The Serapion Brethren, Vol. I.

by E. T. A. Hoffmann

"'"My word!" he cried, "the gentleman'll have a better night of it than he would have had in the old coach!--and the nightgown and nightcap all ready and waiting!"

"'Mistress Anne, almost fainting with the shock of this irreverent mention of the maidenly night-gear, was letting the candlestick fall, but I caught it in time, and lighted the fellow out. He cast a facetious look at the old woman as he departed. When I came back she was all in a tremble; she thought I would tell her to go, and proceed coolly to desecrate the maidenly couch by sleeping in it, but she revived when I told her I wasn't accustomed to anything so soft, and should be obliged if she would make me up a shake-down as well as she could in the sitting-room. Her wrinkles of annoyance vanished, and her face lighted up, in a way it never has since, into a most gracious smile. She dipped her long lean arms down to the ground, fingered up the down-trodden heels of her slippers, and trotted off, half frightened and half delighted. As I meant to have a fine long sleep, I told her not to come with my coffee before nine o'clock; so I left the old woman for the night almost with Wallenstein's words.

"I was tired to death, and thought I should fall asleep in a moment, but the manifold thoughts and fancies which began to cross each other in my brain drove sleep away. I seemed to be only beginning to realize the rapid change which had taken place in my position and circumstances. It was only now, when I had actually taken possession of my property, and was absolutely in my house, that I quite grasped the fact that I was suddenly lifted out of very narrow circumstances to a position of affluence, and that life was opening before me a vista of most agreeable ease and comfort. The watchman's discordant voice croaked out "Eleven," and "Twelve." I was so wide awake that I distinctly heard my watch ticking on the table, and a cricket chirping somewhere a long way off; but as the last stroke of twelve sounded, hollow and faint, from a church-clock in the distance, measured footfalls began to walk up and down the room, and at every step came the sounds of sobbing and sighing, growing louder and louder, till they were like the heart-breaking cries of some creature in deadly pain or peril, and then there came a scuffling and a scratching on the outside of the door, and a dog whimpered and moaned, in tones that were almost human. I had noticed the old pug--my aunt's pet and darling--the evening before. It was evidently him, whining to get in. I got out of bed: I stared most scrutinizingly all about the room, which was dimly lighted by the glimmer of the sky. Everything that was in it I could make out distinctly; but no form was to be seen moving up and down, though the footsteps, and the sobbing and sighing, still went on, apparently close beside my bed. And then, suddenly, I was seized by that terror, arising from the proximity of a spirit, which I had never known before. I felt a cold perspiration dropping from my forehead, and my hair standing straight up on end, as if frozen by its iciness. I could not move a limb, nor open my mouth to scream, for terror; but my blood streamed faster in my throbbing veins, and kept my inner senses active, though they could exercise no control over my organs, which were paralyzed as with a spasm of death. Suddenly the footsteps stopped, and the sobbing ceased; then I could hear a sort of coughing sound--like a clearing of the throat more than coughing; the door of a cupboard seemed to open; there was a clattering as of a silver spoon; then a sound as if some bottle was opened and put back on the shelf; a sound of swallowing, and then a deep-drawn sigh. At that instant a tall, white figure seemed to come wavering forward out of the wall. I sunk down into the depths of an ice river of the wildest terror. I lost consciousness.

"I came to myself with the sensation of a fall from some height. You all know that every-day dream sensation; but the peculiar feeling that I experienced then I hardly know how to describe to you. It was some time before I could make out where I was, and then there was a sense as if something terrible had been happening, which a long, death-like sleep had wiped away the remembrance of. At last it all came gradually back to me, but I thought it was nothing but a painful dream. However, when I got up I noticed the portrait for the first time--the portrait in the wedding-dress; a life-size, three-quarter length portrait. A cold shiver ran down my back, for I felt sure I recognized in it the figure which I had seen in the night. But then I could see nothing in the shape of a cupboard in the room, and that confirmed me in the conclusion that I had only been dreaming.

"'Mistress Anne brought my coffee. She looked me long in the face, and said, "Eh, sir! you are looking pale and badly!--has anything been happening?" Far from telling her anything about it, I said an oppression in my chest had prevented me from sleeping. "It's the stomach!--it's the stomach!" said the old woman. "Eh! we've help at hand for that!" She scuffled up to the wall; opened a door in the hangings which I had not noticed before, and I saw into a cupboard where there were glasses, small bottles, and two or three silver spoons. The old woman took out one of the spoons, clattering and tinkling it as she did so; opened a bottle; poured a few drops from it into the spoon; put it back in its place, and then came towards me with her unsteady, wavering gait. I gave a scream of horror. It was the exact reproduction, in broad, waking daylight, of the scene of the previous night.

"'"Well, well!" croaked the old woman, with a strange grin; "it's only a drop of medicine, sir. The mistress was troubled with her stomach too, and often had to take a little."

"'I manned myself, and swallowed the stuff, which was bitter and hot. My eyes were on the bride's picture, which was just over the wall-press. "Whose portrait's that?" I asked.

"'"Good gracious, sir! don't you know?" she cried. "That's poor dear mistress, that's dead and gone your aunt." The tears ran down her cheeks. The dog began to whimper, as it had done in the night. I mastered my inward shudder, and forced myself with some difficulty to be composed. I said:

"'"Mistress Anne! I feel quite positive that my aunt was at that cupboard last night at twelve o'clock, taking some of those drops."

"'The old woman showed no surprise. A strange, deadly pallor seemed to extinguish the last sparks of life in her wrinkled face, and she said softly, "Has the Feast of the Invention of the Cross come round again?--No; it's long past the third of May."