“Leave it,” said I, “since it is the custom of the house, and go to bed, I have no more need of you than I have ever had.”
“Mon Dieu, monsieur,” said he, “if you will permit me, I will pass the night on an easy chair in your room.”
“And why, my friend?”
“Because I have heard there were ghosts here. Yes, yes, sir, I understand the servants now, they are very much afraid of these ghosts, and I who am an old soldier, I would like to show them that I am not so foolish as they are.”
I refused, however, and left him to arrange the bed, while I went down to the library, after having told him not to wait for me. I wandered through the immense hall before beginning my work, and locked myself in carefully, lest I should be disturbed by some prying or mischievous valet. I then lighted a silver candelabra with numerous branches and began to turn over the leaves of the fantastical pamphlet relative to the green ladies.
The frequent apparition of the d’Ionis demoiselles observed and reported in detail coincided in every particular with what I had seen and with what the abbé had recounted to me. But then neither he nor I had possessed sufficient faith, or courage to question the phantoms. Others had done so, according to the chroniclers, and it had been reserved for them to see the three maidens, no longer as greenish clouds, but in all the brilliancy of their youth and beauty, not all of them at once, but one in particular, while the others remained in the background. Then this funereal beauty answered all serious and decent questions that might be asked of her. She unveiled the secrets of the past, of the present, and of the future. She gave judicious advice. She informed those who were capable of making a good use of them where treasures lay concealed. She foretold disasters that might be averted, mistakes to be repaired. She spoke in the name of God and of the angels. She was a beneficent power to those who consulted her with good and pious designs, but she invariably reproved and threatened mockers, libertines and impious people. According to the manuscript, they had been known to inflict severe punishment upon those whose intentions were wicked or fraudulent, and those who were only influenced by malice or idle curiosity might expect fearful things to befall them, such as they would have bitter cause to regret.
Without particularizing these fearful things, the manuscript furnished the formula of invocation and all the rules to be observed, with so much seriousness and such naïve good faith that I yielded myself to its influence. The apparition assumed such marvelous colors in imagination as to beguile me rather to desire than to fear it. I did not feel in the least depressed or alarmed at the idea of seeing the dead walk or of hearing them speak; on the contrary, I revelled in elysian dreams, and beheld a Beatrix arise in the rays of my empyrean.
“And why should these dreams be denied me,” I exclaimed, mentally, “since the prologue of the vision has already been vouchsafed me? My foolish fears have hitherto rendered me unworthy and incapable of believing in Swedenborgian revelations, such as superior minds credit and which I have mistakenly ridiculed. But now I will gladly renounce these old illusions, and such sentiments will surely be more healthful and agreeable to the soul of a poet than the cold denial of our age. If I pass for a madman, should I even become one, what matters it; I will have lived in an ideal sphere, and will, perhaps, be happier than all the sages of the earth combined.”
Thus I communed with myself, resting my head on my hands. It was about two o’clock in the morning and the most profound silence reigned throughout the castle and the surrounding country, when a sound of delicate and exquisite music, which seemed to proceed from the rotunda snatched me from my revery. I raised my head and pushed back the candlestick, so that I could see to whom I was indebted for this serenade, but the four candles which lighted my writing-table thoroughly, were not sufficient for me to distinguish objects at the end of the hall even, still less the rotunda beyond.
I proceeded at once towards this rotunda and being no longer dazzled by another light, I could distinguish the upper portion of the beautiful group in the fountain, fully illuminated by the moon, whose rays penetrated the arched window of the cupola. The rest of the circular hall was in shadow. In order to assure myself that I was as much alone as I appeared to be, I drew back the bolt of the large glass door which opened on the parterre, and saw in fact that no one was there. The music had seemed to diminish and fade away in proportion to my approach, so that I now could scarcely hear it. I passed into the other gallery, and found it also deserted, but here the sounds which had so charmed me could once more be heard distinctly, and this time they seemed to proceed from the rear.