of himself, I opened\nthe gate softly, and walking quietly round the laurel bushes, found him\nsitting, to my astonishment, with none other than the very man who was\noccupying my thoughts, Ram Singh, the Buddhist.\n\nThe two were sitting upon a garden bench, and the Oriental appeared to\nbe laying down some weighty proposition, checking every point upon his\nlong, quivering, brown fingers, while my father, with his hands thrown\nabroad and his face awry, was loud in protestation and in argument.\n\nSo absorbed were they in their controversy, that I stood within a\nhand-touch of them for a minute or more before they became conscious of\nmy presence.\n\nOn observing me the priest sprang to his feet and greeted me with the\nsame lofty courtesy and dignified grace which had so impressed me the\nday before.\n\n\"I promised myself yesterday,\" he said, \"the pleasure of calling upon\nyour father. You see I have kept my word. I have even been daring enough\nto question his views upon some points in connection with the Sanscrit\nand Hindoo tongues, with the result that we have been arguing for\nan hour or more without either of us convincing the other. Without\npretending to as deep a theoretical knowledge as that which has made the\nname of James Hunter West a household word among Oriental scholars,\nI happen to have given considerable attention to this one point, and\nindeed I am in a position to say that I know his views to be unsound.\nI assure you, sir, that up to the year 700, or even later, Sanscrit was\nthe ordinary language of the great bulk of the inhabitants of India.\"\n\n\"And I assure you, sir,\" said my father warmly, \"that it was dead and\nforgotten at that date, save by the learned, who used it as a vehicle\nfor scientific and religious works--just as Latin was used in the Middle\nAges long after it had ceased to be spoken by any European nation.\"\n\n\"If you consult the puranas you will find,\" said Ram Singh, \"that this\ntheory, though commonly received, is entirely untenable.\"\n\n\"And if you will consult the Ramayana, and more particularly the\ncanonical books on Buddhist discipline,\" cried my father, \"you will find\nthat the theory is unassailable.\"\n\n\"But look at the Kullavagga,\" said our visitor earnestly.\n\n\"And look at King Asoka,\" shouted my father triumphantly. \"When, in the\nyear 300 before the Christian era--before, mind you--he ordered the laws\nof Buddha to be engraved upon the rocks, what language did he employ,\neh? Was it Sanscrit?--no! And why was it not Sanscrit? Because the lower\norders of his subjects would not have been able to understand a word\nof it. Ha, ha! That was the reason. How are you going to get round King\nAsoka's edicts, eh?\"\n\n\"He carved them in the various dialects,\" Ram Singh answered. \"But\nenergy is too precious a thing to be wasted in mere wind in this style.\nThe sun has passed its meridian, and I must return to my companions.\"\n\n\"I am sorry that you have not brought them to see us,\" said my father\ncourteously. He was, I could see, uneasy lest in the eagerness of debate\nhe had overstepped the bounds of hospitality.\n\n\"They do not mix with the world,\" Ram Singh answered, rising to\nhis feet. \"They are of a higher grade than I, and more sensitive to\ncontaminating influences. They are immersed in a six months' meditation\nupon the mystery of the third incarnation, which has lasted with few\nintermissions from the time that we left the Himalayas. I shall not see\nyou again, Mr. Hunter West, and I therefore bid you farewell. Your old\nage will be a happy one, as it deserves to be, and your Eastern studies\nwill have a lasting effect upon the knowledge and literature of your own\ncountry. Farewell!\"\n\n\"And am I also to see no more of you?\" I asked.\n\n\"Unless you will walk with me along the sea-shore,\" he answered. \"But\nyou have already been out this morning, and may be tired. I ask too much\nof you.\"\n\n\"Nay, I should be delighted to come,\" I responded from my heart, and we\nset off together, accompanied for some little distance by my father, who\nwould gladly, I could see, have reopened the Sanscrit controversy, had\nnot his stock of breath been too limited to allow of his talking and\nwalking at the same time.\n\n\"He is a learned man,\" Ram Singh remarked, after we had left him behind,\n\"but, like many another, he is intolerant towards opinions which differ\nfrom his own. He will know better some day.\"\n\nI made no answer to this observation, and we trudged along for a time in\nsilence, keeping well down to the water's edge, where the sands afforded\na good foothold.\n\nThe sand dunes which lined the coast formed a continuous ridge upon our\nleft, cutting us off entirely from all human observation, while on the\nright the broad Channel stretched away with hardly a sail to break its\nsilvery uniformity. The Buddhist priest and I were absolutely alone with\nNature.\n\nI could not help reflecting that if he were really the dangerous man\nthat the mate affected to consider him, or that might be inferred from\nthe words of General Heatherstone, I had placed myself completely in his\npower.\n\nYet such was the majestic benignity of the man's aspect, and the\nunruffled serenity of his deep, dark eyes, that I could afford in his\npresence to let fear and suspicion blow past me as lightly as the breeze\nwhich whistled round us. His face might be stern, and even terrible, but\nI felt that he could never be unjust.\n\nAs I glanced from time to time at his noble profile and the sweep of his\njet-black beard, his rough-spun tweed travelling suit struck me with\nan almost painful sense of incongruity, and I re-clothed him in my\nimagination with the grand, sweeping Oriental costume which is the\nfitting and proper frame for such a picture--the only garb which does\nnot detract from the dignity and grace of the wearer.\n\nThe place to which he led me was a small fisher cottage which had been\ndeserted some years before by its tenant, but still stood gaunt and\nbare, with the thatch partly blown away and the windows and doors in\nsad disrepair. This dwelling, which the poorest Scotch beggar would have\nshrunk from, was the one which these singular men had preferred to the\nproffered hospitality of the laird's house. A small garden, now a mass\nof tangled brambles, stood round it, and through this my acquaintance\npicked his way to the ruined door. He glanced into the house and then\nwaved his hand for me to follow him.\n\n\"You have now an opportunity,\" he said, in a subdued, reverential voice,\n\"of seeing a spectacle which few Europeans have had the privilege of\nbeholding. Inside that cottage you will find two Yogis--men who are only\none remove from the highest plane of adeptship. They are both wrapped\nin an ecstatic trance, otherwise I should not venture to obtrude your\npresence upon them. Their astral bodies have departed from them, to be\npresent at the feast of lamps in the holy Lamasery of Rudok in Tibet.\nTread lightly lest by stimulating their corporeal functions you recall\nthem before their devotions are completed.\"\n\nWalking slowly and on tiptoe, I picked my way through the weed-grown\ngarden, and peered through the open doorway.\n\nThere was no furniture in the dreary interior, nor anything to cover the\nuneven floor save a litter of fresh straw in a corner.\n\nAmong this straw two men were crouching, the one small and wizened, the\nother large-boned and gaunt, with their legs crossed in Oriental fashion\nand their heads sunk upon their breasts. Neither of them looked up, or\ntook the smallest notice of our presence.\n\nThey were so still and silent that they might have been two bronze\nstatues but for the slow and measured rhythm of their breathing. Their\nfaces, however, had a peculiar, ashen-grey colour, very different from\nthe healthy brown of my companion's, and I observed, on stooping my\nhead, that only the whites of their eyes were visible, the balls being\nturned upwards beneath the lids.\n\nIn front of them upon a small mat lay an earthenware pitcher of water\nand half-a-loaf of bread, together with a sheet of paper inscribed with\ncertain cabalistic characters. Ram Singh glanced at these, and then,\nmotioning to me to withdraw, followed me out into the garden.\n\n\"I am not to disturb them until ten o'clock,\" he said. \"You have now\nseen in operation one of the grandest results of our occult philosophy,\nthe dissociation of spirit from body. Not only are the spirits of these\nholy men standing at the present moment by the banks of the Ganges, but\nthose spirits are clothed in a material covering so identical with their\nreal bodies that none of the faithful will ever doubt that Lal Hoomi and\nMowdar Khan are actually among them. This is accomplished by our power\nof resolving an object into its chemical atoms, of conveying these\natoms with a speed which exceeds that of lightning to any given spot,\nand of there re-precipitating them and compelling them to retake their\noriginal form. Of old, in the days of our ignorance, it was necessary to\nconvey the whole body in this way, but we have since found that it was\nas easy and more convenient to transmit material enough merely to build\nup an outside shell or semblance. This we have termed the astral body.\"\n\n\"But if you can transmit your spirits so readily,\" I observed, \"why\nshould they be accompanied by any body at all?\"\n\n\"In communicating with brother initiates we are able to employ our\nspirits only, but when we wish to come in contact with ordinary mankind\nit is essential that we should appear in some form which they can see\nand comprehend.\"\n\n\"You have interested me deeply in all that you have told me,\" I said,\ngrasping the hand which Ram Singh had held out to me as a sign that\nour interview was at an end. \"I shall often think of our short\nacquaintance.\"\n\n\"You will derive much benefit from it,\" he said slowly, still holding my\nhand and looking gravely and sadly into my eyes. \"You must remember that\nwhat will happen in the future is not necessarily bad because it does\nnot fall in with your preconceived ideas of right. Be not hasty in your\njudgments. There are certain great rules which must be carried out, at\nwhatever cost to individuals. Their operation may appear to you to be\nharsh and cruel, but that is as nothing compared with the dangerous\nprecedent which would be established by not enforcing them. The ox and\nthe sheep are safe from us, but the man with the blood of the highest\nupon his hands should not and shall not live.\"\n\nHe threw up his arms at the last words with a fierce, threatening\ngesture, and, turning away from me, strode back to the ruined hut.\n\nI stood gazing after him until he disappeared through the doorway, and\nthen started off for home, revolving in my mind all that I had heard,\nand more particularly this last outburst of the occult philosopher.\n\nFar on the right I could see the tall, white tower of Cloomber standing\nout clear-cut and sharp against a dark cloud-bank which rose behind it.\nI thought how any traveller who chanced to pass that way would envy in\nhis heart the tenant of that magnificent building, and how little\nthey would guess the strange terrors, the nameless dangers, which were\ngathering about his head. The black cloud-wrack was but the image, I\nreflected, of the darker, more sombre storm which was about to burst.\n\n\"Whatever it all means, and however it happens,\" I ejaculated, \"God\ngrant that the innocent be not confounded with the guilty.\"\n\nMy father, when I reached home, was still in a ferment over his learned\ndisputation with the stranger.