Carmilla - Joseph Sheridan le Fanu - Literary Tales Collection

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Prolog upon a paper attached to the narrative which follows.
Doctor Hessalius has written a rather elaborate note, which he
accompanies with a reference to his essay on the strange
subject which the manuscript illuminates. This mysterious subject he treats

(00:20):
in that essay with his usual learning and acumen, and
with remarkable directness and condensation. It will form but one
volume of the series of that extraordinary man's collected papers.
As I publish the case in this volume, simply to
interest the laity, I shall forestall the intelligent lady who

(00:43):
relates it in nothing. And after due consideration, I have
determined therefore to abstain from presenting any praisie of the
learned doctor's reasoning or extract from his statement on a
subject which he describes as involving not in probably some
of the profoundest arcana of our dual existence and its intermediates.

(01:08):
I was anxious, on discovering this paper, to reopen the
correspondence commenced by doctor Hessalius so many years before, with
a person so clever and careful as his informants. Seems
to have been. Much to my regret, However, I found
that she had died in the interval, She probably could

(01:28):
have added little to the narrative, which she communicates in
the following pages with so far as I can pronounce
such conscientious particularity. Chapter one an early fright in Styria. We,

(01:51):
though by no means magnificent people inhabit a castle or schloss.
A small income in that part of the world goes
a great way eight or nine hundred a year. Does
wonders scantily enough hours would have answered among wealthy people
at home. My father is English and I bear an

(02:12):
English name. Although I never saw England, but here, in
this lonely and primitive place, where everything is so marvelously cheap,
I really don't see. However, so much more money would
be at all materially adding to our comforts or even luxuries.
My father was in the Austrian service and retired upon

(02:35):
a pension and his patrimony, and purchased this feudal residence
and the small estate on which it stands a bargain.
Nothing can be more picturesque or solitary. It stands on
a slight eminence and a forest. The road, very old
and narrow, passes in front of its drawbridge. Never raised

(02:58):
in my time, and its moat stocked with perch and
sailed over by many swans, and floating on its surface
white fleets of water lilies. Over All this, the Schloss
shows its many windowed front, its towers, and its Gothic chapel.
The forest opens in an irregular and very picturesque glade

(03:22):
before its gate, and at the right a steep Gothic
bridge carries the road over a stream that winds in
deep shadow through the wood. I have said that this
is a very lonely place. Judge whether I say truth.
Looking from the hall door towards the road, the forest
in which our castle stands extends fifteen miles to the

(03:44):
right and twelve to the left. The nearest inhabited village
is about seven of your English miles to the left.
The nearest inhabited Schloss of any historic associations is that
of old General Spielsdorf, nearly twenty miles away to the right.
I have said the nearest inhabited village because there is

(04:09):
only three miles westward, that is to say, in the
direction of General Spielsdorf. Schloss, a ruined village with its
quaint little church, now roofless in the isle of which
are the moldering tombs of the proud family of Carnstein,
now extinct, who once owned the equally desolate chateau, which,

(04:30):
in the thick of the forest overlooks the silent ruins
of the town. Respecting the cause of the desertion of
this striking and melancholy spot, there is a legend which
I shall relate to you another time. I must tell

(04:51):
you now how very small is the party who constitute
the inhabitants of our castle. I don't include servants or
those pendants who occupy rooms in the buildings attached to
the Schloss. Listen and wonder my father, who was the
kindest man on earth, but growing old, and I at

(05:13):
the date of my story, only nineteen eight years have passed.
Since then, I and my father constituted the family at
the Schloss. My mother, a Styrian lady, died in my infancy,
but I had a good natured governess who had been
with me from I might almost say my infancy. I

(05:37):
could not remember the time when her fat, benignant face
was not a familiar picture in my memory. This was
Madame Perudon, a native of Berne, whose care and good nature,
now in part supplied to me the loss of my mother,
whom I do not even remember, so early I lost her.

(05:57):
She made a third at our little dinner party. There
was a fourth, Mademoiselle de la Fontaine, a lady such
as you term I believe, a finishing governess. She spoke
French and German. Madame pa rudent French and broken English,
to which my father and I added English, which, partly

(06:18):
to prevent its becoming a lost language among us, and
partly from patriotic motives, we spoke every day. The consequence
was a babbel at which strangers used to laugh, and
which I shall make no attempt to reproduce in this narrative.
And there were two or three young lady friends besides

(06:38):
pretty nearly of mine own age, who were occasional visitors
for longer or shorter terms, and these visits I sometimes returned.
These were our regular social resources. But of course there
were chance visits from neighbors of only five or six
leagues distance. My life was not with standing, rather a

(07:01):
solitary one. I can assure you. My gouvernant had just
so much control over me as you might conjecture such
sage persons would have in the case of a rather
spoiled girl whose only parent allowed her pretty nearly her
own way in everything. The first occurrence in my existence

(07:22):
which produced a terrible impression upon my mind, which in
fact never has been effaced, was one of the very
earliest incidents of my life which I can recollect. Some
people will think it so trifling that it should not
be recorded here. You will see, however, by and by
why I mention it. The nursery, as it was called,

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though I had it all to myself, was a large
room in the upper story of the castle, with a
steep oak roof. I can't have been more than six
years old when one night I awoke, and looking round
the room from my bed, failed to see the nursery maid.
Neither was my nurse there, and I thought myself alone.

(08:08):
I was not frightened, for I was one of those
happy children who are studiously kept in ignorance of ghost stories,
of fairy tales, and of all such lore as makes
us cover up our heads when the door cracks suddenly,
or the flicker of an expiring candle makes the shadow
of a bedpost dance upon the wall nearer to our faces.

(08:29):
I was vexed and insulted at finding myself as I
conceived neglected, and I began to whimper preparatory to a
hearty bout of roaring, when to my surprise, I saw
a solemn but very pretty face looking at me from
the side of the bed. It was that of a
young lady who was kneeling with her hands under the coverlet.

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I looked at her with a kind of pleased wonder
and ceased whimpering. She caressed me with her hands and
lay down beside me on the bed and drew me
towards her, smiling. I felt immediately delightfully soothed, and fell
asleep again. I was wakened by a sensation as if

(09:14):
two needles ran into my breast very deep at the
same moment, and I cried loudly. The lady started back
with her eyes fixed on me, and then slipped down
upon the floor, and, as I thought, hid herself under
the bed. I was, now for the first time frightened,

(09:34):
and I yelled with all my might, and main nurse,
nursery maid, housekeeper all came running in and, hearing my story,
they made light of it, soothing me all they could meanwhile,
but child as I was, I could perceive that their
faces were pale with an unwonted look of anxiety. And

(09:54):
I saw them look under the bed and about the room,
and peep under tables and pluck open cupboards. And the
housekeeper whispered to the nurse, lay your hand along that
hollow in the bed. Someone did lie there, so sure
as you did not. The place is still warm. I

(10:15):
remember the nursery maid petting me, and all three examining
my chest, where I told them I felt the puncture,
and pronouncing that there was no sign visible that any
such thing had happened to me. The housekeeper and the
two other servants who were in charge of the nursery
remained sitting up all night, and from that time a

(10:36):
servant always set up in the nursery until I was
about fourteen. I was very nervous for a long time.
After this, a doctor was called in. He was pallid
and elderly. How well I remember his long, saturnine face,
slightly pitted with smallpox, and his chestnut wig. For a

(10:58):
good while every day he came and gave me medicine,
which of course I hated. The morning after I saw
this apparition, I was in a state of terror and
could not bear to be left alone daylight. Though it
was for a moment, I remember my father coming up
and standing at the bedside and talking cheerfully, and asking

(11:21):
the nurse a number of questions, and laughing very heartily
at one of the answers, and patting me on the
shoulder and kissing me, and telling me not to be frightened,
that it was nothing but a dream and could not
hurt me. But I was not comforted, for I knew
the visit of the strange woman was not a dream,

(11:41):
and I was awfully frightened. I was a little consoled
by the nursery maids assuring me that it was she
who had come and looked at me and laying down
beside me in the bed, and that I must have
been half dreaming not to have known her face. But this,
though supported by the nurse, did not quite satisfy me.

(12:03):
I remembered in the course of that day a venerable
old man in a black cassock coming into the room
with the nurse and housekeeper, and talking a little to
them and very kindly to me. His face was very
sweet and gentle, and He told me they were going
to pray, and joined my hands together and desired me

(12:24):
to say softly while they were praying, Lord, hear all
good prayers for us, for Jesus sake. I think those
were the very words, for I often repeated them to myself,
and my nurse used for years to make me say
them in my prayers. I remembered so well the thoughtful,

(12:44):
sweet face of that white haired old man in his
black cassock, as he stood in that rude, lofty brown room,
with the clumsy furniture of a fashion three hundred years
old about him, and the scanty light entering its shadowy
atmosphere through the small lattice he kneeled, and the three
women with him, and he prayed aloud with an earnest,

(13:07):
quavering voice for what appeared to me a long time.
I forget all my life preceding that event, and for
some time after it is all obscure also. But the
scenes I have just described stand out vivid as the
isolated pictures of the phantasmagoria surrounded by darkness. End of

(13:34):
chapter one, Chapter two, a guest, I am now going
to tell you something so strange that it will require
all your faith in my veracity to believe my story.
It is not only true, nevertheless, but truth of which

(13:56):
I have been an eye witness. It was a sweet
summer evening, and my father asked me, as he sometimes did,
to take a little ramble with him along that beautiful
forest vista which I have mentioned as lying in front
of the Schloss General Spielsdorf. Cannot come to us so
soon as I had hoped, said my father, as we

(14:18):
pursued our walk. He was to have paid us a
visit of some weeks, and we had expected his arrival
next day. He was to have brought with him a
young lady, his niece and ward, Mademoiselle Reinefeldt, whom I
had never seen, but whom I had heard described as
a very charming girl, and in whose society I had

(14:39):
promised myself many happy days. I was more disappointed than
a young lady living in a town or a bustling
neighborhood can possibly imagine. This visit and the new acquaintance
it promised, had furnished my day dream for many weeks.
And how soon does he come, I asked? Not till autumn,

(15:03):
Not for two months, I dare say, he answered, and
I am very glad now, dear that you never knew
Mademoiselle Riinfeldt. And why, I asked, both mortified and curious,
because the poor young lady is dead, he replied, I
quite forgot. I had not told you, But you were
not in the room when I received the General's letter

(15:24):
this evening. I was very much shocked. General Spielsdorf had
mentioned in his first letter six or seven weeks before
that she was not so well as he would wish her.
But there was nothing to suggest the remotest suspicion of danger.
Here is the General's letter, he said, handing it to me.

