Through the great bay windows opposite me, a magnificent panorama of lawn, meadows and rivers, beyond which I fancied I could detect the needle-like front of a steeple, spread itself before my eyes. All this natural beauty lay enhanced by a thin covering of gleaming snow. It was Christmas! The glamour of the hour and season enchanted me; past injuries and St. Rudolphs were forgotten; I was at peace with all men.
At peace! What wouldn’t I give if I could always be so; if these broad acres, this noble mansion, this stately apartment were mine—mine—ALL MINE—and the stillness of the room again oppressed me.
Where were the many guests miladi had mentioned? Where were the sounds of revelry? The high-pitched voices of women, the hoarser tones of men, the indistinct murmuring of conversation such as I had sat and listened to in days of yore; how it had hummed and buzzed around me when plunged in pleasant reverie, it then had no more effect on my hearing than the lapping of the gentlest waves on the seashore. There were no such sounds now; these massive walls were a sure, impenetrable barrier to whatever might be going on outside—this room—far from being filled with giddy babblers—was empty, distractedly, painfully EMPTY, empty save for the dancing moonbeams and the moving shadows.
But was it empty? My heart gave a violent, sickly throb as I recollected the look of disquietude, of grave, of indisputably grave apprehension in miladi’s eyes as she peered around! Of what had she been afraid—of the approaching twilight, of the shadows, of the gloom; and as I cast a terrified glance ahead of me I fancied—foolish fancy! that those palls of darkness I have already mentioned had come out further from the nooks and crannies and were fast approaching me.
Those of us who have ever ridden on horseback by night across some dreary wilderness, or along a lonely road have doubtless had occasion to observe a strange alteration in the behaviour of our beast; its psychic propensities have been suddenly and mysteriously awakened; it fights shy of some particular tree, or stone, or gap in the hedge; its ears twitch, its flanks quiver, it is all on the tremble, the slightest sound would now make it take the bit between its teeth and bolt; it is afraid not necessarily of what it has seen, but what it fears may be there! And—to an anomalous species of terror I found myself a bounden slave.
I dreaded to think of the effect even the most trivial sound or incident might now produce on my agitated mind. Had I been able, I would have risked the displeasure of my hostess and left the room, but I COULD NOT; every atom of strength seemed to have quitted my body—I was pro tempore cataleptic—PARALYSED.
A faint and almost imperceptible movement suddenly attracted my attention to a square patch of light on the carpet immediately before me.
To my horror something was coming THROUGH the floor. Slowly, very slowly, first of all a head, a head surmounted with long dishevelled black hair, then a FACE! God save me from seeing the like again—a face that might have once been beautiful, or plain, or ugly, but was now—NOTHING—nothing—I won’t describe—nothing but the GRAVE; then shoulders, bust, what was once a body, legs. Held in its arms in close embrace—was the figure of a baby—in a like state of nudity and decay.
For a moment, only for a moment, they stood swaying silently to and fro in the moonlight, and then with a snakelike movement of her body the phantom of the woman glided across the room, vanishing in the recess containing the large bay window.