\n\n\"I trust, Jack,\" he said, \"that I did not handle him too roughly. I\nshould remember that I am _in loco magistri_, and be less prone to argue\nwith my guests. Yet, when he took up this most untenable position, I\ncould not refrain from attacking him and hurling him out of it, which\nindeed I did, though you, who are ignorant of the niceties of the\nquestion, may have failed to perceive it. You observed, however, that my\nreference to King Asoka's edicts was so conclusive that he at once rose\nand took his leave.\"\n\n\"You held your own bravely,\" I answered, \"but what is your impression of\nthe man now that you have seen him?\"\n\n\"Why,\" said my father, \"he is one of those holy men who, under the\nvarious names of Sannasis, Yogis, Sevras, Qualanders, Hakims, and Cufis\nhave devoted their lives to the study of the mysteries of the Buddhist\nfaith. He is, I take it, a theosophist, or worshipper of the God of\nknowledge, the highest grade of which is the adept. This man and his\ncompanions have not attained this high position or they could not have\ncrossed the sea without contamination. It is probable that they are all\nadvanced chelas who hope in time to attain to the supreme honour of\nadeptship.\"\n\n\"But, father,\" interrupted my sister, \"this does not explain why men of\nsuch sanctity and attainments should choose to take up their quarters on\nthe shores of a desolate Scotch bay.\"\n\n\"Ah, there you get beyond me,\" my father answered. \"I may suggest,\nhowever, that it is nobody's business but their own, so long as they\nkeep the peace and are amenable to the law of the land.\"\n\n\"Have you ever heard,\" I asked, \"that these higher priests of whom you\nspeak have powers which are unknown to us?\"\n\n\"Why, Eastern literature is full of it. The Bible is an Eastern book,\nand is it not full of the record of such powers from cover to cover?\nIt is unquestionable that they have in the past known many of Nature's\nsecrets which are lost to us. I cannot say, however, from my own\nknowledge that the modern theosophists really possess the powers that\nthey claim.\"\n\n\"Are they a vindictive class of people?\" I asked. \"Is there any offence\namong them which can only be expiated by death?\"\n\n\"Not that I know of,\" my father answered, raising his white eyebrows\nin surprise. \"You appear to be in an inquisitive humour this\nafternoon--what is the object of all these questions? Have our Eastern\nneighbours aroused your curiosity or suspicion in any way?\"\n\nI parried the question as best I might, for I was unwilling to let the\nold man know what was in my mind. No good purpose could come from his\nenlightenment; his age and his health demanded rest rather than anxiety;\nand indeed, with the best will in the world I should have found it\ndifficult to explain to another what was so very obscure to myself. For\nevery reason I felt that it was best that he should be kept in the dark.\n\nNever in all my experience had I known a day pass so slowly as did that\neventful 5th of October. In every possible manner I endeavoured to while\naway the tedious hours, and yet it seemed as if darkness would never\narrive.\n\nI tried to read, I tried to write, I paced about the lawn, I walked to\nthe end of the lane, I put new flies upon my fishing-hooks, I began to\nindex my father's library--in a dozen ways I endeavoured to relieve the\nsuspense which was becoming intolerable. My sister, I could see, was\nsuffering from the same feverish restlessness.\n\nAgain and again our good father remonstrated with us in his mild way for\nour erratic behaviour and the continual interruption of his work which\narose from it.\n\nAt last, however, the tea was brought, and the tea was taken, the\ncurtains were drawn, the lamps lit, and after another interminable\ninterval the prayers were read and the servants dismissed to their\nrooms. My father compounded and swallowed his nightly jorum of toddy,\nand then shuffled off to his room, leaving the two of us in the parlour\nwith our nerves in a tingle and our minds full of the most vague and yet\nterrible apprehensions.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV. OF THE VISITOR WHO RAN DOWN THE ROAD IN THE NIGHT-TIME\n\n\nIt was a quarter past ten o'clock by the parlour timepiece when my\nfather went off to his room, and left Esther and myself together. We\nheard his slow steps dying away up the creaking staircase, until the\ndistant slamming of a door announced that he had reached his sanctum.\n\nThe simple oil lamp upon the table threw a weird, uncertain light over\nthe old room, flickering upon the carved oak panelling, and casting\nstrange, fantastic shadows from the high-elbowed, straight-backed\nfurniture. My sister's white, anxious face stood out in the obscurity\nwith a startling exactness of profile like one of Rembrandt's portraits.\n\nWe sat opposite to each other on either side of the table with no sound\nbreaking the silence save the measured ticking of the clock and the\nintermittent chirping of a cricket beneath the grate.\n\nThere was something awe-inspiring in the absolute stillness. The\nwhistling of a belated peasant upon the high road was a relief to us,\nand we strained our ears to catch the last of his notes as he plodded\nsteadily homewards.\n\nAt first we had made some pretence--she of knitting and I of\nreading--but we soon abandoned the useless deception, and sat uneasily\nwaiting, starting and glancing at each other with questioning eyes\nwhenever the faggot crackled in the fire or a rat scampered behind the\nwainscot. There was a heavy electrical feeling in the air, which weighed\nus down with a foreboding of disaster.\n\nI rose and flung the hall door open to admit the fresh breeze of the\nnight. Ragged clouds swept across the sky, and the moon peeped out at\ntimes between their hurrying fringes, bathing the whole countryside in\nits cold, white radiance. From where I stood in the doorway I could see\nthe edge of the Cloomber wood, though the house itself was only\nvisible from the rising ground some little distance off. At my sister's\nsuggestion we walked together, she with her shawl over her head, as far\nas the summit of this elevation, and looked out in the direction of the\nHall.\n\nThere was no illumination of the windows tonight. From roof to basement\nnot a light twinkled in any part of the great building. Its huge mass\nloomed up dark and sullen amid the trees which surrounded it, looking\nmore like some giant sarcophagus than a human habitation.\n\nTo our overwrought nerves there was something of terror in its mere bulk\nand its silence. We stood for some little time peering at it through the\ndarkness, and then we made our way back to the parlour again, where\nwe sat waiting--waiting, we knew not for what, and yet with absolute\nconviction that some terrible experience was in store for us.\n\nIt was twelve o'clock or thereabout when my sister suddenly sprang to\nher feet and held up her fingers to bespeak attention.\n\n\"Do you hear nothing?\" she asked.\n\nI strained my ears, but without success.\n\n\"Come to the door,\" she cried, with a trembling voice. \"Now can you hear\nanything?\"\n\nIn the deep silence of the night I distinctly heard a dull, murmuring,\nclattering sound, continuous apparently, but very faint and low.\n\n\"What is it?\" I asked, in a subdued voice.\n\n\"It's the sound of a man running towards us,\" she answered, and then,\nsuddenly dropping the last semblance of self-command, she fell upon\nher knees beside the table and began praying aloud with that frenzied\nearnestness which intense, overpowering fear can produce, breaking off\nnow and again into half-hysterical whimperings.\n\nI could distinguish the sound clearly enough now to know that her quick,\nfeminine perception had not deceived her, and that it was indeed caused\nby a running man.\n\nOn he came, and on down the high road, his footfalls ringing out clearer\nand sharper every moment. An urgent messenger he must be, for he neither\npaused nor slackened his pace.\n\nThe quick, crisp rattle was changed suddenly to a dull, muffled murmur.\nHe had reached the point where sand had been recently laid down for\na hundred yards or so. In a few moments, however, he was back on hard\nground again and his flying feet came nearer and ever nearer.\n\nHe must, I reflected, be abreast of the head of the lane now. Would he\nhold on? Or would he turn down to Branksome?\n\nThe thought had hardly crossed my mind when I heard by the difference of\nthe sound that the runner had turned the corner, and that his goal was\nbeyond all question the laird's house.\n\nRushing down to the gate of the lawn, I reached it just as our visitor\ndashed it open and fell into my arms. I could see in the moonlight that\nit was none other than Mordaunt Heatherstone.\n\n\"What has happened?\" I cried. \"What is amiss, Mordaunt?\"\n\n\"My father!\" he gasped--\"my father!\"\n\nHis hat was gone, his eyes dilated with terror, and his face as\nbloodless as that of a corpse. I could feel that the hands which clasped\nmy arms were quivering and shaking with emotion.\n\n\"You are exhausted,\" I said, leading him into the parlour. \"Give\nyourself a moment's rest before you speak to us. Be calm, man, you are\nwith your best friends.\"\n\nI laid him on the old horsehair sofa, while Esther, whose fears had all\nflown to the winds now that something practical was to be done, dashed\nsome brandy into a tumbler and brought it to him. The stimulant had a\nmarvellous effect upon him, for the colour began to come back into his\npale cheeks and the light of recognition in his eyes.\n\nHe sat up and took Esther's hand in both of his, like a man who is\nwaking out of some bad dream and wishes to assure himself that he is\nreally in safety.\n\n\"Your father?\" I asked. \"What of him?\"\n\n\"He is gone.\"\n\n\"Gone!\"\n\n\"Yes; he is gone; and so is Corporal Rufus Smith. We shall never set\neyes upon them again.\"\n\n\"But where have they gone?\" I cried. \"This is unworthy of you, Mordaunt.\nWhat right have we to sit here, allowing our private feelings to\novercome us, while there is a possibility of succouring your father? Up,\nman! Let us follow him. Tell me only what direction he took.\"\n\n\"It's no use,\" young Heatherstone answered, burying his face in\nhis hands. \"Don't reproach me, West, for you don't know all the\ncircumstances. What can we do to reverse the tremendous and unknown laws\nwhich are acting against us? The blow has long been hanging over us, and\nnow it has fallen. God help us!\"\n\n\"In Heaven's name tell me what has happened?\" said I excitedly. \"We must\nnot yield to despair.\"\n\n\"We can do nothing until daybreak,\" he answered. \"We shall then\nendeavour to obtain some trace of them. It is hopeless at present.\"\n\n\"And how about Gabriel and Mrs. Heatherstone?\" I asked. \"Can we\nnot bring them down from the Hall at once? Your poor sister must be\ndistracted with terror.\"\n\n\"She knows nothing of it,\" Mordaunt answered. \"She sleeps at the other\nside of the house, and has not heard or seen anything. As to my poor\nmother, she has expected some such event for so long a time that it has\nnot come upon her as a surprise. She is, of course, overwhelmed with\ngrief, but would, I think, prefer to be left to herself for the\npresent. Her firmness and composure should be a lesson to me, but I am\nconstitutionally excitable, and this catastrophe coming after our long\nperiod of suspense deprived me of my very reason for a time.\"\n\n\"If we can do nothing until the morning,\" I said, \"you have time to tell\nus all that has occurred.