(15:46):
I am afraid he is in great affliction. The letter
appears to me to have been written very nearly in distraction.
We sat down on a rude bench under a group
of magnificent lime trees. The sun was setting with all
its melancholy splendor behind the Sylvan horizon, and the stream

(16:06):
that flows beside our home and passes under the steep
old bridge I have mentioned, wound through many a group
of noble trees, almost at our feet, reflecting in its
current the fading crimson of the sky. General Spielsdorf's letter
was so extraordinary, so vehement, and in some places so

(16:27):
self contradictory, that I read it twice over, the second
time aloud to my father, and was still unable to
account for it, except by supposing that grief had unsettled
his mind. It said, I have lost my darling daughter,
for as such I loved her. During the last days

(16:50):
of dear Bertha's illness, I was not able to write
to you. Before then, I had no idea of her danger.
I have lost her, and now learn all too late.
She died in the peace of innocence and in the
glorious hope of a blessed futurity. The fiend who betrayed

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our infatuated hospitality has done it all. I thought I
was receiving into my house innocence, gaiety, a charming companion
for my lost Bertha. Heavens, what a fool have I been.
I thank God my child died without a suspicion of

(17:32):
the cause of her sufferings. She is gone without so
much as conjecturing the nature of her illness and the
accursed passion of the agent of all this misery. I
devote my remaining days to tracking and extinguishing a monster
I am told I may hope to accomplish my righteous
and merciful purpose. At present there is scarcely a gleam

(17:55):
of light to guide me. I curse my conceited incredulity,
my despicable affectation of superiority, my blindness, my obstinacy. All
too late, I cannot write or talk collectedly. Now I
am distracted. So soon as I shall have a little recovered,

(18:17):
I mean to devote myself for a time to enquiry,
which may possibly lead me as far as Vienna some
time in the autumn two months hence or earlier. If
I live, I will see you, that is, if you
permit me. I will then tell you all that I
scarce dare put upon paper. Now farewell, pray for me,

(18:42):
dear friend. In these terms ended this strange letter. Though
I had never seen Bertha reinfeldt my eyes filled with
tears at the sudden intelligence. I was startled, as well
as profoundly disappointed. The sun had now set, and it

(19:04):
was twilight by the time I had returned the General's
letter to my father. It was a soft, clear evening,
and we loitered, speculating upon the possible meanings of the
violent and incoherent sentences which I had just been reading.
We had nearly a mile to walk before reaching the
road that passes the Schloss in front, and by that

(19:27):
time the moon was shining brilliantly. At the drawbridge we
met Madame Perudon and Mademoiselle de la Fontaine, who had
come out without their bonnets to enjoy the exquisite moonlight.
We heard their voices gabbling in animated dialogue as we approached.
We joined them at the drawbridge and turned about to

(19:48):
admire with them the beautiful scene. The glade through which
we had just walked lay before us. At our left,
the narrow road wound away under clumps of lordly trees
and was lost to sight amid the thickening forest. At
the right, the same road crosses the steep and picturesque bridge,

(20:08):
near which stands a ruined tower which once guarded that pass.
And beyond the bridge, an abrupt eminence rises, covered with
trees and showing in the shadows some gray, ivy clustered rocks.
Over the sward and low grounds. A thin film of
mist was stealing like smoke, marking the distances with a

(20:29):
transparent veil. And here and there we could see the
river faintly flashing in the moonlight. No softer, sweeter scene
could be imagined. The news I had just heard made
it melancholy, but nothing could disturb its character of profound
serenity and the enchanted glory and vagueness of the prospect.

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My father, who enjoyed the picturesque, and I stood looking
in silence over the expanse beneath us. The two good governesses,
standing a little way behind us, discoursed upon the scene
and were eloquent upon the moon. Madame Peraudon was fat,
middle aged, and romantic, and talked and sighed poetically. Mademoiselle

(21:17):
de la Fontaine, in right of her father, who was
a German, assumed to be psychological, metaphysical, and something of
a mystic, now declared that when the moon shone with
the light so intense, it was well known that it
indicated a special spiritual activity. The effect of the full
moon in such a state of brilliancy was manifold. It

(21:39):
acted on dreams, it acted on lunacy, It acted on
nervous people. It had marvelous physical influences connected with life.
Mademoiselle related that her cousin who was mate of a
merchant ship, having taken a nap on deck on such
a night, lying on his back with his face full
in the light of the moon, had wakened after a

(22:02):
dream of an old woman clawing him by the cheek,
with his features horribly drawn to one side, and his
countenance had never quite recovered his equilibrium. The moon this night,
she said, is full of idyllic and magnetic influence. And
see when you look behind you at the front of

(22:23):
the schloss, how all its windows flash and twinkle with
that silvery splendor, as if unseen hands had lighted up
the rooms to receive fairy guests. There are indolent styles
of the spirits, in which, indisposed to talk ourselves, the
talk of others is pleasant to our listless ears. And

(22:45):
I gazed on, pleased with the tinkle of the ladies conversation.
I have got into one of my moping moods to night,
said my father, after a silence, and quoting Shakespeare, whom
by way of keeping up our English, he used to
read aloud, he said, in truth, I know not why

(23:05):
I am so sad. It wearies me, you say it
wearies you, But how I got it came by it.
I forget the rest, but I feel as if some
great misfortune were hanging over us. I suppose the poor
general's afflicted letter has had something to do with it.

(23:27):
At this moment, the unwonted sound of carriage wheels and
many hoofs upon the road arrested our attention. They seemed
to be approaching from the high ground overlooking the bridge,
and very soon the equipage emerged. From that point. Two
horsemen first crossed the bridge. Then came a carriage drawn
by four horses, and two men rode behind. It seemed

(23:52):
to be the traveling carriage of a person of rank,
and we were all immediately absorbed in watching that very
unusual spectacle. It became in a few moments greatly more interesting,
for just as the carriage had passed the summit of
the steep bridge, one of the leaders, taking fright, communicated
his panic to the rest, and after a plunge or two,

(24:14):
the whole team broke into a wild gallop together, and
dashing between the horsemen who rode in front, came thundering
along the road towards us with the speed of a hurricane.
The excitement of the scene was made more painful by
the clear, long drawn screams of a female voice from
the carriage window. We all advanced in curiosity and horror,

(24:39):
me rather in silence. The rest with various ejaculations of terror.
Our suspense did not last long. Just before you reached
the castle drawbridge on the route they were coming, there
stands by the roadside a magnificent lime tree. On the
other stands an ancient stone cross, at sight of which
the the horses, now going at a pace that was

(25:02):
perfectly frightful, swerved so as to bring the wheel over
the projecting roots of the tree. I knew what was coming.
I covered my eyes, unable to see it out, and
turned my head away. At the same moment I heard
a cry from my lady friend's, who had gone on.
A little curiosity opened my eyes, and I saw a

(25:25):
scene of utter confusion. Two of the horses were on
the ground, the carriage lay upon its side, with two
wheels in the air. The men were busy removing the traces,
and a lady with a commanding air and figure had
gotten out and stood with clasped hands, raising the handkerchief
that was in them every now and then to her
eyes through the carriage door was now lifted a young

(25:48):
lady who appeared to be lifeless. My dear old father
was already beside the elder lady, with his hat in
his hand, evidently tendering his aid and the resources of
his shit loss. The lady did not appear to hear
him or to have eyes for anything, but the slender girl,
who was being placed against the slope of the bank

(26:14):
I approached. The young lady was apparently stunned, but she
was certainly not dead. My father, who piqued himself on
being something of a physician, had just had his fingers
on her wrist and assured the lady, who declared herself
her mother, that her pulse, though faint and irregular, was
undoubtedly still distinguishable. The lady clasped her hands and looked upward,

(26:38):
as if in a momentary transport of gratitude, but immediately
she broke out again in that theatrical way which is
I believe natural to some people. She was what is
called a fine looking woman for her time of life,
and must have been handsome. She was tall, but not thin,
and dressed in black velvet, and looked rather pale, but

(26:59):
with a proud and commanding countenance, though now agitated strangely,
who was ever being so born to calamity? I heard
her say with clasped hands as I came up here.
Am I on a journey of life and death in
prosecuting which to lose an hour is possibly to lose all.

(27:21):
My child will not have recovered sufficiently to resume her route.
For who can say how long I must leave her?
I cannot dare not delay? How far on, sir, can
you tell as the nearest village? I must leave her
there and shall not see my darling or even hear
of her till my return three months? Hence, I plucked

(27:43):
my father by the coat and whispered earnestly in his ear, Oh, Papa,
pray ask her to let her stay with us. It
would be so delightful. Do pray if Madame will entrust
her child to the care of my daughter and of
her good gouvernant Madame Peraudon, and permit her to remain

(28:04):
as our guest under my charge until her return. It
will confer a distinction and an obligation upon us, and
we shall treat her with all the care and devotion
which so sacred a trust deserves. I cannot do that, sir.
It would be to task your kindness and chivalry too cruelly,

(28:25):
said the lady distractedly. It would, on the contrary, be
to confer on us a very great kindness at the
moment when we most need it. My daughter has just
been disappointed by a cruel misfortune in a visit from
which she had long anticipated a great deal of happiness.
If you confide this young lady to our care, it

(28:47):
will be her best consolation. The nearest village on your
route is distant and affords no such inn as you
could think of placing your daughter at. You cannot allow
her to continue her journey for any considerable distance without danger. If,
as you say, you cannot suspend your journey, you must
part with her to night, And know where could you
do so with more honest assurances of care and tenderness

(29:11):
than here. There was something in this lady's air and appearance,
so distinguished and even imposing, and in her manner so engaging,
as to impress one quite apart from the dignity of
her equipage, with a conviction that she was a person
of consequence. By this time, the carriage was replaced in

(29:33):
its upright position, and the horses quite tractable in the traces. Again,
the lady threw on her daughter a glance which I
fancied was not quite so affectionate as one might have
anticipated from the beginning of the scene. And then she
beckoned slightly to my father, and withdrew two or three
steps with him out of hearing, and talked to him

(29:54):
with a fixed and stern countenance, not at all like
that with which she had hitherto sp I was filled
with wonder that my father did not seem to perceive
the change, and also unspeakably curious to learn what it
could be that she was speaking almost in his ear
with so much earnestness and rapidity. Two or three minutes

(30:17):
at most I think she remained thus employed. Then she turned,
and a few steps brought her to where her daughter lay,
supported by Madame Perudant. She kneeled beside her for a
moment and whispered, as Madame supposed a little benediction in
her ear. Then, hastily kissing her, she stepped into her carriage.
The door was closed. The footmen in stately liveries jumped

(30:40):
up behind the outriders spurred on the postitions cracked their whips,
the horses plunged and broke suddenly into a furious canter
that threatened soon again to become a gallop, and the
carriage whirled away, followed at the same rapid pace by
the two horsemen. In the rear end of chapter two

(31:04):
Chapter three we compare notes. We followed the cortege with
our eyes until it was swiftly lost to sight in
the misty wood, and the very sound of the hoofs
and the wheels died away in the silent night air.
Nothing remained to assure us that the adventure had not
been an illusion of a moment. But the young lady,

(31:26):
who just at that moment opened her eyes. I could
not see, for her face was turned from me, but
she raised her head, evidently looking about her, and I
heard a very sweet voice ask, complainingly, where is mamma
our good Madame Peraudon answered tenderly and added some comfortable assurances.

(31:48):
I then heard her ask where am I? What is
this place? And after that she said I don't see
the carriage, and motzka, where is she? Madame answered all
her questions in so far as she understood them, and
gradually The young lady remembered how the misadventure came about,

(32:11):
and was glad to hear that no one in or
in attendance on the carriage was hurt, And on learning
that her Mamma had left her here till her return
in about three months, she wept. I was going to
add my consolations to those of Madame Pruden, when Mademoiselle
de la Fontaine placed her hand upon my arm, saying,
don't approach. One at a time is as much as

(32:34):
she can at present converse with a very little excitement
would possibly overpower her. Now, as soon as she is
comfortably in bed, I thought, I will run up to
her room and see her. My father, in the meantime
had sent a servant on horseback for the physician, who
lived about two leagues away, and a bedroom was being

(32:54):
prepared for the young lady's reception. The stranger now rose, and,
leading on Madame's arm, walked slowly over the drawbridge and
into the castle gate. In the hall, servants waited to
receive her, and she was conducted forthwith to her room.
The room we usually sat in as our drawing room,

(33:15):
is long, having four windows that looked over the moat
and the drawbridge upon the forest scene I have just described.
It is furnished in old carved oak, with large carved cabinets,
and the chairs are cushioned with crimson utrect velvet. The
walls are covered with tapestry and surrounded with great gold frames,

(33:36):
the figures being as large as life in ancient and
very curious costume, and the subjects represented are hunting, hawking,
and generally festive. It is not too stately to be
extremely comfortable. And here we had our tea for with
his usual patriotic leanings, he insisted that the National Beverage
should make its appearance regularly. With our coffee and chocolate.

