His feelings were, indeed, at the moment, wrought to a pitch of intensity. He felt that he could scarcely wait with patience for the coming of the body and the opening of the vault, so eager was he to descend.
"O Time," he said, as with folded arms, he stood gazing at the dark grating of the vault, "thy wings are of lightning in our pleasures; but thou creepest with feet of lead to the sorrowful and weary. And yet thou, who dost constantly move onwards, overcoming all things in thy flight, wilt at last conquer even death itself; thou, most subtle and insatiable of depredators, wilt at last take all."
A heavy rumbling sound interrupted the meditation of the mourner. It was the vehicle containing the body of the domestic from Clopton, and which, in its progress, had gathered up other bodies in the town on that night to be interred.
The ceremony was performed without the usual formalities, and in all haste. Walter drew aside as the buriers, preceded by the sexton, approached and opened the vault. They ignited their torches previous to descending the flight of steps, and when they did so a cry of horror and alarm proceeded from the sexton, who had first entered the vault, and he rushed out, whilst those who had followed seemed equally horror-stricken. They threw down the corpse, after a glance at the interior, and fled.
Walter, who had quietly followed, was struck with dread. He stopped, and taking up one of the torches, descended into the vault; when a dreadful sight presented itself,—a sight which, as long as memory held a seat in his brain, remained there.
The vault was situate deep below the surface. On hastening down the steps Walter held his torch on high, and when about half-way its rays fell upon a figure, which, like some sheeted ghost, leant against the damp walls.
Arderne was brave as the steel he wore, but at first he stopped and hesitated, whilst the door of the vault closing behind him added to the horror of the situation.
As he continued to regard this startling object, the light becoming more steady, he recognised the features of the figure.
"Oh!" he said, "do I behold aright, or do mine eyes play false?"
With horror in his features he approached nearer, and became confirmed in his first suspicion. It was Charlotte Clopton. She was dressed in her grave-clothes, as she had been consigned to the tomb. She appeared to have been but a short time dead, and in the agonies of despair, hunger, or, perhaps, madness, consequent upon the dreadful situation, she had bitten a large piece from her round white shoulder.