\"\n\n\"I will do so,\" he answered, rising and holding his shaking hands to the\nfire. \"You know already that we have had reason for some time--for many\nyears in fact--to fear that a terrible retribution was hanging over my\nfather's head for a certain action of his early life. In this action he\nwas associated with the man known as Corporal Rufus Smith, so that the\nfact of the latter finding his way to my father was a warning to us that\nthe time had come, and that this 5th of October--the anniversary of the\nmisdeed--would be the day of its atonement. I told you of our fears\nin my letter, and, if I am not mistaken, my father also had some\nconversation with you, John, upon the subject. When I saw yesterday\nmorning that he had hunted out the old uniform which he had always\nretained since he wore it in the Afghan war, I was sure that the end was\nat hand, and that our forebodings would be realised.\n\n\"He appeared to be more composed in the afternoon than I have seen him\nfor years, and spoke freely of his life in India and of the incidents of\nhis youth. About nine o'clock he requested us to go up to our own rooms,\nand locked us in there--a precaution which he frequently took when the\ndark fit was upon him. It was always his endeavour, poor soul, to keep\nus clear of the curse which had fallen upon his own unfortunate head.\nBefore parting from us he tenderly embraced my mother and Gabriel,\nand he afterwards followed me to my room, where he clasped my hand\naffectionately and gave into my charge a small packet addressed to\nyourself.\"\n\n\"To me?\" I interrupted.\n\n\"To you. I shall fulfill my commission when I have told you my story. I\nconjured him to allow me to sit up with him and share any danger which\nmight arise, but he implored me with irresistible earnestness not to add\nto his troubles by thwarting his arrangements. Seeing that I was really\ndistressing him by my pertinacity, I at last allowed him to close the\ndoor and to turn the key upon the outside. I shall always reproach\nmyself for my want of firmness. But what can you do when your own father\nrefuses your assistance or co-operation? You cannot force yourself upon\nhim.\"\n\n\"I am sure that you did all you could do,\" my sister said.\n\n\"I meant to, dear Esther, but, God help me, it was hard to tell what\nwas right. He left me, and I heard his footsteps die away down the long\ncorridor. It was then about ten o'clock, or a little after. For a time\nI paced up and down the room, and then, carrying the lamp to the head of\nmy bed, I lay down without undressing, reading St. Thomas a Kempis, and\npraying from my heart that the night might pass safely over us.\n\n\"I had at last fallen into a troubled sleep when I was suddenly aroused\nby a loud, sonorous sound ringing in my ears. I sat up bewildered, but\nall was silent again. The lamp was burning low, and my watch showed\nme that it was going on to midnight. I blundered to my feet, and was\nstriking a match with the intention of lighting the candles, when the\nsharp, vehement cry broke out again so loud and so clear that it might\nhave been in the very room with me. My chamber is in the front of the\nhouse, while those of my mother and sister are at the back, so that I am\nthe only one who commands a view of the avenue.\n\n\"Rushing to the window I drew the blind aside and looked out. You know\nthat the gravel-drive opens up so as to form a broad stretch immediately\nin front of the house. Just in the centre of this clear space there\nstood three men looking up at the house.\n\n\"The moon shone full upon them, glistening on their upturned eyeballs,\nand by its light I could see that they were swarthy-faced and\nblack-haired, of a type that I was familiar with among the Sikhs and\nAfridis. Two of them were thin, with eager, aesthetic countenances,\nwhile the third was kinglike and majestic, with a noble figure and\nflowing beard.\"\n\n\"Ram Singh!\" I ejaculated.\n\n\"What, you know of them?\" exclaimed Mordaunt in great surprise. \"You\nhave met them?\"\n\n\"I know of them. They are Buddhist priests,\" I answered, \"but go on.\"\n\n\"They stood in a line,\" he continued, \"sweeping their arms upwards\nand downwards, while their lips moved as if repeating some prayer or\nincantation. Suddenly they ceased to gesticulate, and broke out for the\nthird time into the wild, weird, piercing cry which had roused me from\nmy slumber. Never shall I forget that shrill, dreadful summons swelling\nand reverberating through the silent night with an intensity of sound\nwhich is still ringing in my ears.\n\n\"As it died slowly away, there was a rasping and creaking as of keys\nand bolts, followed by the clang of an opening door and the clatter of\nhurrying feet. From my window I saw my father and Corporal Rufus Smith\nrush frantically out of the house hatless and unkempt, like men who are\nobeying a sudden and overpowering impulse. The three strangers laid\nno hands on them, but all five swept swiftly away down the avenue and\nvanished among the trees. I am positive that no force was used, or\nconstraint of any visible kind, and yet I am as sure that my poor father\nand his companion were helpless prisoners as if I had seen them dragged\naway in manacles.\n\n\"All this took little time in the acting. From the first summons which\ndisturbed my sleep to the last shadowy glimpse which I had of them\nbetween the tree trunks could hardly have occupied more than five\nminutes of actual time. So sudden was it, and so strange, that when the\ndrama was over and they were gone I could have believed that it was\nall some terrible nightmare, some delusion, had I not felt that the\nimpression was too real, too vivid, to be imputed to fancy.\n\n\"I threw my whole weight against my bedroom door in the hope of forcing\nthe lock. It stood firm for a while, but I flung myself upon it again\nand again, until something snapped and I found myself in the passage.\n\n\"My first thought was for my mother. I rushed to her room and turned\nthe key in her door. The moment that I did so she stepped out into the\ncorridor in her dressing-gown, and held up a warning finger.\n\n\"'No noise, she said, Gabriel is asleep. They have been called away?'\n\n\"'They have,' I answered.\n\n\"'God's will be done!' she cried. 'Your poor father will be happier in\nthe next world than he has ever been in this. Thank Heaven that Gabriel\nis asleep. I gave her chloral in her cocoa.'\n\n\"'What am I to do?' I said distractedly.\n\n\"'Where have they gone? How can I help him? We cannot let him go from\nus like this, or leave these men to do what they will with him. Shall I\nride into Wigtown and arouse the police?'\n\n\"'Anything rather than that,' my mother said earnestly. 'He has begged\nme again and again to avoid it. My son, we shall never set eyes upon\nyour father again. You may marvel at my dry eyes, but if you knew as\nI know the peace which death would bring him, you could not find it in\nyour heart to mourn for him. All pursuit is, I feel, vain, and yet some\npursuit there must be. Let it be as private as possible. We cannot serve\nhim better than by consulting his wishes.'\n\n\"'But every minute is precious,' I cried. 'Even now he may be calling\nupon us to rescue him from the clutches of those dark-skinned fiends.'\n\n\"The thought so maddened me that I rushed out of the house and down to\nthe high road, but once there I had no indication in which direction to\nturn. The whole wide moor lay before me, without a sign of movement\nupon its broad expanse. I listened, but not a sound broke the perfect\nstillness of the night.\n\n\"It was then, my dear friends, as I stood, not knowing in which\ndirection to turn, that the horror and responsibility broke full upon\nme. I felt that I was combating against forces of which I knew nothing.\nAll was strange and dark and terrible.\n\n\"The thought of you, and of the help which I might look for from your\nadvice and assistance, was a beacon of hope to me. At Branksome, at\nleast, I should receive sympathy, and, above all, directions as to what\nI should do, for my mind is in such a whirl that I cannot trust my own\njudgment. My mother was content to be alone, my sister asleep, and\nno prospect of being able to do anything until daybreak. Under those\ncircumstances what more natural than that I should fly to you as fast as\nmy feet would carry me? You have a clear head, Jack; speak out, man, and\ntell me what I should do. Esther, what should I do?\"\n\nHe turned from one to the other of us with outstretched hands and eager,\nquestioning eyes.\n\n\"You can do nothing while the darkness lasts,\" I answered. \"We must\nreport the matter to the Wigtown police, but we need not send our\nmessage to them until we are actually starting upon the search, so as to\ncomply with the law and yet have a private investigation, as your mother\nwishes. John Fullarton, over the hill, has a lurcher dog which is as\ngood as a bloodhound. If we set him on the general's trail he will run\nhim down if he had to follow him to John o' Groat's.\"\n\n\"It is terrible to wait calmly here while he may need our assistance.\"\n\n\"I fear our assistance could under any circumstances do him little\ngood. There are forces at work here which are beyond human intervention.\nBesides, there is no alternative. We have, apparently, no possible\nclue as to the direction which they have taken, and for us to wander\naimlessly over the moor in the darkness would be to waste the strength\nwhich may be more profitably used in the morning. It will be daylight\nby five o'clock. In an hour or so we can walk over the hill together and\nget Fullarton's dog.\"\n\n\"Another hour!\" Mordaunt groaned, \"every minute seems an age.\"\n\n\"Lie down on the sofa and rest yourself,\" said I. \"You cannot serve your\nfather better than by laying up all the strength you can, for we may\nhave a weary trudge before us. But you mentioned a packet which the\ngeneral had intended for me.\"\n\n\"It is here,\" he answered, drawing a small, flat parcel from his pocket\nand handing it over to me, \"you will find, no doubt, that it will\nexplain all which has been so mysterious.\"\n\nThe packet was sealed at each end with black wax, bearing the impress\nof the flying griffin, which I knew to be the general's crest. It\nwas further secured by a band of broad tape, which I cut with my\npocket-knife. Across the outside was written in bold handwriting: \"J.\nFothergill West, Esq.,\" and underneath: \"To be handed to that gentleman\nin the event of the disappearance or decease of Major-General J. B.\nHeatherstone, V.C., C.B., late of the Indian Army.\"\n\nSo at last I was to know the dark secret which had cast a shadow over\nour lives. Here in my hands I held the solution of it.\n\nWith eager fingers I broke the seals and undid the wrapper. A note and a\nsmall bundle of discoloured paper lay within. I drew the lamp over to me\nand opened the former. It was dated the preceding afternoon, and ran in\nthis way:\n\nMY DEAR WEST,--\n\nI should have satisfied your very natural curiosity on the subject which\nwe have had occasion to talk of more than once, but I refrained for your\nown sake. I knew by sad experience how unsettling and unnerving it is\nto be for ever waiting for a catastrophe which you are convinced must\nbefall, and which you can neither avert nor accelerate.\n\nThough it affects me specially, as being the person most concerned, I am\nstill conscious that the natural sympathy which I have observed in you,\nand your regard for Gabriel's father, would both combine to render you\nunhappy if you knew the hopelessness and yet the vagueness of the fate\nwhich threatens me. I feared to disturb your mind, and I was therefore\nsilent, though at some cost to myself, for my isolation has not been the\nleast of the troubles which have weighed me down.