(34:00):
We sat here this night, and with candles lighted, were
talking over the adventure of the evening. Madame Perudon and
Mademoiselle de la Fontaine were both part of our party.
The young stranger had hardly lain down in her bed
when she sank into a deep sleep, and those ladies
had left her in the care of a servant. How

(34:20):
do you like, our guest, I asked, as soon as
Madame entered. Tell me all about her. I like her extremely,
answered Madame. She is I almost think the prettiest creature
I ever saw about your age, and so gentle and nice.
She is absolutely beautiful, through in Mademoiselle, who had peeped

(34:42):
for a moment into the stranger's room, and such a
sweet voice, added Madame prudent. Did you remark a woman
in the carriage after it was set up again who
did not get out, inquired Mademoiselle, but only looked from
the window. No, we had not seen her. Then she
described a hideous black woman with a sort of colored

(35:05):
turban on her head, and who was gazing all the
time from the carriage window, nodding and grinning derisively toward
the ladies, with gleaming eyes and large white eyeballs, and
her teeth set as if in fury. Did you remark
what an ill looking pack of men the servants were,
asked Madame, Yes, said my father, who had just come in.

(35:26):
Ugly hang dog looking fellows as ever I beheld in
my life. I hope they mayn't rob the poor lady
in the forest. They are clever rogues. However, they got
everything to rights in a minute. I dare say they
are worn out with too long traveling, said Madame. Besides
looking wicked their faces were so strangely lean and dark

(35:49):
and sullen. I am very curious, I own, but I
dare say the young lady will tell you all about
it tomorrow, if she is sufficiently recovered. I don't think
she will, said my father, with a mysterious smile and
a little nod of his head, as if he knew
more about it than he cared to tell us. This
made us all the more inquisitive as to what had

(36:11):
passed between him and the lady in black velvet in
the brief but earnest interview that had immediately preceded her departure.
We were scarcely alone when I entreated him to tell me.
He did not need much pressing. There is no particular
reason why I should not tell you. She expressed a
reluctance to trouble us with the care of her daughter,

(36:32):
saying she was in delicate health and nervous, but not
subject to any kind of seizure. She volunteered that, nor
to any allusion, being in fact perfectly sane. How very
odd to say all that I interpolated. It was so
unnecessary at all events, it was said, he laughed. And

(36:55):
as you wish to know all that passed, which was
very little. Indeed, I tell you. She then said, I
am making a long journey of vital importance. She emphasized
the word rapid and secret. I shall return for my
child in three months. In the meantime, she will be
silent as to who we are, whence we come, and

(37:16):
whither we are traveling. That is all she said. She
spoke very pure French. When she said the word secret.
She paused for a few seconds, looking sternly, her eyes
fixed on mine. I fancy she makes a great point
of that. You saw how quickly she was gone. I

(37:38):
hope I have not done a very foolish thing in
taking charge of the young lady. For my part, I
was delighted. I was longing to see and talk to her,
and only waiting till the doctor should give me leave. You,
who live in towns, can have no idea how great
an event the introduction of a new friend is. In

(38:00):
such a solitude as surrounded us. The doctor did not
arrive till nearly one o'clock. But I could no more
have gone to my bed and slept than I could
have overtaken on foot the carriage in which the Princess
in Black velvet had driven away. When the physician came
down to the drawing room, it was to report very
favorably upon his patient. She was now sitting up, her

(38:23):
pulse quite regular, apparently perfectly well. She had sustained no injury,
and the little shock to her nerves had passed away
quite harmlessly. There could be no harm, certainly in my
seeing her, if we both wished it. And with this permission,
I sent forthwith to know whether she would allow me
to visit her for a few minutes in her room.

(38:45):
The servant returned immediately to say that she desired nothing more.
You may be sure I was not long in availing
myself of this permission. Our visitor lay in one of
the handsomest rooms in the Schloss. It was for half
a little stately. There was a somber piece of tapestry
opposite the bed, representing Cleopatra with the asps to her bosom,

(39:09):
and other solemn classic scenes were displayed a little faded
upon the other walls. But there was gold carving and
rich and varied color enough in the other decorations of
the room to more than redeem the gloom of the
old tapestry. There were candles at the bedside. She was
sitting up, her slender, pretty figure, enveloped in the soft

(39:31):
silk dressing gown embroidered with flowers and lined with thick
quilted silk, which her mother had thrown over her feet
as she lay on the ground. What was it that,
as I reached the bedside and had just begun my
little greeting, struck me dumb in a moment, and made
me recoil a step or two from before her. I

(39:53):
will tell you I saw the very face which had
visited me in my childhood at night, and which remained
so fixed in my memory, and on which I had,
for so many years, so often ruminated with horror when
no one suspected of what I was thinking. It was pretty,

(40:14):
even beautiful, And when I first beheld it wore the
same melancholy expression, but this almost instantly lighted into a strange,
fixed smile of recognition. There was a silence of fully
a minute, and then at length she spoke. I could

(40:35):
not how wonderful, she exclaimed, twelve years ago, I saw
your face in a dream, and it has haunted me
ever since. Wonderful, indeed, I repeated, overcoming with an effort
the horror that had for a time suspended my utterances

(40:57):
twelve years ago, in vision or a reality, I certainly
saw you. I could not forget your face. It has
remained before my eyes of her since her smile had softened.
Whatever I had fancied strange in it was gone, and
it and her dimpling cheeks were now delightfully pretty and intelligent.

(41:18):
I felt reassured, and continued more in the vain which
hospitality indicated, to bid her welcome, and to tell her
how much pleasure her accidental arrival had given us all,
and especially what a happiness it was to me. I
took her hand as I spoke. I was a little shy,
as lonely people are, but the situation made me eloquent

(41:39):
and even bold. She pressed my hand, she laid hers
upon it, and her eyes glowed as looking hastily into mine,
she smiled again and blushed. She answered my welcome very prettily.
I sat down beside her, still wondering, and she said,
I must tell you you my vision about you. It

(42:02):
is so very strange that you and I should have
had each of the other, so vivid a dream, that
each should have seen I you and you me looking
as we do now, when, of course we were both
mere children. I was a child about six years old,
and I awoke from a confused and troubled dream, and

(42:25):
found myself in a room unlike my nursery, wainscudded clumsily
in some dark wood, and with cupboards and bedsteads and
chairs and benches placed about it. The beds were, I thought,
all empty, and the room itself without any one but
myself in it. And I, after looking about me for
some time, and admiring especially an iron candlestick with two branches,

(42:50):
which I should certainly know again, crept under one of
the beds to reach the window. But as I got
from under the bed, I heard some one cry, and
looking up, while I was still upon my knees, I
saw you, most assuredly, you as I see you now,

(43:11):
a beautiful young lady with golden hair and large blue
eyes and lips, your lips, you as you are here.
Your looks won me. I climbed on the bed and
put my arms about you, and I think we both
fell asleep. I was aroused by a scream. You were

(43:32):
sitting up screaming. I was frightened and slipped down upon
the ground and it seemed to me lost consciousness for
a moment, and when I came to myself, I was
again in my nursery at home. Your face I have
never forgotten, since I could not be misled by the
mere resemblance you are the lady whom I saw. Then

(43:58):
it was now my turn to relate my core responding vision,
which I did to the undisguised wonder of my new acquaintance.
I don't know which should be most afraid of the other,
she said, again, smiling. If you were less pretty, I
think I should be very much afraid of you. But
being as you are, and you and I both so young,

(44:20):
I feel only that I have made your acquaintance twelve
years ago, and have already a right to your intimacy
at all events. It does seem as if we were
destined from our earliest childhood to be friends. I wonder
whether you feel as strangely drawn towards me as I
do to you. I have never had a friend. Shall

(44:44):
I find one? Now? She sighed, and her fine dark
eyes gazed passionately on me. Now the truth is, I
felt rather unaccountably towards the beautiful stranger. I did feel,
as she said, drawn towards her. But there was also

(45:05):
something of repulsion in this ambiguous feeling. However, the sense
of attraction immensely prevailed. She interested and won me. She
was so beautiful and so indescribably engaging. I perceived now
something of languor and exhaustion stealing over her, and hastened

(45:27):
to bid her good night. The doctor thinks, I added
that you ought to have a maid sit up with
you tonight. One of ours is waiting, and you will
find her a very useful and quiet creature. How kind
of you. But I could not sleep. I never could
with an attendant in the room. I shan't require any assistance,

(45:49):
and shall I confess my weakness. I am haunted with
a terror of robbers. Our house was robbed once and
two servants murdered. So I always lock my door. It
has become a habit. And you look so kind. I
know you will forgive me. I see there is a
key in the lock. She held me close in her

(46:12):
pretty arms for a moment and whispered in my ear,
good night, darling. It is very hard to part with you,
but good night tomorrow, but not early. I shall see
you again. She sank back on the pillow with a sigh,
and her fine eyes followed me with a fond and

(46:34):
melancholy gaze, and she murmured again, good night, dear friend.
Young people like and even love on impulse. I was
flattered by the evident, though as yet undeserved fondness she
showed me. I liked the confidence with which she at
once received me. She was determined that we should be

(46:56):
very near friends. Next day came and we met again.
I was delighted with my companion, that is to say,
in many respects. Her looks lost nothing in daylight. She
was most certainly the most beautiful creature I had ever seen,
and the unpleasant remembrance of the face presented in my

(47:17):
early dream had lost the effect of the first unexpected recognition.
She confessed that she had experienced a similar shock on
seeing me, and precisely the same faint antipathy that had
mingled with my admiration of her. We now laughed together
over our momentary horrors. End of Chapter three, Chapter four,

(47:44):
Her Habits a saunter. I told you that I was
charmed with her in most particulars. There were some that
did not please me so well. She was above the
middle height of women. I shall begin by describing her.
She was slender and wonderfully graceful, except that her movements

(48:07):
were languid, very languid. Indeed, there was nothing in her
appearance to indicate an invalid. Her complexion was rich and brilliant.
Her features were small and beautifully formed, her eyes large,
dark and lustrous. Her hair was quite wonderful. I never
saw hair so magnificently thick and long. When it was
down about her shoulders, I have often placed my hands

(48:30):
under it and laughed with wonder at its weight. It
was exquisitely fine and soft, and in color a rich,
very dark brown, with something of gold. I loved to
let it down, tumbling with its own weight. As in
her room, she lay back in her chair, talking in
her sweet low voice. I used to fold and braid it,

(48:50):
and spread it out in play with it. Heavens, if
I had but known all I said, there were particulars
which did not please please me. I have told you
that her confidence won me the first night I saw her.
But I found that she exercised with respect to herself,
her mother, her history, everything in fact connected with her life,

(49:12):
plans and people. An ever wakeful reserve. I dare say
I was unreasonable. Perhaps I was wrong. I dare say
I ought to have respected this solemn injunction laid upon
my father by the stately lady in black velvet. But
curiosity is a restless and unscrupulous passion, and no one

(49:33):
girl can endure with patience that her should be baffled
by another. What harm could it do any one to
tell me what I so ardently desired to know? Had
she no trust in my good sense or honor? Why
would she not believe me when I assured her so
solemnly that I would not divulge one syllable of what
she told me to any mortal breathing. There was a coldness,

(49:58):
it seemed to me beyond her years, in her smiling,
melancholy persistent refusal to afford me the least ray of light.
I cannot say we quarreled upon this point, for she
would not quarrel upon any It was, of course very
unfair of me to press her very ill bred, but

(50:18):
really I could not help it, and I might just
as well have let it alone. What she did tell
me amounted, in my unconscionable estimation, to nothing. It was
all summed up in three very vague disclosures. First, her
name was Carmila. Second, her family was very ancient and noble. Third,

(50:44):
her home lay in the direction of the west. She
would not tell me the name of her family, nor
there armorial bearings, nor the name of their estate, nor
even that of the country they lived in. You are
not to suppose that I worry her incessantly on these subjects.
I watched opportunity, and rather insinuated than urged my inquiries.

