“That’s an infernal falsehood, Bob!” exclaimed Jack Rily, starting from his seat on the barrel, and vainly endeavouring to subdue the nervous excitement that had gained so rapidly upon him.
“It’s true—true as you’re there!” cried the murderer, who felt a ferocious joy at thus inspiring terror in the mind of the strong and hardened ruffian who had conquered him. “And I’ll tell you somethink more too,” continued Vitriol Bob: “you said just now—and you said truly also—that on the anniwersary of the murder the young lady wanders about the place, uttering holler moans. Well—this is the night, then, that she was murdered just twenty years ago;—and the clock has struck one!”
The effect which these words produced upon Jack Rily and Mrs. Mortimer was as rapid as it was extraordinary. Although they were both of a nature peculiarly inaccessible to superstitious terrors on common occasions, and under any other circumstances would have laughed at the idea of spectral visitations and ghostly wanderings,—yet now they vainly struggled against the powerful influence of increasing terror; and, although in their hearts, they more than half suspected that Vitriol Bob had spoken only to aggravate their alarms, yet they could not shake off the awe and consternation that seized upon their souls. In respect to Jack Rily, it was one of those periods of evanescent weakness which the most brutal and remorseless ruffians are known periodically to experience;—but, with regard to Mrs. Mortimer, it was the singularity of her present position—the consciousness that she was in a lonely place with two men of desperate character—the terrible remembrance that the murdered corse of her husband lay in the adjoining room—the impression made upon her mind by the appalling history of crime which had been to elaborately detailed to her—the thought that the very floors and the ceilings of the uppermost chambers in that house, bore testimony to the tale of blood—and the idea that the ghost of the assassinated lady was wont to wander in the depth of the night and on the scene of the crime,—it was all this that struck Mrs. Mortimer with awe and consternation, rendering her incapable of serious reflection, and levelling her strong mind as it were beneath the influence of superstitious terrors.
“Well—what the devil is the matter with you both?” demanded Vitriol Bob, after a pause.
“How do you mean?” asked Jack Rily, reseating himself, and grasping the brandy-bottle with a trembling hand.
“Why—you and the old lady looked at each other as if you already heard the light step and the rustling shroud of the apparition,” said the murderer.
“Hark! what was that?” ejaculated the Doctor, once more starting to his feet.
“It certainly was a noise somewhere,” observed Mrs. Mortimer, trembling from head to foot.
“Perhaps the old man in the back-kitchen has got up and is groping his way about,” said Vitriol Bob, speaking with an affectation of terror which was so natural that it cruelly enhanced the superstitious alarms experienced by his companions.
“This is intolerable!” exclaimed Rily, looking in a ghastly manner towards the door, as if he more than half expected to behold it suddenly thrown open, and some hideous form appear on the threshold. “I can’t make out what it is that has come over me to-night! ’Tis like a warning—and yet I never believed in ghosts until now.”