\n\nMany signs, however, and chief among them the presence of the Buddhists\nupon the coast as described by you this morning, have convinced me that\nthe weary waiting is at last over and that the hour of retribution is at\nhand. Why I should have been allowed to live nearly forty years after my\noffence is more than I can understand, but it is possible that those who\nhad command over my fate know that such a life is the greatest of all\npenalties to me.\n\nNever for an hour, night or day, have they suffered me to forget that\nthey have marked me down as their victim. Their accursed astral bell has\nbeen ringing my knell for two-score years, reminding me ever that there\nis no spot upon earth where I can hope to be in safety. Oh, the peace,\nthe blessed peace of dissolution! Come what may on the other side of the\ntomb, I shall at least be quit of that thrice terrible sound.\n\nThere is no need for me to enter into the wretched business again, or\nto detail at any length the events of October 5th, 1841, and the various\ncircumstances which led up to the death of Ghoolab Shah, the arch adept.\n\nI have torn a sheaf of leaves from my old journal, in which you will\nfind a bald account of the matter, and an independent narrative was\nfurnished by Sir Edward Elliott, of the Artillery, to the Star of India\nsome years ago--in which, however, the names were suppressed.\n\nI have reason to believe that many people, even among those who knew\nIndia well, thought that Sir Edward was romancing, and that he had\nevolved his incidents from his imagination. The few faded sheets which\nI send you will show you that this is not the case, and that our men of\nscience must recognise powers and laws which can and have been used by\nman, but which are unknown to European civilisation.\n\nI do not wish to whine or to whimper, but I cannot help feeling that I\nhave had hard measure dealt me in this world. I would not, God knows,\ntake the life of any man, far less an aged one, in cold blood. My temper\nand nature, however, were always fiery and headstrong, and in action\nwhen my blood is up, I have no knowledge of what I am about. Neither\nthe corporal nor I would have laid a finger upon Ghoolab Shah had we not\nseen that the tribesmen were rallying behind him. Well, well, it is an\nold story now, and there is no profit in discussing it. May no other\npoor fellow ever have the same evil fortune!\n\nI have written a short supplement to the statements contained in my\njournal for your information and that of any one else who may chance to\nbe interested in the matter.\n\nAnd now, adieu! Be a good husband to Gabriel, and, if your sister be\nbrave enough to marry into such a devil-ridden family as ours, by all\nmeans let her do so. I have left enough to keep my poor wife in comfort.\n\nWhen she rejoins me I should wish it to be equally divided between the\nchildren. If you hear that I am gone, do not pity, but congratulate\n\nYour unfortunate friend,\n\nJOHN BERTHIER HEATHERSTONE.\n\nI threw aside the letter and picked up the roll of blue foolscap which\ncontained the solution of the mystery. It was all ragged and frayed at\nthe inner edge, with traces of gum and thread still adhering to it, to\nshow that it had been torn out of a strongly bound volume. The ink with\nwhich it had been written was faded somewhat, but across the head of the\nfirst page was inscribed in bold, clear characters, evidently of later\ndate than the rest: \"Journal of Lieutenant J. B. Heatherstone in the\nThull Valley during the autumn of 1841,\" and then underneath:\n\nThis extract contains some account of the events of the first week of\nOctober of that year, including the skirmish of the Terada ravine and\nthe death of the man Ghoolab Shah.\n\nI have the narrative lying before me now, and I copy it verbatim. If it\ncontains some matter which has no direct bearing upon the question\nat issue, I can only say that I thought it better to publish what is\nirrelevant than by cutting and clipping to lay the whole statement open\nto the charge of having been tampered with.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV. THE DAY-BOOK OF JOHN BERTHIER HEATHERSTONE\n\nThull Valley, Oct. 1, 1841.--The Fifth Bengal and Thirty-third Queen's\npassed through this morning on their way to the Front. Had tiffin with\nthe Bengalese. Latest news from home that two attempts had been made on\nthe Queen's life by semi-maniacs named Francis and Bean.\n\nIt promises to be a hard winter. The snow-line has descended a thousand\nfeet upon the peaks, but the passes will be open for weeks to come, and,\neven if they were blocked, we have established so many depots in the\ncountry that Pollock and Nott will have no difficulty in holding their\nown. They shall not meet with the fate of Elphinstone's army. One such\ntragedy is enough for a century.\n\nElliott of the Artillery, and I, are answerable for the safety of the\ncommunications for a distance of twenty miles or more, from the mouth of\nthe valley to this side of the wooden bridge over the Lotar. Goodenough,\nof the Rifles, is responsible on the other side, and Lieutenant-Colonel\nSidney Herbert of the Engineers, has a general supervision over both\nsections.\n\nOur force is not strong enough for the work which has to be done. I have\na company and a half of our own regiment, and a squadron of Sowars,\nwho are of no use at all among the rocks. Elliott has three guns, but\nseveral of his men are down with cholera, and I doubt if he has enough\nto serve more than two.\n\n(Note: capsicum for cholera--tried it)\n\nOn the other hand, each convoy is usually provided with some guard of\nits own, though it is often absurdly inefficient. These valleys and\nravines which branch out of the main pass are alive with Afridis and\nPathans, who are keen robbers as well as religious fanatics. I wonder\nthey don't swoop down on some of our caravans. They could plunder them\nand get back to their mountain fastnesses before we could interfere or\novertake them. Nothing but fear will restrain them.\n\nIf I had my way I would hang one at the mouth of every ravine as a\nwarning to the gang. They are personifications of the devil to look at,\nhawk-nosed, full-lipped, with a mane of tangled hair, and most Satanic\nsneer. No news today from the Front.\n\nOctober 2.--I must really ask Herbert for another company at the very\nleast. I am convinced that the communications would be cut off if any\nserious attack were made upon us.\n\nNow, this morning two urgent messages were sent me from two different\npoints more than sixteen miles apart, to say that there were signs of a\ndescent of the tribes.\n\nElliott, with one gun and the Sowars, went to the farther ravine, while\nI, with the infantry, hurried to the other, but we found it was a false\nalarm. I saw no signs of the Hillmen, and though we were greeted by a\nsplutter of jezail bullets we were unable to capture any of the rascals.\n\nWoe betide them if they fall into my hands. I would give them as short\na shrift as ever a Highland cateran got from a Glasgow judge. These\ncontinued alarms may mean nothing or they may be an indication that the\nHillmen are assembling and have some plan in view.\n\nWe have had no news from the Front for some time, but to-day a convoy of\nwounded came through with the intelligence that Nott had taken Ghuznee.\nI hope he warmed up any of the black rascals that fell into his hands.\n\nNo word of Pollock.\n\nAn elephant battery came up from the Punjab, looking in very good\ncondition. There were several convalescents with it going up to rejoin\ntheir regiments. Knew none of them except Mostyn of the Hussars and\nyoung Blakesley, who was my fag at Charterhouse, and whom I have never\nseen since.\n\nPunch and cigars _al fresco_ up to eleven o'clock.\n\nLetters to-day from Wills & Co. about their little bill forwarded on\nfrom Delhi. Thought a campaign freed a man from these annoyances. Wills\nsays in his note that, since his written applications have been in\nvain, he must call upon me in person. If he calls upon me now he will\nassuredly be the boldest and most persevering of tailors.\n\nA line from Calcutta Daisy and another from Hobhouse to say that Matilda\ncomes in for all the money under the will. I am glad of it.\n\nOctober 3.--Glorious news from the Front today. Barclay, of the Madras\nCavalry, galloped through with dispatches. Pollock entered Cabul\ntriumphantly on the 16th of last month, and, better still, Lady Sale\nhas been rescued by Shakespear, and brought safe into the British camp,\ntogether with the other hostages. _Te Deum laudamus!_\n\nThis should end the whole wretched business--this and the sack of the\ncity. I hope Pollock won't be squeamish, or truckle to the hysterical\nparty at home. The towns should be laid in ashes and the fields sown\nwith salt. Above all, the Residency and the Palace must come down. So\nshall Burnes, McNaghten, and many another gallant fellow know that his\ncountrymen could avenge if they could not save him!\n\nIt is hard when others are gaining glory and experience to be stuck in\nthis miserable valley. I have been out of it completely, bar a few petty\nskirmishes. However, we may see some service yet.\n\nA jemidar of ours brought in a Hillman today, who says that the tribes\nare massing in the Terada ravine, ten miles to the north of us, and\nintend attacking the next convoy. We can't rely on information of this\nsort, but there may prove to be some truth in it. Proposed to shoot our\ninformant, so as to prevent his playing the double traitor and reporting\nour proceedings. Elliott demurred.\n\nIf you are making war you should throw no chance away. I hate\nhalf-and-half measures. The Children of Israel seem to have been the\nonly people who ever carried war to its logical conclusion--except\nCromwell in Ireland. Made a compromise at last by which the man is to\nbe detained as a prisoner and executed if his information prove to be\nfalse. I only hope we get a fair chance of showing what we can do.\n\nNo doubt these fellows at the Front will have C.B.'s and knighthoods\nshowering upon them thick and fast, while we poor devils, who have had\nmost of the responsibility and anxiety, will be passed over completely.\nElliott has a whitlow.\n\nThe last convoy left us a large packet of sauces, but as they forgot to\nleave anything to eat with them, we have handed them over to the Sowars,\nwho drink them out of their pannikins as if they were liqueurs. We hear\nthat another large convoy may be expected from the plains in the course\nof a day or two. Took nine to four on Cleopatra for the Calcutta Cup.\n\nOctober 4.--The Hillmen really mean business this time, I think. We have\nhad two of our spies come in this morning with the same account about\nthe gathering in the Terada quarter. That old rascal Zemaun is at the\nhead of it, and I had recommended the Government to present him with\na telescope in return for his neutrality! There will be no Zemaun to\npresent it to if I can but lay hands upon him.\n\nWe expect the convoy tomorrow morning, and need anticipate no attack\nuntil it comes up, for these fellows fight for plunder, not for glory,\nthough, to do them justice, they have plenty of pluck when they get\nstarted. I have devised an excellent plan, and it has Elliott's hearty\nsupport. By Jove! if we can only manage it, it will be as pretty a ruse\nas ever I heard of.\n\nOur intention is to give out that we are going down the valley to meet\nthe convoy and to block the mouth of a pass from which we profess to\nexpect an attack. Very good. We shall make a night-march to-night and\nreach their camp. Once there I shall conceal my two hundred men in the\nwaggons and travel up with the convoy again.