(51:07):
Once or twice. Indeed, I did attack her more directly,
but no matter what my tactics, utter failure was invariably
the result. Reproaches and caresses were all lost upon her.
But I must add this that her evasion was conducted
with so pretty a melancholy and deprecation, with so many

(51:27):
and even passionate declarations of her liking for me and
trust in my honor, and with so many promises that
I should at last know all that I could not
find it in my heart long to be offended with her.
She used to place her pretty arms around my neck,
draw me to her, and laying her cheek to mine,
murmur with her lips near my ear. Dearest, your little

(51:52):
heart is wounded, Think me not cruel because I obey
the irresistible law of my strength and weakness. If your
dear heart is wounded, my wild heart bleeds with yours.
In the rapture of my enormous humiliation. I live in
your warm life, and you shall die, Die sweetly, die

(52:17):
into mine. I cannot help it. As I draw near
to you, you, in your turn, will draw near to
others and learn the rapture of that cruelty which yet
is love. So for a while, seek to know no
more of me and mine, but trust me with all

(52:38):
your loving spirit. And when she had spoken such a rhapsody,
she would press me more closely in her trembling embrace,
and her lips in soft kisses, gently glow upon my cheek.
Her agitations and her language were unintelligible to me. From

(52:58):
these foolish embraces, which were not of very frequent occurrence,
I must allow, I used to wish to extricate myself,
but my energies seemed to fail me. Her murmured words
sounded like a lullaby in my ear, and soothed my
resistance into a trance from which I only seemed to

(53:18):
recover myself. When she withdrew her arms in these mysterious moods,
I did not like her. I experienced a strange, tumultuous
excitement that was pleasurable ever and anon mingled with a
vague sense of fear and distrust. I had no distinct
thoughts about her while such scenes lasted, But I was

(53:41):
conscious of a love growing into adoration, and also of abhorrence. This,
I know is paradox, but I can make no other
attempt to explain the feeling. I now write, after an
interval of more than ten years, with a trembling head,
and with a confused and horrible recollection of certain occurrences

(54:04):
and situations in the ordeal through which I was unconsciously passing,
though with a very vivid and sharp remembrance of the
main current of my story. But I suspect in all
lives there are certain emotional scenes, those in which our
passions have been most wildly and terribly roused, that are,

(54:24):
of all others, the most vaguely and dimly remembered. Sometimes,
after an hour of apathy, my strange and beautiful companion
would take my hand and hold it with a fond pressure,
renewed again and again, blushing softly, gazing in my face
with languid and burning eyes, and breathing so fast that

(54:45):
her dress rose and fell with the tumultuous respiration. It
was like the ardor of a lover. It embarrassed me.
It was hateful and yet overpowering, And with gloating eyes,
she drew me to her, and her hot lips traveled
along my cheek and kisses, and she would whisper, almost
in sobs. You are mine, you shall be mine. You

(55:10):
and I are one forever. Then she had thrown herself
back in her chair, with her small hands over her eyes,
leaving me trembling. Are we related? I used to ask,
what can you mean by all this? I remind you,
perhaps of someone whom you love, but you must not.

(55:32):
I hate it. I don't know you. I don't know
myself when you look so and talk. So she used
to sigh at my vehemence, then turn away and drop
my hand. Respecting these very extraordinary manifestations, I strove in
vain to form any satisfactory theory. I could not refer

(55:55):
them to affectation or trick. It was unmistakably the momentary
breaking out of suppressed instinct. And emotion. Was she, notwithstanding
her mother's volunteered denial, subject to brief visitations of insanity?
Or was there here a disguise and a romance? I
had read in old story books of such things. What

(56:17):
if a boyish lover had found his way into the
house and sought to prosecute his suit and masquerade with
the assistance of a clever old adventuress. But there were
many things against this hypothesis. Highly interesting as it was
to my vanity, I could boast of no little attentions,
such as masculine gallantry delights to offer. Between these passionate moments,

(56:40):
there were long intervals of commonplace, of gaiety, of brooding melancholy,
during which, except that I detected her eyes so full
of melancholy fire following me, at times, I might have
been as nothing to her. Except in these brief periods
of mysterious excitement. Her ways were girlish, and there there
was always a languor about her, quite incompatible with a

(57:03):
masculine system in a state of health. In some respects
her habits were odd, perhaps not so singular in the
opinion of a town lady like you, as they appeared
to us rustic people. She used to come down very late,
generally not till one o'clock. She would then take a
cup of chocolate, but eat nothing. We then went out

(57:24):
for a walk, which was a mere saunter, and she
seemed almost immediately exhausted, and either returned to the schloss
or sat on one of the benches that were placed
here and there among the trees. This was a bodily
languor in which her mind did not sympathize. She was
always an animated talker and very intelligent. She sometimes alluded

(57:46):
for a moment to her own home, or mentioned an
adventure or situation, or an early recollection which indicated a
people of strange manners, and described customs of which we
knew nothing. I gathered from these chance hints at her
native country was much more remote than I had at
first fancied. As we sat thus one afternoon under the trees,

(58:07):
a funeral passed us by. It was that of a
pretty young girl whom I had often seen, the daughter
of one of the rangers of the forest. The poor
man was walking behind the coffin of his darling. She
was his only child, and he looked quite heart broken.
Peasants walking two and two came behind. They were singing

(58:28):
a funeral hymn. I rose to mark my respect as
they passed and joined in the hymn. They were very
sweetly singing. My companion shook me a little roughly, and
I turned surprised. She said, brusquely. Don't you perceive how
discordant that is? I think it very sweet. On the contrary,

(58:50):
I answered, vexed at the interruption, and very uncomfortable lest
the people who composed the little procession should observe and
resent what was passing. I I resumed therefore instantly, and
was again interrupted. You pierce my ears, said Carmilla, almost angrily,
and stopping her ears with her tiny fingers. Besides, how

(59:11):
can you tell that your religion and mine are the same.
Your forms wound me, and I hate funerals. What a fuss?
Why you must die? Every one must die, and all
are happier when they do come home. My father has
gone on with the clergyman to the churchyard. I thought

(59:32):
you knew she was to be buried to day. She
I don't trouble my head about peasants. I don't know
who she is, answered Carmilla, with a flash from her
fine eyes. She is the poor girl who fancied she
saw a ghost a fortnight ago, and has been dying
ever since till yesterday when she expired. Tell me nothing

(59:55):
about ghosts. I sha'n't sleep to night if you do.
I hope there is no plague or fever coming. All
this looks very like it, I continued. The Swineherd's young
wife died only a week ago, and she thought something
seized her by the throat as she lay in her
bed and nearly strangled her. Papa says, some horrible fancies

(01:00:17):
do accompany some forms of fever. She was quite well
the day before, she sank afterwards and died before a
week well. Her funeral is over. I hope and her
hymn sung, and our ears shan't be tortured with that
discord and jargon. It has made me nervous. Sit down

(01:00:39):
here beside me, Sit close, hold my hand. Press it hard, hard, harder.
We had moved a little back and had come to
another seat. She sat down. Her face underwent a change,
then alarmed and even terrified me. For a moment, it

(01:01:00):
darkened and became horribly livid. Her teeth and hands were clenched,
and she frowned and compressed her lips, while she stared
down upon the ground at her feet and trembled all
over with a continued shudder as irrepressible as ag you.
All her energy seemed strained to suppress a fit with
which she was then breathlessly tugging, And at length a low,

(01:01:22):
convulsive cry of suffering broke from her, and gradually the
hysteria subsided. There that comes of strangling people with hymns.
She said, at last, hold me, hold me still. It
is passing away, And so gradually it did, and perhaps

(01:01:44):
to dissipate the somber impression which the spectacle had left
upon me, she became unusually animated and shatty, And so
we got home. This was the first time I had
seen her exhibit any definable symptoms of that delicacy of
health which her mother had spoken of. It was the
first time, also I had seen her exhibit anything like temper.

(01:02:07):
Both passed away like a summer cloud, and never but
once afterwards did I witness on her part a momentary
sign of anger. I will tell you how it happened.
She and I were looking out of one of the
long drawing room windows. When there entered the courtyard over
the drawbridge the figure of a wanderer, whom I knew
very well. He used to visit the Schloss generally twice

(01:02:28):
a year. It was the figure of a hunchback with
the sharp, lean features that generally accompanied deformity. He wore
a pointed black beard, and he was smiling from ear
to ear, showing his white fangs. He was dressed in buff,
black and scarlet, and crossed with more straps and belts
than I could count, from which hung all manner of things. Behind.

(01:02:51):
He carried a magic lantern and two boxes, which I
well knew in, one of which was a salamander, and
the other a mandrake. These monsters used to make my
father laugh. They were compounded of parts of monkeys, parrots, squirrels,
fish and hedgehogs, dried and stitched together with great neatness
and startling effect. He had a fiddle, a box of

(01:03:14):
conjuring apparatus, a pair of foils and masks attached to
his belt, several other mysterious cases dangling about him, and
a black staff with copper ferules in his hand. His
companion was a rough spare dog. That followed at his heels,
but stopped short suspiciously at the drawbridge, and in a

(01:03:34):
little while began to howl dismally. In the meantime, the Mountebank,
standing in the midst of the courtyard, raised his grotesque
hat and made us a very ceremonious bow, paying his
compliments very volubly, inexecrable French and German, not much better. Then,

(01:03:56):
disengaging his fiddle, he began to scrape a lively air,
to which he sang with a merry discord, dancing with
ludicrous airs and activity that made me laugh in spite
of the dog's howling. Then he advanced to the window,
with many smiles and salutations, and his hat in his
left hand, his fiddle under his arm, and with a
fluency that never took breath, he gabbled a long advertisement

(01:04:19):
of all his accomplishments, and the resources of the various
arts which he placed at our service, and the curiosities
and entertainments which it was in his power at our
bidding to display. Will your ladyships be pleased to buy
an amulet against the oupire, which is going like the
wolf I hear through these woods, he said, dropping his

(01:04:41):
hat on the pavement. They are dying of it right
and left. And here is a charm that never fails,
only pinned to the pillow, and you may laugh in
his face. These charms consisted of oblong slips of vellum
with cabalistic ciphers and diagrams upon them. Carmilla instantly purchased one,

(01:05:02):
and so did I. He was looking up, and we
were smiling down upon him, amused. At least I can
answer for myself. His piercing black eye, as he looked
up in our faces, seemed to detect something that fixed
for a moment his curiosity. In an instant, he unrolled
a leather case full of all manner of odd little

(01:05:22):
steel instruments. See here, my lady, he said, displaying and
addressing me, I profess, among other things less useful, the
aught of dentistry, plague, take the dog, he interpolated. Silence, beast,
he howled, so that your ladyships can scarcely hear a word,

(01:05:44):
Your noble friend, the young lady at your right has
the sharpest tooth, long, thin, pointed like an awl, like
a needle. With my shop and long sight, as I
look up, I have seen it distinctly. Now. If it
happens to hurt the young lady, and I think it

(01:06:05):
must here am I? Here are my file, my punch,
my nippers, I will make it round and blunt. If
her ladyship pleases no longer the tooth of a fish,
but of a beautiful young lady as she is, Hey
is the young lady displeased? Have I been too bold?

(01:06:26):
Have I offended her? The young lady indeed looked very
angry as she drew back from the window. How dare
that mountebank insult us? So? Where is your father? I
shall demand redress from him? My father would have had
the wretch tied up to the pump and flogged with
a cart whip and burnt to the bones with the

(01:06:47):
cattle brand. She retired from the window a step or
two and sat down, and had hardly lost sight of
the offender when her wrath subsided as suddenly as it
had risen, and she gradually recovered her usual tone and
seemed to forget the little hunchback and his follies. My

(01:07:07):
father was out of spirits that evening. On coming in,
he told us that there had been another case very
similar to the two fatal ones which had lately occurred.
The sister of a young peasant on his estate only
a mile away, was very ill, had been, as she
described it, attacked very nearly in the same way, and

(01:07:28):
was now slowly but steadily sinking. All this, said my father,
is strictly referable to natural causes. These poor people infect
one another with their superstitions, and so repeat in imagination
the images of terror that have infested their neighbors. But
that very circumstance frightens one horribly, said Carmeila, how so,

(01:07:53):
inquired my father. I am so afraid of fancying I
see such things I think would be as bad as reality.
We are in God's hands. Nothing can happen without his permission,
and all will end well for those who love him.
He is our faithful creator. He has made us all
and will take care of us. Creator Nature, said the

(01:08:19):
young lady in answer to my gentle father. And this
disease that invades the country is natural nature. All things
proceed from nature, don't they? All things in the heaven,
in the earth and under the earth, act and live
as nature ordains. I think so. The doctor said he

(01:08:46):
would come here to day, said my father. After a silence.
I want to know what he thinks about it, and
what he thinks we had better do. Doctors never did
me any good, said Carmela. Then you have been ill,
I asked, more ill than ever you were? She answered,

(01:09:06):
long ago. Yes, a long time I suffered from this
very illness. But I forget all but my pain and weakness,
and they were not so bad as are suffered in
other diseases. You were very young, then, I dare say,

(01:09:27):
let us talk no more of it. You would not
wound a friend. She looked languidly in my eyes, and
passed her arm round my waist lovingly, and led me
out of the room. My father was busy over some
papers near the window. Why does your papa like to
frighten us, said the pretty girl, with a sigh in

(01:09:48):
a little shudder. He doesn't, dear Carmela. It is the
very furthest thing from his mind. Are you afraid, dearest?
I should be very much if I fancied there any
real danger of my being attacked as those poor people were.
You are afraid to die? Yes, everyone is, but to

(01:10:11):
die as lovers may to die together so that they
may live together. Girls are caterpillars. While they live in
the world, to be finally butterflies when the summer comes.
But in the meantime there are grubs and larvae, don't

(01:10:32):
you see, each with their peculiar propensities, necessities and structure,
So says Monsieur Beauffont in his big book. In the
next room, later in the day, the doctor came and
was closeted with Papa for some time. He was a
skillful man of sixty and upwards. He wore powder and

(01:10:54):
shaved his pale face as smooth as a pumpkin. He
and Papa emerged from the room together, and I heard
Papa laugh and say as they came out, Well, I
do wonder at a wise man like you, what do
you say to hippogriffs and dragons. The Doctor was smiling
and made answer, shaking his head. Nevertheless, life and death

(01:11:15):
are mysterious states, and we know little of the resources
of either. And they walked on, and I heard no more.
I did not then know what the doctor had been broaching,
but I think I guess it now. End of chapter four,

(01:11:37):
Chapter five, A wonderful likeness this evening, there arrived from
Grots the grave, dark faced son of the picture cleaner
with a horse and cart laden with two large packing cases,
having many pictures in each. It was a journey of
ten leagues, and whenever a messenger arrived at the Schloss

(01:11:57):
from our little capital of Grots, we used to crowd
about him in the hall to hear the news. This
arrival created in our secluded quarters quite a sensation. The
cases remained in the hall, and the messenger was taken
charge of by the servants till he had eaten his supper. Then,
with assistance and armed with hammer, ripping chisel and turnscrew,

(01:12:17):
he met us in the hall where we had assembled
to witness the unpacking of the cases. Carmila sat looking
listlessly on while one after the other the old pictures,
nearly all portraits which had undergone the process of renovation,
were brought to light. My mother was of an old
Hungarian family, and most of these pictures, which were about

(01:12:38):
to be restored to their places, had come to us
through her. My father had a list in his hand,
from which he read as the artists rummaged out the
corresponding numbers. I don't know that the pictures were very good,
but they were undoubtedly very old, and some of them
very curious. Also, they had for the most part the
merit of being now seen by me, I may for

(01:13:00):
the first time, for the smoke and dust of time
had all but obliterated them. There is a picture I
have not yet seen, said my father. In one corner
at the top of it is the name as well
as I could read, Marcia Karnstein, and the date sixteen
ninety eight. And I am curious to see how it

(01:13:21):
has turned out. I remembered it. It was a small picture,
about a foot and a half high and nearly square,
without a frame, but it was so blackened by age
I could not make it out. The artist now produced
it with evident pride. It was quite beautiful. It was startling.
It seemed to live. It was the effigy of Carmela. Carmela, Dear,

(01:13:48):
here is an absolute miracle. Here you are, living, smiling,
ready to speak in this picture. Isn't it beautiful? Papa?
And see even the little mole on her throat. My
father laughed and said, certainly, it is a wonderful likeness.
But he looked away, and, to my surprise, seemed but

(01:14:09):
little struck by it, and went on talking to the
picture cleaner, who was also something of an artist, and
discoursed with intelligence about the portraits or other works which
his art had just brought into light and color. While
I was more and more lost in wonder the more
I looked at the picture. Will you let me hang
this picture in my room, Papa, I asked, certainly, dear,

(01:14:32):
he said, smiling, I am very glad you think it
so like? It must be prettier even than I thought,
if it is. The young lady did not acknowledge this
pretty speech, did not seem to hear it. She was
leaning back in her seat, her fine eyes under their
long lashes, gazing on me in contemplation, and she smiled

(01:14:52):
in a kind of rapture. And now you can read
quite plainly the name that is written in the corner.
It is not Marcia. It looks as if it was
done in gold. The name is Mercalla, Countess Kernstein. And
this is a little coronet over and underneath a d.
Sixteen ninety eight. I am descended from the Carnsteins, that is,

(01:15:15):
Mamma was ah, said the lady languidly. So am I
I think a very long descent, very ancient. Are there
any Carnsteins living now, none who bear the name. I
believe the family were ruined. I believe in some civil
wars long ago. But the ruins of the castle are

(01:15:37):
only about three miles away. How interesting, she said, languidly.
But see what beautiful moonlight. She glanced through the hall door,
which stood a little open. Suppose you take a little
ramble around the court and look down at the road
and river. It is so like the night you came

(01:15:57):
to us, I said, She sighed, smiling, she rose, and,
with each her arm about the other's waist, we walked
out upon the pavement in silence. Slowly we walked down
to the drawbridge, where the beautiful landscape opened before us.
And so you were thinking of the night I came here,

(01:16:18):
she almost whispered. Are you glad I came to light it,
dear Carmila, I answered, And you asked for the picture
you think like me to hang in your room. She
murmured with a sigh, as she drew her arm closer
about my waist and let her pretty head sink upon
my shoulder. How romantic you are, Carmila, I said. Whenever

(01:16:43):
you tell me your story, it will be made up
chiefly of some one great romance, She kissed me silently.
I am sure, Carmila, you have been in love, that
there is at this moment an affair of the heart
going on. I have been in love with no one,
and never shall, she whispered, unless it should be with you.

(01:17:09):
How beautiful she looked in the moonlight. Shy and strained
was the look with which she quickly hid her face
in my neck and hair, with tumultuous sighs that seemed
almost to sob, and pressed in mine a hand that trembled.
Her soft cheek was glowing against mine. Darling, Darling, she murmured,

(01:17:30):
I live in you, and you would die for me.
I love you, so, I started from her. She was
gazing on me with eyes from which all fire, all
meaning had flown, and a face colorless and apathetic. Is
there a chill in the air, dear, she said drowsily.

(01:17:50):
I almost shiver. Have I been dreaming? Let us come in, Come, Come,
come in. You look ill, Carmela, a little faint. You
certainly must take some wine, I said, yes, I will.
I'm better now, I shall be quite well in a

(01:18:11):
few minutes. Yes, do give me a little wine, answered Carmela,
as we approached the door. Let us look again for
a moment. It is the last time. Perhaps I shall
see the moonlight with you. How do you feel now,
dear Carmila, are you really better? I asked, I was

(01:18:36):
beginning to take alarm lest she should have been stricken
with the strange epidemic that they said and invaded the
country about us. Papa would be grieved beyond measure, I added,
if he thought you were ever so little ill. Without
immediately letting us know, we have a very skillful doctor
near us, the physician who was with Papa to day,

(01:18:56):
I'm sure he is. I know how kind you all are.
But dear child, I am quite well again. There is
nothing ever wrong with me but a little weakness. People
say I am languid, I am incapable of exertion. I
can scarcely walk as far as a child of three
years old, and every now and then the little strength

(01:19:17):
I have falters, and I become as you have just
seen me. But after all I am very easily set
up again. In a moment, I am perfectly myself. See
how I have recovered so indeed, she had, and she
and I talked a great deal, and very animated, she was,

(01:19:38):
and the remainder of that evening passed without any recurrence
of what I call her infatuations, I mean, her crazy
talk and looks which embarrassed and even frightened me. But
there occurred that night an event which gave my thoughts
quite a new turn, and seemed to startle even Carmilla's
languid nature into momentary energy. End of chapter five, Chapter six,

(01:20:10):
A very strange agony. When we got into the drawing
room and had sat down to our coffee and chocolate,
although Carmilla did not take any, she seemed quite herself again,
and Madame and Mademoiselle de la Fontaine joined us and
made a little card party, in the course of which
Papa came in for what he called his dish of tea.

(01:20:31):
When the game was over, he sat down beside Carmilla
on the sofa and asked her a little anxiously whether
she had heard from her mother since her arrival. She
answered no. He then asked whether she knew where a
letter would reach her at present. I cannot tell, she
answered ambiguously. But I have been thinking of leaving you.

(01:20:53):
You have been already too hospitable and too kind to me.
I have given you an infinity of trouble, and I
should wish to take carriage tomorrow and post in pursuit
of her. I know where I shall ultimately find her,
although I dare not yet tell you. But you must
not dream of any such thing, exclaimed my father, to
my great relief. We can afford to lose you so

(01:21:15):
and I won't consent to your leaving us except under
the care of your mother, who was so good as
to consent to your remaining with us till she herself
should return. I should be quite happy if I knew
that you heard from her, But this evening the accounts
of the progress of the mysterious disease that has invaded
our neighborhood grow even more alarming. And my beautiful guest,
I do feel the responsibility unaided by advice from your

(01:21:38):
mother very much, but I shall do my best. And
one thing is certain that you must not think of
leaving us without her distinct direction to that effect. We
should suffer too much in parting from you to consent
to it easily. Thank you, sir a thousand times for
your hospitality, she answered, smiling bashfully. You have all been

(01:22:01):
too kind to me. I have seldom been so happy
in all my life before, as in your beautiful chateau
under your care, and in the society of your dear daughter.
So he gallantly, in his old fashioned way, kissed her hand,
smiling and pleased at her little speech. I accompanied Carmilla

(01:22:21):
as usual to her room, and sat and chatted with
her while she was preparing for bed. Do you think
I said at length that you will ever confide fully
in me? She turned round, smiling, but made no answer,
only continued to smile on me. You won't answer that,

(01:22:42):
I said. You can't answer pleasantly. I ought not to
have asked you. You are quite right to ask me
that or anything. You do not know how dear you
are to me, or you could not think any confidence
too great to look for. But I am under vows

(01:23:02):
no none half so awfully, and I dare not tell
my story yet, even to you. The time is very
near when you shall know everything. You will think me cruel,
very selfish, But love is always selfish. The more ardent,
the more selfish, how jealous I am, you cannot know.