\n\nOur friends the enemy, having heard that we intended to go south, and\nseeing the caravan going north without us, will naturally swoop down\nupon it under the impression that we are twenty miles away. We shall\nteach them such a lesson that they would as soon think of stopping a\nthunderbolt as of interfering again with one of Her Britannic Majesty's\nprovision trains. I am all on thorns to be off.\n\nElliott has rigged up two of his guns so ingeniously that they look more\nlike costermongers' barrows than anything else. To see artillery ready\nfor action in the convoy might arouse suspicion. The artillerymen will\nbe in the waggons next the guns, all ready to unlimber and open fire.\nInfantry in front and rear. Have told our confidential and discreet\nSepoy servants the plan which we do not intend to adopt. N.B.--If you\nwish a thing to be noised over a whole province always whisper it under\na vow of secrecy to your confidential native servant.\n\n8.45 P.M.--Just starting for the convoy. May luck go with us!\n\nOctober 5.--Seven o'clock in the evening. _Io triumphe!_ Crown us with\nlaurel--Elliott and myself! Who can compare with us as vermin killers?\n\nI have only just got back, tired and weary, stained with blood and\ndust, but I have sat down before either washing or changing to have the\nsatisfaction of seeing our deeds set forth in black and white--if only\nin my private log for no eye but my own. I shall describe it all fully\nas a preparation for an official account, which must be drawn up when\nElliott gets back. Billy Dawson used to say that there were three\ndegrees of comparison--a prevarication, a lie, and an official account.\nWe at least cannot exaggerate our success, for it would be impossible to\nadd anything to it.\n\nWe set out, then, as per programme, and came upon the camp near the head\nof the valley. They had two weak companies of the 54th with them who\nmight no doubt have held their own with warning, but an unexpected rush\nof wild Hillmen is a very difficult thing to stand against. With our\nreinforcements, however, and on our guard, we might defy the rascals.\n\nChamberlain was in command--a fine young fellow. We soon made him\nunderstand the situation, and were all ready for a start by daybreak\nthough his waggons were so full that we were compelled to leave several\ntons of fodder behind in order to make room for my Sepoys and for the\nartillery.\n\nAbout five o'clock we inspanned, to use an Africanism, and by six we\nwere well on our way, with our escort as straggling and unconcerned as\npossible--as helpless-looking a caravan as ever invited attack.\n\nI could soon see that it was to be no false alarm this time, and that\nthe tribes really meant business.\n\nFrom my post of observation, under the canvas screens of one of the\nwaggons, I could make out turbaned heads popping up to have a look at\nus from among the rocks, and an occasional scout hurrying northward with\nthe news of our approach.\n\nIt was not, however, until we came abreast of the Terada Pass, a gloomy\ndefile bounded by gigantic cliffs, that the Afridis began to show in\nforce, though they had ambushed themselves so cleverly that, had we not\nbeen keenly on the look-out for them, we might have walked right into\nthe trap. As it was, the convoy halted, upon which the Hillmen, seeing\nthat they were observed, opened a heavy but ill-directed fire upon us.\n\nI had asked Chamberlain to throw out his men in skirmishing order, and\nto give them directions to retreat slowly upon the waggons so as to draw\nthe Afridis on. The ruse succeeded to perfection.\n\nAs the redcoats steadily retired, keeping behind cover as much as\npossible, the enemy followed them up with yells of exultation, springing\nfrom rock to rock, waving their jezails in the air, and howling like a\npack of demons.\n\nWith their black, contorted, mocking faces, their fierce gestures, and\ntheir fluttering garments, they would have made a study for any painter\nwho wished to portray Milton's conception of the army of the damned.\n\nFrom every side they pressed in until, seeing, as they thought, nothing\nbetween them and victory, they left the shelter of the rocks and came\nrushing down, a furious, howling throng, with the green banner of the\nProphet in their van.\n\nNow was our chance, and gloriously we utilised it.\n\nFrom every cranny and slit of the waggons came a blaze of fire, every\nshot of which told among the close-packed mob. Two or three score rolled\nover like rabbits and the rest reeled for a moment, and then, with their\nchiefs at their head, came on again in a magnificent rush.\n\nIt was useless, however, for undisciplined men to attempt to face such a\nwell-directed fire. The leaders were bowled over, and the others, after\nhesitating for a few moments, turned and made for the rocks.\n\nIt was our turn now to assume the offensive. The guns were unlimbered\nand grape poured into them, while our little infantry force advanced at\nthe double, shooting and stabbing all whom they overtook.\n\nNever had I known the tide of battle turn so rapidly and so decisively.\nThe sullen retreat became a flight, and the flight a panic-stricken\nrout, until there was nothing left of the tribesmen except a scattered,\ndemoralised rabble flying wildly to their native fastnesses for shelter\nand protection.\n\nI was by no means inclined to let them off cheaply now that I had them\nin my power. On the contrary, I determined to teach them such a lesson\nthat the sight of a single scarlet uniform would in future be a passport\nin itself.\n\nWe followed hard upon the track of the fugitives and entered the Terada\ndefile at their very heels. Having detached Chamberlain and Elliott with\na company on either side to protect my wings, I pushed on with my Sepoys\nand a handful of artillerymen, giving the enemy no time to rally or\nto recover themselves. We were so handicapped, however, by our stiff\nEuropean uniforms and by our want of practice in climbing, that we\nshould have been unable to overtake any of the mountaineers had it not\nbeen for a fortunate accident.\n\nThere is a smaller ravine which opens into the main pass, and in their\nhurry and confusion some of the fugitives rushed down this. I saw sixty\nor seventy of them turn down, but I should have passed them by and\ncontinued in pursuit of the main body had not one of my scouts come\nrustling up to inform me that the smaller ravine was a _cul-de-sac_, and\nthat the Afridis who had gone up it had no possible means of getting out\nagain except by cutting their way through our ranks.\n\nHere was an opportunity of striking terror into the tribes. Leaving\nChamberlain and Elliott to continue the pursuit of the main body, I\nwheeled my Sepoys into the narrow path and proceeded slowly down it in\nextended order, covering the whole ground from cliff to cliff. Not a\njackal could have passed us unseen. The rebels were caught like rats in\na trap.\n\nThe defile in which we found ourselves was the most gloomy and majestic\nthat I have ever seen. On either side naked precipices rose sheer up\nfor a thousand feet or more, converging upon each other so as to leave a\nvery narrow slit of daylight above us, which was further reduced by the\nfeathery fringe of palm trees and aloes which hung over each lip of the\nchasm.\n\nThe cliffs were not more than a couple of hundred yards apart at the\nentrance, but as we advanced they grew nearer and nearer, until a half\ncompany in close order could hardly march abreast.\n\nA sort of twilight reigned in this strange valley, and the dim,\nuncertain light made the great, basalt rocks loom up vague and\nfantastic. There was no path, and the ground was most uneven, but I\npushed on briskly, cautioning my fellows to have their fingers on their\ntriggers, for I could see that we were nearing the point where the two\ncliffs would form an acute angle with each other.\n\nAt last we came in sight of the place. A great pile of boulders was\nheaped up at the very end of the pass, and among these our fugitives\nwere skulking, entirely demoralised apparently, and incapable of\nresistance. They were useless as prisoners, and it was out of the\nquestion to let them go, so there was no choice but to polish them off.\n\nWaving my sword, I was leading my men on, when we had a most dramatic\ninterruption of a sort which I have seen once or twice on the boards of\nDrury Lane, but never in real life.\n\nIn the side of the cliff, close to the pile of stones where the Hillmen\nwere making their last stand, there was a cave which looked more like\nthe lair of some wild beast than a human habitation.\n\nOut of this dark archway there suddenly emerged an old man--such a\nvery, very old man that all the other veterans whom I have seen were\nas chickens compared with him. His hair and beard were both as white\nas snow, and each reached more than half-way to his waist. His face was\nwrinkled and brown and ebony, a cross between a monkey and a mummy, and\nso thin and emaciated were his shrivelled limbs that you would hardly\nhave given him credit for having any vitality left, were it not for his\neyes, which glittered and sparkled with excitement, like two diamonds in\na setting of mahogany.\n\nThis apparition came rushing out of the cave, and, throwing himself\nbetween the fugitives and our fellows, motioned us back with as\nimperious a sweep of the hand as ever an emperor used to his slaves.\n\n\"Men of blood,\" he cried, in a voice of thunder, speaking excellent\nEnglish, too--\"this is a place for prayer and meditation, not for\nmurder. Desist, lest the wrath of the gods fall upon you.\"\n\n\"Stand aside, old man,\" I shouted. \"You will meet with a hurt if you\ndon't get out of the way.\"\n\nI could see that the Hillmen were taking heart, and that some of\nmy Sepoys were flinching, as if they did not relish this new enemy.\nClearly, I must act promptly if I wished to complete our success.\n\nI dashed forward at the head of the white artillerymen who had stuck to\nme. The old fellow rushed at us with his arms out as if to stop us, but\nit was not time to stick at trifles, so I passed my sword through his\nbody at the same moment that one of the gunners brought his carbine down\nupon his head. He dropped instantly, and the Hillmen, at the sight of\nhis fall, set up the most unearthly howl of horror and consternation.\n\nThe Sepoys, who had been inclined to hang back, came on again the\nmoment he was disposed of, and it did not take us long to consummate our\nvictory. Hardly a man of the enemy got out of the defile alive.\n\nWhat could Hannibal or Caesar have done more? Our own loss in the whole\naffair has been insignificant--three killed and about fifteen wounded.\nGot their banner, a green wisp of a thing with a sentence of the Koran\nengraved upon it.\n\nI looked, after the action, for the old chap, but his body had\ndisappeared, though how or whither I have no conception. His blood be\nupon his own head! He would be alive now if he had not interfered, as\nthe constables say at home, \"with an officer in the execution of his\nduty.\"\n\nThe scouts tell me that his name was Ghoolab Shah, and that he was one\nof the highest and holiest of the Buddhists. He had great fame in the\ndistrict as a prophet and worker of miracles--hence the hubbub when he\nwas cut down. They tell me that he was living in this very cave when\nTamerlane passed this way in 1399, with a lot more bosh of that sort.