(01:23:27):
You must come with me, loving me to death, or
else hate me and still come with me and hating
me through death and after. There is no such word
as indifference in my apathetic nature. Now, Carmela, you are
going to talk your wild nonsense again, I said hastily.

(01:23:50):
Not I silly, little fool as I am, and full
of whims and fancies. For your sake, I'll talk like
a sage. For you. Ever read a ball? No, how
you do? Run on? What is it like? How charming
it must be? I almost forget it is years ago,

(01:24:11):
I laughed. You are not so old. Your first ball
can hardly be forgotten. Yet I remember everything about it
with an effort. I see it all as divers see
what is going on above them through a medium, dense,
rippling but transparent. There occurred that night, what has confused

(01:24:33):
the picture and made its colors faint. I was all
but assassinated in my bed, wounded. Here. She touched her breast,
and never was the same. Since were you near dying? Yes?
Very a cruel love, strange love that would have taken

(01:24:56):
my life. Love will have its sacrifice, no sacrifice without blood.
Let us go to sleep. Now. I feel so lazy.
How can I get up just now and lock my door?
She was lying with her tiny hands buried in her
rich wavy hair under her cheek, her little head upon

(01:25:19):
the pillow, and her glittering eyes followed me whenever I moved,
with a kind of shy smile that I could not decipher.
I bid her good night and crept from the room
with an uncomfortable sensation. I often wondered whether our pretty
guest ever said her prayers. I certainly had never seen
her upon her knees in the morning. She never came

(01:25:41):
down until long after our family prayers were over, and
at night she never left the drawing room to attend
our brief evening prayers in the hall. If it had
not been that it had casually come out in one
of our careless talks that she had been baptized, I
should have doubted her being a Christian. Religion was a
subject on which I had never heard her speak a word.

(01:26:02):
If I had known the world better, this particular neglect
or antipathy would not have so much surprised me. The
precautions of nervous people are infectious, and persons of a
like temperament are pretty sure after a time to imitate them.
I had adopted Carmila's habit of locking her bedroom door,
having taken into my head all her whimsical alarms about

(01:26:22):
midnight invaders and prowling assassins. I had also adopted her
precaution of making a brief search through her room to
satisfy herself that no lurking assassin or robber was ensconced.
These wise measures taken, I got into my bed and
fell asleep. A light was burning in my room. This

(01:26:43):
was an old habit, a very early date, and which
nothing could have tempted me to dispense with. Thus fortified,
I might take my rest in peace. But dreams come
through stone walls, light up dark rooms or darken light ones,
and their persons make their exits and their entrances as
they please, and laugh at Locksmith's. I had a dream

(01:27:08):
that night that was the beginning of a very strange agony.
I cannot call it a nightmare, for I was quite
conscious of being asleep, But I was equally conscious of
being in my room and lying in bed precisely as
I actually was. I saw, or fancied, I saw the
room and its furniture, just as I had seen it last,

(01:27:31):
except that it was very dark, and I saw something
moving round the foot of the bed, which at first
I could not accurately distinguish, but I soon saw that
it was a sooty black animal that resembled a monstrous cat.
It appeared to me about four or five feet long,
for it measured fully the length of the hearthrug as
it passed over it. And it continued chewing and frowing

(01:27:52):
with the lithe sinister restlessness of a beast in a cage.
I could not cry out, although as you may suppose,
I was terrified. Its pace was growing faster, and the
room rapidly darker and darker, and at length so dark
that I could no longer see anything of it but
its eyes. I felt it spring lightly on the bed.

(01:28:13):
The two broad eyes approached my face, and suddenly I
felt a stinging pain, as if two large needles darted
an inch or two apart deep into my breast. I
waked with a scream. The room was lighted by the
candle that burnt there all through the night, and I
saw a female figure standing at the foot of the bed,
a little at the right side. It was in a dark,

(01:28:35):
loose dress, and its hair was down and covered its shoulders.
A block of stone could not have been more Still,
there was not the slightest stir of respiration. As I
stared at it, the figure appeared to have changed its
place and was now nearer the door, then close to it.
The door opened and it passed out. I was now

(01:28:59):
relieved and able to breathe and move. My first thought
was that Carmela had been playing me a trick, and
that I had forgotten to secure my door. I hastened
to it and found it locked as usual on the inside.
I was afraid to open it. I was horrified. I
sprang into my bed and covered my head up in
the bedclothes, and lay there more dead than alive till morning.

(01:29:27):
End of chapter six, Chapter seven, descending, It would be
vain my attempting to tell you the horror with which
even now I recalled the occurrence of that night. It
was no such transitory terror as a dream leaves behind it.
It seemed to deepen by time, and communicated itself to

(01:29:51):
the room and the very furniture that had encompassed the apparition.
I could not bear next day to be alone for
a moment. I should have told Papa, but for two
opposite reasons. At one time I thought he would laugh
at my story, and I could not bear its being
treated as a jest. And at another I thought he

(01:30:13):
might fancy that I had been attacked by the mysterious
complaint which had invaded our neighborhood. I had myself no
misgiving of the kind, and as he had been rather
an invalid for some time, I was afraid of alarming him.
I was comfortable enough with my good natured companions, Madame
Perodon and the vivacious Mademoiselle la Fontaine. They both perceived

(01:30:37):
that I was out of spirits and nervous, and at
length I told them what lay so heavy at my heart.
Mademoiselle laughed, but I fancied that Madame perodn looked anxious
by the bye, said Mademoiselle, laughing. The long lime tree
walk behind Carmilla's bedroom window is haunted. Nonsense, exclaimed Madame,

(01:31:00):
who probably thought the theme rather inopportune, And who tells
that story. My dear Martin says he came up twice
when the old yard gate was being repaired before sunrise,
and twice saw the same female figure walking down the
lime tree avenue. So well he might, as long as
there are cows to milk in the river fields, said Madame.

(01:31:25):
I dare say, but Martin chooses to be frightened, and
never did I see fool more frightened. You must not
say a word about it to Carmilla, because she can
see down that walk from her room window, I interposed,
and she is, if possible, a greater coward than I.

(01:31:46):
Carmela came down rather later than usual that day. I
was so frightened last night, she said, so soon as
we were together. And I am sure I should have
seen something dreadful if it had not been for that
charm I bought from the poor little hunchback whom I
called such hard names. I had a dream of something

(01:32:07):
black coming round my bed, and I awoke in perfect horror,
and I really thought, for some seconds I saw a
dark figure near the chimney piece. But I felt under
my pillow for my charm, and the moment my fingers
touched it, the figure disappeared. And I felt quite certain,
only that I had it by me, that something frightful

(01:32:30):
would have made its appearance and perhaps throttled me, as
it did those poor people we heard of. Well, listen
to me, I began and recounted my adventure at the recital,
of which she appeared horrified. And had you the charm
near you, she asked earnestly. No, I had dropped it

(01:32:51):
into a china vase in the drawing room. But I
shall certainly take it with me to night, as you
have so much faith in it. At this distance of time,
I cannot tell you or even understand how I overcame
my horror so effectually as to lie alone in my
room that night. I remember distinctly that I pinned the
charm to my pillow. I fell asleep almost immediately, and

(01:33:14):
slept even more soundly than usual all night. Next night
I passed as well. My sleep was delightfully deep and dreamless,
but I wakened with a sense of lassitude and melancholy, which, however,
did not exceed a degree that was almost luxurious. Well,

(01:33:35):
I told you so, said Carmela, when I described my
night's sleep. I had such delightful sleep myself. Last night
I pinned the charm to the breast of my night dress.
It was too far away. The night before, I am
quite sure it was all fancy, except the dreams. I

(01:33:56):
used to think that evil spirits made dreams, but our
doctor told me it is no such thing, only a
fever passing by or some other malady, as they often do,
he said, knocks at the door, and not being able
to get in, passes on with that alarm. And what
do you think the charm is, said I. It has

(01:34:17):
been fumigated or immersed in some drug, and is an
antidote against the malaria. She answered, Then it acts only
on the body. Certainly, you don't suppose that evil spirits
are frightened by bits of ribbon or the perfumes of
a druggist's shop. No, these complaints wandering in the air

(01:34:39):
begin by trying the nerves and so infect the brain.
But before they can seize upon you, the antidote repels them. That,
I am sure, is what the charm is done for us.
It is nothing magical, It is simply natural. I should
have been happier if I could quite have agreed with Carmela.

(01:35:03):
But I did my best, and the impression was a
little losing its force. For some nights I slept profoundly,
but still every morning I felt the same lassitude, and
a languor weighed upon me. All day. I felt myself
a changed girl. A strange melancholy was stealing over me,

(01:35:26):
a melancholy that I would not have interrupted. Dim thoughts
of death began to open, and an idea that I
was slowly sinking took gentle and somehow not unwelcome possession
of me. If it was sad, the tone of mind
which this induced was also sweet. Whatever it might be,

(01:35:49):
my soul acquiesced in it. I would not admit that
I was ill. I would not consent to tell my
Papa or to have the doctor sent for Carmilla became
more devoted to me than ever, and her strange paroxysms
of languid adoration more frequent. She used to gloat on
me with increasing ardor the more my strength and spirits waned.

(01:36:14):
This always shocked me, like a momentary glare of insanity.
Without knowing it, I was now in a pretty advanced
stage of the strangest illness under which mortal ever suffered.
There was an unaccountable fascination in its earlier symptoms that
more than reconciled me to the incapacitating effect of that

(01:36:35):
stage of the malady. This fascination increased for a time
until it reached a certain point, when gradually a sense
of the horrible mingled itself, with it deepening as you
shall hear until it discolored and perverted the whole state
of my life. The first change I experienced was rather agreeable.

(01:37:00):
It was very near the turning point from which began
the descent of averness. Certain vague and strange sensations visited
me in my sleep. The prevailing one was of that pleasant, peculiar,
cold thrill which we feel in bathing when we move
against the current of a river. This was soon accompanied

(01:37:20):
by dreams that seemed interminable and were so vague that
I could never recollect their scenery and persons, or anyone
connected portion of their action. But they left an awful
impression and a sense of exhaustion, as if I had
passed through a long period of great mental exertion and danger.