\n\nI went into the cave, and how any man could live in it a week is a\nmystery to me, for it was little more than four feet high, and as damp\nand dismal a grotto as ever was seen. A wooden settle and a rough\ntable were the sole furniture, with a lot of parchment scrolls with\nhieroglyphics.\n\nWell, he has gone where he will learn that the gospel of peace and good\nwill is superior to all his Pagan lore. Peace go with him.\n\nElliott and Chamberlain never caught the main body--I knew they\nwouldn't--so the honours of the day rest with me. I ought to get a step\nfor it, anyhow, and perhaps, who knows? some mention in the _Gazette_.\nWhat a lucky chance! I think Zemaun deserves his telescope after all for\ngiving it to me. Shall have something to eat now, for I am half starved.\nGlory is an excellent thing, but you cannot live upon it.\n\nOctober 6, 11 A.M.--Let me try to set down as calmly and as accurately\nas I can all that occurred last night. I have never been a dreamer or\na visionary, so I can rely upon my own senses, though I am bound to\nsay that if any other fellow had told me the same thing I should have\ndoubted him. I might even have suspected that I was deceived at the time\nhad I not heard the bell since. However, I must narrate what happened.\n\nElliott was in my tent with me having a quiet cheroot until about ten\no'clock. I then walked the rounds with my jemidar, and having seen that\nall was right I turned in a little before eleven.\n\nI was just dropping off to sleep, for I was dog-tired after the day's\nwork, when I was aroused by some slight noise, and, looking round, I saw\na man dressed in Asiatic costume standing at the entrance of my tent. He\nwas motionless when I saw him, and he had his eyes fixed upon me with a\nsolemn and stern expression.\n\nMy first thought was that the fellow was some Ghazi or Afghan fanatic\nwho had stolen in with the intention of stabbing me, and with this idea\nin my mind I had all the will to spring from my couch and defend myself,\nbut the power was unaccountably lacking.\n\nAn overpowering languor and want of energy possessed me. Had I seen\nthe dagger descending upon my breast I could not have made an effort\nto avert it. I suppose a bird when it is under the influence of a snake\nfeels very much as I did in the presence of this gloomy-faced stranger.\nMy mind was clear enough, but my body was as torpid as though I were\nstill asleep.\n\nI shut my eyes once or twice and tried to persuade myself that the whole\nthing was a delusion, but every time that I opened them there was the\nman still regarding me with the same stony, menacing stare.\n\nThe silence became unendurable. I felt that I must overcome my languor\nso far as to address him. I am not a nervous man, and I never knew\nbefore what Virgil meant when he wrote \"adhoesit faucibus ora.\" At last\nI managed to stammer out a few words, asking the intruder who he was and\nwhat he wanted.\n\n\"Lieutenant Heatherstone,\" he answered, speaking slowly and gravely,\n\"you have committed this day the foulest sacrilege and the greatest\ncrime which it is possible for man to do. You have slain one of the\nthrice blessed and reverend ones, an arch adept of the first degree, an\nelder brother who has trod the higher path for more years than you\nhave numbered months. You have cut him off at a time when his labours\npromised to reach a climax and when he was about to attain a height of\noccult knowledge which would have brought man one step nearer to his\nCreator. All this you have done without excuse, without provocation, at\na time when he was pleading the cause of the helpless and distressed.\nListen now to me, John Heatherstone.\n\n\"When first the occult sciences were pursued many thousands of years\nago, it was found by the learned that the short tenure of human\nexistence was too limited to allow a man to attain the loftiest heights\nof inner life. The inquirers of those days directed their energies in\nthe first place, therefore, to the lengthening of their own days in\norder that they might have more scope for improvement.\n\n\"By their knowledge of the secret laws of Nature they were enabled to\nfortify their bodies against disease and old age. It only remained to\nprotect themselves against the assaults of wicked and violent men who\nare ever ready to destroy what is wiser and nobler than themselves.\nThere was no direct means by which this protection could be effected,\nbut it was in some measure attained by arranging the occult forces in\nsuch a way that a terrible and unavoidable retribution should await the\noffender.\n\n\"It was irrevocably ordained by laws which cannot be reversed that any\none who should shed the blood of a brother who had attained a certain\ndegree of sanctity should be a doomed man. Those laws are extant to this\nday, John Heatherstone, and you have placed yourself in their power.\nKing or emperor would be helpless before the forces which you have\ncalled into play. What hope, then, is there for you?\n\n\"In former days these laws acted so instantaneously that the slayer\nperished with his victim. It was judged afterwards that this prompt\nretribution prevented the offender from having time to realise the\nenormity of his offence.\n\n\"It was therefore ordained that in all such cases the retribution should\nbe left in the hands of the _chelas_, or immediate disciples of the\nholy man, with power to extend or shorten it at their will, exacting\nit either at the time or at any future anniversary of the day when the\ncrime was committed.\n\n\"Why punishment should come on those days only it does not concern\nyou to know. Suffice it that you are the murderer of Ghoolab Shah,\nthe thrice blessed, and that I am the senior of his three _chelas_\ncommissioned to avenge his death.\n\n\"It is no personal matter between us. Amid our studies we have no\nleisure or inclination for personal matters. It is an immutable law, and\nit is as impossible for us to relax it as it is for you to escape from\nit. Sooner or later we shall come to you and claim your life in atonement\nfor the one which you have taken.\n\n\"The same fate shall be meted out to the wretched soldier, Smith, who,\nthough less guilty than yourself, has incurred the same penalty by\nraising his sacrilegious hand against the chosen of Buddha. If your\nlife is prolonged, it is merely that you may have time to repent of your\nmisdeed and to feel the full force of your punishment.\n\n\"And lest you should be tempted to cast it out of your mind and to\nforget it, our bell--our astral bell, the use of which is one of our\noccult secrets--shall ever remind you of what have been and what is to\nbe. You shall hear it by day and you shall hear it by night, and it will\nbe a sign to you that do what you may and go where you will, you can\nnever shake yourself clear of the _chelas_ of Ghoolab Shah.\n\n\"You will never see me more, accursed one, until the day when we come\nfor you. Live in fear, and in that anticipation which is worse than\ndeath.\"\n\nWith a menacing wave of the hand the figure turned and swept out of my\ntent into the darkness. The instant that the fellow disappeared from my\nsight I recovered from my lethargy which had fallen upon me. Springing\nto my feet, I rushed to the opening and looked out. A Sepoy sentry was\nstanding leaning upon his musket, a few paces off.\n\n\"You dog,\" I said in Hindustani. \"What do you mean by letting people\ndisturb me in this way?\"\n\nThe man stared at me in amazement. \"Has any one disturbed the sahib?\" he\nasked.\n\n\"This instant--this moment. You must have seen him pass out of my tent.\"\n\n\"Surely the Burra Sahib is mistaken,\" the man answered, respectfully but\nfirmly. \"I have been here for an hour, and no one has passed from the\ntent.\"\n\nPuzzled and disconcerted, I was sitting by the side of my couch\nwondering whether the whole thing were a delusion, brought on by the\nnervous excitement of our skirmish, when a new marvel overtook me. From\nover my head there suddenly sounded a sharp, tinkling sound, like that\nproduced by an empty glass when flipped by the nail, only louder and\nmore intense.\n\nI looked up, but nothing was to be seen. I examined the whole interior\nof the tent carefully, but without discovering any cause for the strange\nsound. At last, worn out with fatigue, I gave the mystery up, and\nthrowing myself on the couch was soon fast asleep.\n\nWhen I awoke this morning I was inclined to put the whole of my\nyesternight's experiences down to imagination, but I was soon disabused\nof the idea, for I had hardly risen before the same strange sound was\nrepeated in my very ear as loudly, and to all appearance as causelesly,\nas before. What it is or where it comes from I cannot conceive. I have\nnot heard it since.\n\nCan the fellow's threats have something in them and this be the warning\nbell of which he spoke? Surely it is impossible. Yet his manner was\nindescribably impressive.\n\nI have tried to set down what he said as accurately as I can, but I\nfear I have omitted a good deal. What is to be the end of this strange\naffair? I must go in for a course of religion and holy water. Not a word\nto Chamberlain or Elliott. They tell me I am looking like a ghost this\nmorning.\n\n_Evening_.--Have managed to compare notes with Gunner Rufus Smith of the\nArtillery, who knocked the old fellow over with the butt of his gun. His\nexperience has been the same as mine. He has heard the sound, too. What\nis the meaning of it all? My brain is in a whirl.\n\nOct. 10 (four days later).--God help us!\n\nThis last laconic entry terminated the journal. It seemed to me that,\ncoming as it did after four days' complete silence, it told a clearer\ntale of shaken nerve and a broken spirit than could any more elaborate\nnarrative. Pinned on to the journal was a supplementary statement which\nhad evidently been recently added by the general.\n\n\"From that day to this,\" it said, \"I have had no night or day free from\nthe intrusion of that dreadful sound with its accompanying train of\nthought. Time and custom have brought me no relief, but on the contrary,\nas the years pass over my head my physical strength decreases and my\nnerves become less able to bear up against the continual strain.\n\n\"I am a broken man in mind and body. I live in a state of tension,\nalways straining my ears for the hated sound, afraid to converse with\nmy fellows for fear of exposing my dreadful condition to them, with\nno comfort or hope of comfort on this side of the grave. I should be\nwilling, Heaven knows, to die, and yet as each 5th of October comes\nround, I am prostrated with fear because I do not know what strange and\nterrible experience may be in store for me.\n\n\"Forty years have passed since I slew Ghoolab Shah, and forty times\nI have gone through all the horrors of death, without attaining the\nblessed peace which lies beyond.\n\n\"I have no means of knowing in what shape my fate will come upon me. I\nhave immured myself in this lonely country, and surrounded myself with\nbarriers, because in my weaker moments my instincts urge me to take some\nsteps for self-protection, but I know well in my heart how futile it\nall is. They must come quickly now, for I grow old, and Nature will\nforestall them unless they make haste.\n\n\"I take credit to myself that I have kept my hands off the prussic-acid\nor opium bottle. It has always been in my power to checkmate my occult\npersecutors in that way, but I have ever held that a man in this world\ncannot desert his post until he has been relieved in due course by the\nauthorities. I have had no scruples, however, about exposing myself to\ndanger, and, during the Sikh and Sepoy wars, I did all that a man could\ndo to court Death. He passed me by, however, and picked out many a young\nfellow to whom life was only opening and who had everything to live for,\nwhile I survived to win crosses and honours which had lost all relish\nfor me.\n\n\"Well, well, these things cannot depend upon chance, and there is no\ndoubt some deep reason for it all.\n\n\"One compensation Providence has made me in the shape of a true and\nfaithful wife, to whom I told my dreadful secret before the wedding, and\nwho nobly consented to share my lot. She has lifted half the burden from\nmy shoulders, but with the effect, poor soul, of crushing her own life\nbeneath its weight!\n\n\"My children, too, have been a comfort to me. Mordaunt knows all, or\nnearly all. Gabriel we have endeavoured to keep in the dark, though we\ncannot prevent her from knowing that there is something amiss.\n\n\"I should like this statement to be shown to Dr. John Easterling\nof Stranraer. He heard on one occasion this haunting sound. My sad\nexperience may show him that I spoke truth when I said that there was\nmuch knowledge in the world which has never found its way to England.\n\n\"J. B. HEATHERSTONE.\"\n\nIt was going on for dawn by the time that I had finished this\nextraordinary narrative, to which my sister and Mordaunt Heatherstone\nlistened with the most absorbed attention. Already we could see through\nthe window that the stars had begun to fade and a grey light to appear\nin the east. The crofter who owned the lurcher dog lived a couple of\nmiles off, so it was time for us to be on foot. Leaving Esther to tell\nmy father the story in such fashion as she might, we thrust some food in\nour pockets and set off upon our solemn and eventful errand.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI. AT THE HOLE OF CREE\n\nIt was dark enough when we started to make it no easy matter to find our\nway across the moors, but as we advanced it grew lighter and lighter,\nuntil by the time we reached Fullarton's cabin it was broad daylight.\n\nEarly as it was, he was up and about, for the Wigtown peasants are an\nearly rising race. We explained our mission to him in as few words as\npossible, and having made his bargain--what Scot ever neglected that\npreliminary?--he agreed not only to let us have the use of his dog but\nto come with us himself.\n\nMordaunt, in his desire for privacy, would have demurred at this\narrangement, but I pointed out to him that we had no idea what was in\nstore for us, and the addition of a strong, able-bodied man to our party\nmight prove to be of the utmost consequence.\n\nAgain, the dog was less likely to give us trouble if we had its master\nto control it. My arguments carried the day, and the biped accompanied\nus as well as his four-footed companion.\n\nThere was some little similarity between the two, for the man was a\ntowsy-headed fellow with a great mop of yellow hair and a straggling\nbeard, while the dog was of the long-haired, unkempt breed looking like\nan animated bundle of oakum.\n\nAll our way to the Hall its owner kept retailing instances of the\ncreature's sagacity and powers of scent, which, according to his\naccount, were little less than miraculous. His anecdotes had a poor\naudience, I fear, for my mind was filled with the strange story which I\nhad been reading, while Mordaunt strode on with wild eyes and feverish\ncheeks, without a thought for anything but the problem which we had to\nsolve.\n\nAgain and again as we topped an eminence I saw him look eagerly round\nhim in the faint hope of seeing some trace of the absentee, but over the\nwhole expanse of moorland there was no sign of movement or of life. All\nwas dead and silent and deserted.\n\nOur visit to the Hall was a very brief one, for every minute now was\nof importance. Mordaunt rushed in and emerged with an old coat of his\nfather's, which he handed to Fullarton, who held it out to the dog.\n\nThe intelligent brute sniffed at it all over, then ran whining a little\nway down the avenue, came back to sniff the coat again, and finally\nelevating its stump of a tail in triumph, uttered a succession of sharp\nyelps to show that it was satisfied that it had struck the trail. Its\nowner tied a long cord to its collar to prevent it from going too fast\nfor us, and we all set off upon our search, the dog tugging and\nstraining at its leash in its excitement as it followed in the general's\nfootsteps.\n\nOur way lay for a couple of hundred yards along the high road, and then\npassed through a gap in the hedge and on to the moor, across which we\nwere led in a bee-line to the northward.\n\nThe sun had by this time risen above the horizon, and the whole\ncountryside looked so fresh and sweet, from the blue, sparkling sea to\nthe purple mountains, that it was difficult to realise how weird and\nuncanny was the enterprise upon which we were engaged.\n\nThe scent must have lain strongly upon the ground, for the dog never\nhesitated nor stopped, dragging its master along at a pace which\nrendered conversation impossible.\n\nAt one place, in crossing a small stream, we seemed to get off the trail\nfor a few minutes, but our keen-nosed ally soon picked it up on the\nother side and followed it over the trackless moor, whining and yelping\nall the time in its eagerness. Had we not all three been fleet of foot\nand long of wind, we could not have persisted in the continuous, rapid\njourney over the roughest of ground, with the heather often well-nigh up\nto our waists.\n\nFor my own part, I have no idea now, looking back, what goal it was\nwhich I expected to reach at the end of our pursuit. I can remember that\nmy mind was full of the vaguest and most varying speculations.\n\nCould it be that the three Buddhists had had a craft in readiness off\nthe coast, and had embarked with their prisoners for the East? The\ndirection of their track seemed at first to favour this supposition,\nfor it lay in the line of the upper end of the bay, but it ended by\nbranching off and striking directly inland. Clearly the ocean was not to\nbe our terminus.\n\nBy ten o'clock we had walked close upon twelve miles, and were compelled\nto call a halt for a few minutes to recover our breath, for the last\nmile or two we had been breasting the long, wearying slope of the\nWigtown hills.\n\nFrom the summit of this range, which is nowhere more than a thousand\nfeet in height, we could see, looking northward, such a scene of\nbleakness and desolation as can hardly be matched in any country.\n\nRight away to the horizon stretched the broad expanse of mud and of\nwater, mingled and mixed together in the wildest chaos, like a portion\nof some world in the process of formation. Here and there on the\ndun-coloured surface of this great marsh there had burst out patches of\nsickly yellow reeds and of livid, greenish scum, which only served\nto heighten and intensify the gloomy effect of the dull, melancholy\nexpanse.\n\nOn the side nearest to us some abandoned peat-cuttings showed that\nubiquitous man had been at work there, but beyond these few petty scars\nthere was no sign anywhere of human life. Not even a crow nor a seagull\nflapped its way over that hideous desert.\n\nThis is the great Bog of Cree. It is a salt-water marsh formed by an\ninroad of the sea, and so intersected is it with dangerous swamps and\ntreacherous pitfalls of liquid mud, that no man would venture through\nit unless he had the guidance of one of the few peasants who retain the\nsecret of its paths.\n\nAs we approached the fringe of rushes which marked its border, a foul,\ndank smell rose up from the stagnant wilderness, as from impure water\nand decaying vegetation--an earthy, noisome smell which poisoned the\nfresh upland air.\n\nSo forbidding and gloomy was the aspect of the place that our stout\ncrofter hesitated, and it was all that we could do to persuade him\nto proceed. Our lurcher, however, not being subject to the delicate\nimpressions of our higher organisation, still ran yelping along with its\nnose on the ground and every fibre of its body quivering with excitement\nand eagerness.\n\nThere was no difficulty about picking our way through the morass, for\nwherever the five could go we three could follow.\n\nIf we could have had any doubts as to our dog's guidance they would\nall have been removed now, for in the soft, black, oozing soil we could\ndistinctly trace the tracks of the whole party. From these we could\nsee that they had walked abreast, and, furthermore, that each was about\nequidistant from the other. Clearly, then, no physical force had been\nused in taking the general and his companion along. The compulsion had\nbeen psychical and not material.\n\nOnce within the swamp, we had to be careful not to deviate from the\nnarrow track, which offered a firm foothold.\n\nOn each side lay shallow sheets of stagnant water overlying a\ntreacherous bottom of semi-fluid mud, which rose above the surface\nhere and there in moist, sweltering banks, mottled over with occasional\npatches of unhealthy vegetation. Great purple and yellow fungi had\nbroken out in a dense eruption, as though Nature were afflicted with a\nfoul disease, which manifested itself by this crop of plague spots.\n\nHere and there dark, crab-like creatures scuttled across our path,\nand hideous, flesh-coloured worms wriggled and writhed amid the sickly\nreeds. Swarms of buzzing, piping insects rose up at every step and\nformed a dense cloud around our heads, settling on our hands and faces\nand inoculating us with their filthy venom. Never had I ventured into so\npestilent and forbidding a place.\n\nMordaunt Heatherstone strode on, however, with a set purpose upon his\nswarthy brow, and we could but follow him, determined to stand by him\nto the end of the adventure. As we advanced, the path grew narrower\nand narrower until, as we saw by the tracks, our predecessors had been\ncompelled to walk in single file. Fullarton was leading us with the dog,\nMordaunt behind him, while I brought up the rear. The peasant had been\nsulky and surly for a little time back, hardly answering when spoken to,\nbut he now stopped short and positively refused to go a step farther.\n\n\"It's no' canny,\" he said, \"besides I ken where it will lead us tae.\"\n\n\"Where, then?\" I asked.\n\n\"Tae the Hole o' Cree,\" he answered. \"It's no far frae here, I'm\nthinking.\"\n\n\"The Hole of Cree! What is that, then?\"\n\n\"It's a great, muckle hole in the ground that gangs awa' doon so deep\nthat naebody could ever reach the bottom. Indeed there are folk wha says\nthat it's just a door leadin' intae the bottomless pit itsel'.\"\n\n\"You have been there, then?\" I asked.\n\n\"Been there!\" he cried. \"What would I be doin' at the Hole o' Cree? No,\nI've never been there, nor any other man in his senses.\"\n\n\"How do you know about it, then?\"\n\n\"My great-grandfeyther had been there, and that's how I ken,\" Fullarton\nanswered. \"He was fou' one Saturday nicht and he went for a bet. He\ndidna like tae talk aboot it afterwards, and he wouldna tell a' what\nbefell him, but he was aye feared o' the very name. He's the first\nFullarton that's been at the Hole o' Cree, and he'll be the last for\nme. If ye'll tak' my advice ye'll just gie the matter up and gang hame\nagain, for there's na guid tae be got oot o' this place.\"\n\n\"We shall go on with you or without you,\" Mordaunt answered. \"Let us\nhave your dog and we can pick you up on our way back.\"\n\n\"Na, na,\" he cried, \"I'll no' hae my dog scaret wi' bogles, and running\ndown Auld Nick as if he were a hare. The dog shall bide wi' me.\"\n\n\"The dog shall go with us,\" said my companion, with his eyes blazing.\n\"We have no time to argue with you. Here's a five-pound note. Let us\nhave the dog, or, by Heaven, I shall take it by force and throw you in\nthe bog if you hinder us.