(01:37:44):
After all these dreams, there remained, on waking a remembrance
of having been in a place very nearly dark, and
of having spoken to people whom I could not see,
and especially of one clear voice, of a female's very
deep that spoke as if at a distance, slowly and

(01:38:05):
producing always the same sensation of indescribable solemnity and fear.
Sometimes there came a sensation as if a hand was
drawn softly along my cheek and neck. Sometimes it was
as if warm lips kissed me, and longer and longer,

(01:38:25):
and more lovingly as they reached my throat. But there
the caress fixed itself. My heart beat faster, my breathing
rose and fell rapidly and full drawn, a sobbing that
rose into a sense of strangulation supervened and turned into
a dreadful convulsion, in which my senses left me and

(01:38:46):
I became unconscious. It was now three weeks since the
commencement of this unaccountable state. My sufferings had during the
last week told upon my appearance. I had grown pale,
My eyes were dilated and darkened underneath, and the languor
which I had long felt began to display itself in

(01:39:07):
my countenance. My father asked me often whether I was ill,
but with an obstinacy which now seems to me unaccountable,
I persisted in assuring him that I was quite well.
In a sense. This was true. I had no pain,
I could complain of, no bodily derangement. My complaint seemed

(01:39:29):
to be one of the imagination or the nerves. And
horrible as my sufferings were, I kept them with a
morbid reserve very nearly to myself. It could not be
that terrible complaint which the peasants called the upire, for
I had now been suffering for three weeks, and they

(01:39:49):
were seldom ill for much more than three days. When
death put an end to their miseries. Carmilla complained of
dreams and feverish sensations, but by no means of so
alarming a kind as mine. I say that mine were
extremely alarming. Had I been capable of comprehending my condition,

(01:40:10):
I would have invoked aid and advice on my knees.
The narcotic of an unsuspected influence was acting upon me,
and my perceptions were benumbed. I am going to tell
you now of a dream that led immediately to an
odd discovery. One night, instead of the voice I was

(01:40:31):
accustomed to hear in the dark, I heard one sweet
and tender and at the same time terrible, which said,
your mother warns you to be aware of the assassin.
At the same time, a light unexpectedly sprang up, and
I saw Carmila standing near the foot of my bed

(01:40:52):
in her white knight dress, bathed from her chin to
her feet in one great stain of blood. I wakened
with a shriek, possessed with the idea that Carmila was
being murdered. I remember springing from my bed, and my
next recollection as that of standing on the lobby crying
for help. Madame and Mademoiselle came scurrying out of their

(01:41:15):
rooms in alarm, A lamp burned always on the lobby,
and seeing me, they soon learned the cause of my terror.
I insisted on our knocking at Carmela's door. Our knocking
was unanswered. It soon became a pounding and an uproar.
We shrieked her name, but all was vain. We all

(01:41:36):
grew frightened, for the door was locked. We hurried back
and panic to my room. There we rang the bell
long and furiously. If my father's room had been at
that side of the house, we would have called him
up at once to our aid, but alas he was
quite out of hearing, and to reach him involved an
excursion for which we none of us had courage. Servants, however,

(01:41:58):
soon came running up the stairs. I had got on
my dressing gown and slippers. Meanwhile, and my companions were
already similarly furnished. Recognizing the voices of the servants on
the lobby. We sallied out together, and, having renewed as
fruitlessly our summons at Carmilla's door, I ordered the men
to force the lock. They did so, and we stood,

(01:42:18):
holding our lights aloft in the doorway, and so stared
into the room. We called her by name, but there
was still no reply. We looked round the room. Everything
was undisturbed. It was exactly in the state in which
I had left it on bidding her good night. But
Carmilla was gone. End of Chapter seven, Chapter eight. Search.

(01:42:51):
At sight of the room perfectly undisturbed except for our
violent entrance, we began to cool a little, and soon
recovered our sense sufficiently to dismiss the men. It had
struck Mademoiselle that possibly Carmilla had been wakened by the
uproar at her door, and, in her first panic, had
jumped from her bed and hid herself in a press
or behind a curtain from which she could not, of

(01:43:14):
course emerge until the Majordomo in his mermidons had withdrawn.
We now recommenced our search and began to call her
name again. It was all to no purpose. Our perplexity
and agitation increased. We examined the windows, but they were secured.
I implored of Carmilla, if she had concealed herself to

(01:43:34):
play this cruel trick, no longer to come out and
to end our anxieties, It was all useless. I was
by this time convinced that she was not in the room,
nor in the dressing room, the door of which was
still locked. On this side, she could not have passed it.
I was utterly puzzled. Had Carmilla discovered one of those

(01:43:54):
secret passages which the old housekeeper said were known to
exist in the Schloss, although the tradition of their exact
situation had been lost a little time, would, no doubt
explain all utterly perplexed. As for the present we were.
It was past four o'clock, and I preferred passing the
remaining hours of darkness in Madame's room. Daylight brought no

(01:44:17):
solution of the difficulty. The whole household, with my father
at his head, was in a state of agitation. Next morning,
every part of the chateau was searched, The grounds were explored.
No trace of the missing lady could be discovered. The
stream was about to be dragged. My father was in distraction.

(01:44:37):
What a tale to have to tell the poor girl's
mother on her return, I too was almost beside myself,
though my grief was of quite a different kind. The
morning was passed in alarm and excitement. It was now
one o'clock and still no tidings. I ran up to
Carmilla's room and found her standing at her dressing table.

(01:45:00):
I was astounded. I could not believe my eyes. She
beckoned to me with her pretty finger in silence, her
face expressed extreme fear. I ran to her in an
ecstasy of joy. I kissed and embraced her again and again.
I ran to the bell and rang it vehemently to
bring others to the spot, who might at once relieve

(01:45:21):
my father's anxiety. Dear Carmila, what has become of you?
All this time? We have been in agonies of anxiety
about you? I exclaimed, Where have you been? How did
you come back? Last night has been a night of wonders,
she said, For mercy's sake, explain all you can. It

(01:45:44):
was past two last night, she said, when I went
to sleep as usual in my bed, with my doors locked,
that of the dressing room, and that opening upon the gallery.
My sleep was uninterrupted, and so far as I know, dreamless.
But I woke just now on the sofa in the
dressing room there, and I found the door between the
rooms open, and the other door forced. How could all

(01:46:08):
this have happened without my being wakened? It must have
been accompanied with a great deal of noise, and I
am particularly easily wakened. And how could I have been
carried out of my bed without my sleep having been interrupted?
I whom the slightest stir startles. By this time, Madame Mademoiselle,
my father, and a number of the servants were in
the room. Carmilla was of course overwhelmed with inquiries, congratulations

(01:46:33):
and welcomes. She had but one story to tell, and
seemed the least able of all the party to suggest
any way of accounting for what had happened. My father
took a turn up and down the room, thinking I
saw Carmela's eye follow him for a moment with a sly,
dark glance. When my father had sent the servants away,

(01:46:54):
Mademoiselle having gone in search of a little bottle of
Valerian and sell volatile, and there being no one now
in the room with Carmela except my father, Madame, and myself.
He came to her thoughtfully, took her hand very kindly,
and led her to the sofa and sat down beside her.
Will you forgive me, my dear if I risk a

(01:47:15):
conjecture and ask a question, who can have better? Right?
She said? Ask what you please, and I will tell
you everything. But my story is simply one of bewilderment
and darkness. I know absolutely nothing. Put any question you please,
But you know, of course, the limitations Mamma has placed
me under perfectly, my dear child, I need not approach

(01:47:39):
the topics on which she desires our silence. Now, the
marvel of last night consists in your having been removed
from your bed and your room without being wakened, and
this removal having occurred apparently while the windows were still
secured and the two doors locked upon the inside. I
will tell you my theory and ask you the question.

(01:48:01):
Carmela was leaning on her hand dejectedly. Madame and I
were listening breathlessly. Now my question is this, Have you
ever been suspected of walking in your sleep? Never since
I was very young, indeed, But you did walk in
your sleep when you were young? Yes, I know, I

(01:48:23):
did I have been told so often by my old nurse.
My father smiled and nodded, Well, what has happened is this?
You got up in your sleep unlocked the door, not
leaving the key as usual in the lock, but taking
it out and locking it on the outside. You again
took the key out and carried it away with you

(01:48:44):
to some one of the five and twenty rooms on
this floor, or perhaps upstairs or downstairs. There are so
many rooms and closets, so much heavy furniture, and such
accumulations of lumber, that it would require a week to
search this old house thoroughly. Do you you see now
what I mean? I do? But not all? She answered,

(01:49:08):
And how, Papa, do you account for her finding herself
on the sofa in the dressing room, which we had
searched so carefully. She came there after you had searched it,
still in her sleep, and at last awoke spontaneously, and
was as much surprised to find herself where she was
as any one else. I wish all mysteries were as
easily and innocently explained as yours, Carmilla, he said, laughing,

(01:49:32):
And so we may congratulate ourselves on the certainty that
the most natural explanation of the occurrence is one that
involves no drugging, no tampering with locks, no burglars or
poisoners or witches, nothing that need alarm Carmilla or any
one else for our safety. Carmela was looking charmingly. Nothing
could be more beautiful than her tints. Her beauty was

(01:49:55):
I think enhanced by that graceful languor that was peculiar
to her. I think my father was silently contrasting her
looks with mine, for he said, I wish my poor
Laura was looking more like herself, and he sighed. So
our alarms were happily ended, and Carmilla restored to her friends.

(01:50:23):
End of chapter eight, Chapter nine the doctor. As Carmilla
would not hear of an attendant sleeping in her room,
my father arranged that a servant should sleep outside her door,
so that she would not attempt to make another such
excursion without being arrested at her own door. That night

(01:50:44):
passed quietly, and next morning early the doctor whom my
father had sent for without telling me a word about it,
arrived to see me. Madame accompanied me to the library,
and there the grave little doctor with white hair and spectacles,
whom I mentioned before, was waiting to receive me. I
told him my story, and as I proceeded he grew

(01:51:07):
graver and graver. We were standing, he and I in
the recess of one of the windows, facing one another.
When my statement was over, he leaned with his shoulders
against the wall and with his eyes fixed on me earnestly,
with an interest in which was a dash of horror.
After a minute's reflection, he asked Madame if he could

(01:51:30):
see my father. He was sent for accordingly, and as
he entered, smiling, he said, I dare say, doctor, you
are going to tell me that I am an old
fool for having brought you here. I hope I am.
But his smile faded into shadow as the doctor, with
a very grave face, beckoned to him. He and the

(01:51:52):
doctor talked for some time in the same recess where
I had just conferred with the position. It seemed an
earnest and argument conversation. The room is very large, and
I and Madame stood together, burning with curiosity. At the
farther end. Not a word could we hear, however, for
they spoke in a very low tone, and the deep

(01:52:14):
recess of the window quite concealed the doctor from view,
and very nearly my father, whose foot, arm and shoulder
only we could see. And the voices were, I suppose,
all the less audible for the sort of closet which
the thick wall and window formed. After a time my
father's face looked into the room. It was pale, thoughtful,

(01:52:37):
and I fancied, agitated. Laura, dear, come here for a moment, madame,
We sha'n't trouble you, the doctor says, at present. Accordingly,
I approached for the first time a little alarmed, for
although I felt very weak, I did not feel ill.
And strength one always fancies is a thing that may

(01:52:58):
be picked up when we please. My father held out
his hand to me as I drew near, but he
was looking at the doctor, and he said, it certainly
is very odd. I don't understand it quite. Laura, come here, dear,
now attend to doctor Spielsburg and recollect yourself. You mentioned

(01:53:19):
a sensation like that of two needles piercing the skin
somewhere about your neck on the night when you first
experienced your horrible dream. Is there still any soreness? None
at all? I answered, Can you indicate with your finger?
About the point at which you think this occurred very
little below my throat here, I answered, I wore a

(01:53:43):
morning dress which covered the place I pointed to. Now
you can satisfy yourself, said the doctor. You won't mind
your papa's lowering your dress a very little. It is
necessary to detect a symptom of the complaint under which
you have been suffering. I acquiesced. It was only an
inch or two below the edge of my collar. God

(01:54:06):
bless me, so it is, exclaimed my father, growing pale.
You see it now with your own eyes, said the doctor,
with a gloomy triumph. What is it, I exclaimed, beginning
to be frightened. Nothing, my dear young lady, but a
small blue spot, about the size of the tip of
your little finger. And now, he continued, turning to Papa.