\"\n\nI could realise the Heatherstone of forty years ago when I saw the\nfierce and sudden wrath which lit up the features of his son.\n\nEither the bribe or the threat had the desired effect, for the fellow\ngrabbed at the money with one hand while with the other he surrendered\nthe leash which held the lurcher. Leaving him to retrace his steps, we\ncontinued to make our way into the utmost recesses of the great swamp.\n\nThe tortuous path grew less and less defined as we proceeded, and was\neven covered in places with water, but the increasing excitement of the\nhound and the sight of the deep footmarks in the mud stimulated us to\npush on. At last, after struggling through a grove of high bulrushes,\nwe came on a spot the gloomy horror of which might have furnished Dante\nwith a fresh terror for his \"Inferno.\"\n\nThe whole bog in this part appeared to have sunk in, forming a great,\nfunnel-shaped depression, which terminated in the centre in a circular\nrift or opening about forty feet in diameter. It was a whirlpool--a\nperfect maelstrom of mud, sloping down on every side to this silent and\nawful chasm.\n\nClearly this was the spot which, under the name of the Hole of Cree,\nbore such a sinister reputation among the rustics. I could not wonder at\nits impressing their imagination, for a more weird or gloomy scene, or\none more worthy of the avenue which led to it, could not be conceived.\n\nThe steps passed down the declivity which surrounded the abyss, and we\nfollowed them with a sinking feeling in our hearts, as we realised that\nthis was the end of our search.\n\nA little way from the downward path was the return trail made by the\nfeet of those who had come back from the chasm's edge. Our eyes fell\nupon these tracks at the same moment, and we each gave a cry of horror,\nand stood gazing speechlessly at them. For there, in those blurred\nfootmarks, the whole drama was revealed.\n\n_Five had gone down, but only three had returned_.\n\nNone shall ever know the details of that strange tragedy. There was no\nmark of struggle nor sign of attempt at escape. We knelt at the edge of\nthe Hole and endeavoured to pierce the unfathomable gloom which shrouded\nit. A faint, sickly exhalation seemed to rise from its depths, and there\nwas a distant hurrying, clattering sound as of waters in the bowels of\nthe earth.\n\nA great stone lay embedded in the mud, and this I hurled over, but we\nnever heard thud or splash to show that it had reached the bottom.\n\nAs we hung over the noisome chasm a sound did at last rise to our ears\nout of its murky depths. High, clear, and throbbing, it tinkled for an\ninstant out of the abyss, to be succeeded by the same deadly stillness\nwhich had preceded it.\n\nI did not wish to appear superstitious, or to put down to extraordinary\ncauses that which may have a natural explanation. That one keen note may\nhave been some strange water sound produced far down in the bowels of\nthe earth. It may have been that or it may have been that sinister bell\nof which I had heard so much. Be this as it may, it was the only sign\nthat rose to us from the last terrible resting-place of the two who had\npaid the debt which had so long been owing.\n\nWe joined our voices in a call with the unreasoning obstinacy with which\nmen will cling to hope, but no answer came back to us save a hollow\nmoaning from the depths beneath. Footsore and heart-sick, we retraced\nour steps and climbed the slimy slope once more.\n\n\"What shall we do, Mordaunt?\" I asked, in a subdued voice. \"We can but\npray that their souls may rest in peace.\"\n\nYoung Heatherstone looked at me with flashing eyes.\n\n\"This may be all according to occult laws,\" he cried, \"but we shall see\nwhat the laws of England have to say upon it. I suppose a _chela_ may be\nhanged as well as any other man. It may not be too late yet to run them\ndown. Here, good dog, good dog--here!\"\n\nHe pulled the hound over and set it on the track of the three men.\nThe creature sniffed at it once or twice, and then, falling upon its\nstomach, with bristling hair and protruding tongue, it lay shivering and\ntrembling, a very embodiment of canine terror.\n\n\"You see,\" I said, \"it is no use contending against those who have\npowers at their command to which we cannot even give a name. There is\nnothing for it but to accept the inevitable, and to hope that these poor\nmen may meet with some compensation in another world for all that they\nhave suffered in this.\"\n\n\"And be free from all devilish religions and their murderous\nworshippers!\" Mordaunt cried furiously.\n\nJustice compelled me to acknowledge in my own heart that the murderous\nspirit had been set on foot by the Christian before it was taken up by\nthe Buddhists, but I forbore to remark upon it, for fear of irritating\nmy companion.\n\nFor a long time I could not draw him away from the scene of his father's\ndeath, but at last, by repeated arguments and reasonings, I succeeded in\nmaking him realise how useless and unprofitable any further efforts on\nour part must necessarily prove, and in inducing him to return with me\nto Cloomber.\n\nOh, the wearisome, tedious journey! It had seemed long enough when we\nhad some slight flicker of hope, or at least of expectation, before us,\nbut now that our worst fears were fulfilled it appeared interminable.\n\nWe picked up our peasant guide at the outskirts of the marsh, and having\nrestored his dog we let him find his own way home, without telling him\nanything of the results of our expedition. We ourselves plodded all\nday over the moors with heavy feet and heavier hearts until we saw the\nill-omened tower of Cloomber, and at last, as the sun was setting, found\nourselves once more beneath its roof.\n\nThere is no need for me to enter into further details, nor to describe\nthe grief which our tidings conveyed to mother and to daughter. Their\nlong expectation of some calamity was not sufficient to prepare them for\nthe terrible reality.\n\nFor weeks my poor Gabriel hovered between life and death, and though\nshe came round at last, thanks to the nursing of my sister and the\nprofessional skill of Dr. John Easterling, she has never to this day\nentirely recovered her former vigour. Mordaunt, too, suffered much\nfor some time, and it was only after our removal to Edinburgh that he\nrallied from the shock which he had undergone.\n\nAs to poor Mrs. Heatherstone, neither medical attention nor change of\nair can ever have a permanent effect upon her. Slowly and surely, but\nvery placidly, she has declined in health and strength, until it is\nevident that in a very few weeks at the most she will have rejoined her\nhusband and restored to him the one thing which he must have grudged to\nleave behind.\n\nThe Laird of Branksome came home from Italy restored in health, with the\nresult that we were compelled to return once more to Edinburgh.\n\nThe change was agreeable to us, for recent events had cast a cloud over\nour country life and had surrounded us with unpleasant associations.\nBesides, a highly honourable and remunerative appointment in connection\nwith the University library had become vacant, and had, through the\nkindness of the late Sir Alexander Grant, been offered to my father,\nwho, as may be imagined, lost no time in accepting so congenial a post.\n\nIn this way we came back to Edinburgh very much more important people\nthan we left it, and with no further reason to be uneasy about the\ndetails of housekeeping. But, in truth, the whole household has been\ndissolved, for I have been married for some months to my dear Gabriel,\nand Esther is to become Mrs. Heatherstone upon the 23rd of the month. If\nshe makes him as good a wife as his sister has made me, we may both set\nourselves down as fortunate men.\n\nThese mere domestic episodes are, as I have already explained,\nintroduced only because I cannot avoid alluding to them.\n\nMy object in drawing up this statement and publishing the evidence which\ncorroborates it, was certainly not to parade my private affairs before\nthe public, but to leave on record an authentic narrative of a most\nremarkable series of events. This I have endeavoured to do in as\nmethodical a manner as possible, exaggerating nothing and suppressing\nnothing.\n\nThe reader has now the evidence before him, and can form his own\nopinions unaided by me as to the causes of the disappearance and death\nof Rufus Smith and of John Berthier Heatherstone, V.C., C.B.\n\nThere is only one point which is still dark to me. Why the _chelas_ of\nGhoolab Shah should have removed their victims to the desolate Hole of\nCree instead of taking their lives at Cloomber, is, I confess, a mystery\nto me.\n\nIn dealing with occult laws, however, we must allow for our own complete\nignorance of the subject. Did we know more we might see that there was\nsome analogy between that foul bog and the sacrilege which had been\ncommitted, and that their ritual and customs demanded that just such a\ndeath was the one appropriate to the crime.\n\nOn this point I should be sorry to be dogmatic, but at least we must\nallow that the Buddhist priests must have had some very good cause for\nthe course of action which they so deliberately carried out.\n\nMonths afterwards I saw a short paragraph in the _Star of India_\nannouncing that three eminent Buddhists--Lal Hoomi, Mowdar Khan, and Ram\nSingh--had just returned in the steamship _Deccan_ from a short trip\nto Europe. The very next item was devoted to an account of the life and\nservices of Major-General Heatherstone, \"who has lately disappeared from\nhis country house in Wigtownshire, and who, there is too much reason to\nfear, has been drowned.\"\n\nI wonder if by chance there was any other human eye but mine which\ntraced a connection between these paragraphs. I never showed them to\nmy wife or to Mordaunt, and they will only know of their existence when\nthey read these pages.\n\nI don't know that there is any other point which needs clearing up. The\nintelligent reader will have already seen the reasons for the general's\nfear of dark faces, of wandering men (not knowing how his pursuers might\ncome after him), and of visitors (from the same cause and because his\nhateful bell was liable to sound at all times).\n\nHis broken sleep led him to wander about the house at night, and\nthe lamps which he burnt in every room were no doubt to prevent his\nimagination from peopling the darkness with terrors. Lastly, his\nelaborate precautions were, as he has himself explained, rather the\nresult of a feverish desire to do something than in the expectation that\nhe could really ward off his fate.\n\nScience will tell you that there are no such powers as those claimed\nby the Eastern mystics. I, John Fothergill West, can confidently answer\nthat science is wrong.\n\nFor what is science? Science is the consensus of opinion of scientific\nmen, and history has shown that it is slow to accept a truth. Science\nsneered at Newton for twenty years. Science proved mathematically that\nan iron ship could not swim, and science declared that a steamship could\nnot cross the Atlantic.\n\nLike Goethe's Mephistopheles, our wise professor's forte is \"stets\nverneinen.\" Thomas Didymus is, to use his own jargon, his prototype. Let\nhim learn that if he will but cease to believe in the infallibility\nof his own methods, and will look to the East, from which all great\nmovements come, he will find there a school of philosophers and of\nsavants who, working on different lines from his own, are many thousand\nyears ahead of him in all the essentials of knowledge.\n\nTHE END"