(01:54:30):
The question is what is best to be done? Is
there any danger? I urged in great trepidation. I trust not,
my dear, answered the doctor. I don't see why you
should not recover. I don't see why you should not
immediately begin to get better. That is the point at
which the sense of strangulation begins. Yes, I answered, and

(01:54:55):
recollect as well as you can. The same point was
a kind of sense of that thrill which you describe
just now, like the current of a cold stream running
against you. It may have been I think it was, ay,
you see, he added, turning to my father. Shall I

(01:55:16):
say a word to Madame? Certainly, said my father. He
called Madame to him and said, I find my young
friend here far from well. It won't be of any
great consequence, I hope, but it will be necessary that
some steps be taken, which I will explain by and by.
But in the meantime, Madame, you will be so good

(01:55:37):
as to not let miss Laura be alone for one moment.
That is the only direction I need give for the present.
It is indispensable. We may rely upon your kindness, Madame,
I know, added my father. Madame satisfied him eagerly. And you,
dear Laura, I know you will observe the doctor's direction.

(01:55:59):
I I shall have to ask your opinion upon another
patient whose symptoms slightly resemble those of my daughter that
have just been detailed to you, very much milder in degree,
but I believe quite of the same sort. She is
a young lady, our guest. But as you say, you
will be passing this way again this evening. You can't
do better than take your supper here and you can

(01:56:21):
then see her. She does not come down till the afternoon.
I thank you, said the doctor. I shall be with
you then at about seven this evening. And then they
repeated their directions to me and Madame. And with this
parting charge, my father left us and walked out with
the doctor. And I saw them pacing together up and

(01:56:41):
down between the road and the moat on the grassy
platform in front of the castle, evidently absorbed in earnest conversation.
The doctor did not return. I saw him mount his
horse there, take his leave, and ride away eastward through
the forest. Nearly yet the same time, I saw the
man arrive from Dranfield with the letters and dismount and

(01:57:04):
hand the bag to my father. In the meantime, Madame
and I were both busy lost in conjecture as to
the reasons of the singular and earnest direction which the
doctor and my father had concurred in imposing. Madame, as
she afterwards told me, was afraid the doctor apprehended a
sudden seizure, and that without prompt assistance, I might either

(01:57:25):
lose my life in a fit or at least be
seriously hurt. The interpretation did not strike me, and I fancied,
perhaps luckily for my nerves, that the arrangement was prescribed
simply to secure a companion who would prevent my taking
too much exercise, or eating unripe fruit, or doing any
of the fifty foolish things to which young people are

(01:57:46):
supposed to be prone. About half an hour after my
father came in, he had a letter in his hand
and said, this letter had been delayed. It is from
General Spielsdorf. He might have been here yet yesterday, he
may not come until tomorrow, or he may be here
to day. He put the letter into my hand, but

(01:58:07):
he did not look pleased, as he used when a guest,
especially when so much loved as the General was coming.
On the contrary, he looked as if he wished him
at the bottom of the red sea. There is plainly
something on his mind which he did not choose to divulge. Papa, darling,
will you tell me this, said I, suddenly, laying my

(01:58:28):
hand on his arm and looking, I am sure, imploringly
in his face. Perhaps he answered, smoothing my hair caressingly
over my eyes. Does the doctor think me very ill. No, dear,
he thinks, if right steps are taken, you will be
quite well again, at least on the high road to

(01:58:49):
a complete recovery, in a day or two. He answered,
a little dryly. I wish our good friend the General
had chosen any other time. That is, I wish you
had been perfectly well to receive him. But do tell me, Papa,
I insisted, what does he think is the matter with me? Nothing?
You must not plague me with questions, he answered, with

(01:59:11):
more irritation than I ever remember him to have displayed before,
And seeing that I looked wounded, I suppose, he kissed
me and added, you shall know all about it in
a day or two. That is all that I know.
In the meantime, you are not to trouble your head
about it. He turned and left the room, but came
back before I had done wondering and puzzling over the

(01:59:32):
oddity of all this. It was merely to say that
he was going to Carnstein and had ordered the carriage
to be ready at twelve, and that I and Madame
should accompany him. He was going to see the priest
who lived near those picturesque grounds, upon business and as
Carmila had never seen them, she could follow when she
came down with Mademoiselle, who would bring materials for what

(01:59:53):
you call a picnic, which might be laid for us
in the ruined castle. At twelve o'clock a wardingly, I
was ready, and not long after my father, Madame and
I set out upon our projected drive. Passing the drawbridge,
we turned to the right and follow the road over
the steep Gothic bridge westward to reach the deserted village

(02:00:14):
and ruined castle of Caernstein. No Sylvan drive can be
fancied prettier. The ground breaks into gentle hills and hollows,
all clothed with beautiful wood, totally destitute of the comparative
formality which artificial planting and early culture and pruning impart.
The irregularities of the ground often lead the road out

(02:00:35):
of its course and cause it to wind beautifully round
the sides of broken hollows and the steeper sides of
the hills, among varieties of ground almost inexhaustible. Turning one
of these points, we suddenly encountered our old friend, the General,
riding towards us, attended by a mounted servant. His portmanteaus
were following in a hired wagon, such as we term

(02:00:58):
a cart. The girl dismounted as we pulled up, and
after the usual greetings, was easily persuaded to accept the
vacant seat in the carriage and send his horse on
with his servant to the Schloss. End of Chapter nine,
Chapter ten bereaved. It was about ten months since we

(02:01:23):
had last seen him, but that time had sufficed to
make an alteration of years in his appearance. He had
grown thinner, something of gloom and anxiety had taken the
place of that cordial serenity which used to characterize his features.
His dark blue eyes, always penetrating, now gleamed with a
sterner light from under his shaggy gray eyebrows. It was

(02:01:46):
not such a change as grief alone. Usually induces, and
angrier passions seemed to have had their share in bringing
it about. We had not long resumed our drive when
the General began to talk with his usual soldierly directness
of the bereavement as he termed it, which he had
sustained in the death of his beloved niece and ward.

(02:02:07):
And he then broke out in a tone of intense
bitterness and fury, inveighing against the hellish arts to which
she had fallen a victim, and expressing with more exasperation
than piety, his wonder that Heaven should tolerate so monstrous
an indulgence of the lusts and malignity of Hell. My father,
who saw at once that something very extraordinary had Befallen,

(02:02:31):
asked him, if not too painful to him, to detail
the circumstances which he thought justified the strong terms in
which he expressed himself. I should tell you with all pleasure,
said the general. But you would not believe me. Why
should I not, he asked, because, he answered testily, you

(02:02:53):
believe in nothing but what consists with your own prejudices
and illusions. I remember when I was like you, but
I have learned better. Try me, said my father. I
am not such a dogmatist as you suppose. Besides which,
I very well know that you generally require proof for

(02:03:15):
what you believe, and am therefore very strongly predisposed to
respect your conclusions. You are right in supposing that I
have not been led lightly into a belief in the
marvelous For what I have experienced is marvelous, and I
have been forced by extraordinary evidence to credit that which
ran counter diametrically to all my theories. I have been

(02:03:39):
made the dupe of a preternatural conspiracy. Notwithstanding his professions
of confidence in the General's penetration. I saw my father
at this point glance at the General with as I thought,
a marked suspicion of his sanity. The General did not
see it, luckily. He was looking gloomily and curiously into

(02:04:00):
the glades and vistas of the woods that were opening
before us. You are going to the ruins of Kernstein,
he said, yes, it is a lucky coincidence. Do you
know I was going to ask you to bring me
there to inspect them. I have a special object in exploring.
There is a ruined chapel, ain't there, with a great

(02:04:21):
many tombs of that extinct family. So there are highly interesting,
said my father. I hope you are thinking of claiming
the title and estates. My father said this gaily, but
the General did not recollect the laugh or even the smile,
which courtesy exacts for a friend's joke. On the contrary,

(02:04:42):
he looked grave and even fierce, ruminating on a matter
that stirred his anger and horror. Something very different, he
said gruffly. I mean to unearth some of those fine people.
I hope, by God's blessing, to accomplish a pious sacrilege here,
which will relieve our earth of certain monsters and enable

(02:05:04):
honest people to sleep in their beds without being assailed
by murderers. I have strange things to tell you, my
dear friend, such as I myself would have scouted as incredible.
A few months since my father looked at him again,
but this time not with a glance of suspicion, with
an eye rather of keen intelligence and alarm. The house

(02:05:29):
of Carnstein, he said, has been long extinct a hundred years.
At least. My dear wife was maternally descended from the Carnsteins,
but the name and title have long ceased to exist.
The castle is a ruin. The very village is deserted.
It is fifty years since the smoke of a chimney
was seen there, not a roof left. Quite true, I

(02:05:53):
have heard a great deal about that since I last
saw you, A great deal that will astonish you. But
I I had better relate everything in the order in
which it occurred, said the General. You saw my dear ward,
my child, I may call her. No creature could have
been more beautiful, and only three months ago none more blooming. Yes,

(02:06:16):
poor thing. When I saw her last, she certainly was
quite lovely, said my father. I was grieved and shocked
more than I can tell you. My dear friend, I
knew what a blow it was to you. He took
the General's hand, and they exchanged a kind pressure. Tears
gathered in the old soldier's eyes. He did not seek

(02:06:39):
to conceal them. He said, we have been very old friends.
I knew you would feel for me, childless as I am.
She had become an object of very near interest to
me and repaid my care by an affection that cheered
my home and made my life happy. That is all gone.

(02:07:00):
The years that remain to me on earth may not
be very long, But by God's mercy, I hope to
accomplish a service to mankind before I die, and to
subserve the vengeance of Heaven upon the fiends who have
murdered my poor child in the spring of her hopes
and beauty. You said just now that you intended relating
everything as it occurred, said my father. Pray, do I

(02:07:21):
assure you that it is not mere curiosity that prompts me.
By this time we had reached the point at which
the Drunsdall road by which the General had come, diverges
from the road which we were traveling to Carnstein. How
far is it to the ruins, inquired the General, looking
anxiously forward, About half a league. Answered my father, pray,

(02:07:42):
let us hear the story you were so good as
to promise end of chapter ten, chapter eleven, the story
with all my heart, said the General with an effort,

(02:08:05):
and after a short pause in which to arrange his subject,
he commenced one of the strangest narratives I ever heard.
My dear child was looking forward with great pleasure to
the visit you had been so good as to arrange
for her. To your charming daughter, here he made me
a gallant but melancholy bow. In the meantime we had

(02:08:28):
an invitation to my old friend, the Count Carlsfeld, whose
loss is about six leagues to the other side of Carnstein.
It was to attend the series of fetes which you
remember were given by him in honor of his illustrious visitor,
the Grand Duke Charles. Yes, and very splendid. I believe
they were, said my father princely, but then his hospitalities

(02:08:55):
are quite regal. He has Aladdin's lamp, the night from which,
when my sorrow dates, was devoted to a magnificent masquerade.
The grounds were thrown open, the trees hung with colored lamps.
There was such a display of fireworks as Paris itself
had never witnessed. And such music, music, you know, is

(02:09:16):
my weakness, Such ravishing music, the finest instrumental band perhaps
in the world, and the finest singers who could be
collected from all the great operas in Europe. As you
wandered through these fantastically illuminated grounds, the moonlighted chateau throwing
a rosy light from its long rows of windows, you

(02:09:38):
would suddenly hear these ravishing voices stealing from the silence
of some grove, or rising from boats upon the lake.
I felt myself as I looked and listened, carried back
into the romance and poetry of my early youth. When
the fireworks were ended and the ball began, we returned

(02:10:01):
to the noble suite of rooms that were thrown open
to the dancers. A masked ball, you know, is a
beautiful sight, but so brilliant, a spectacle of the kind
I never saw before. It was a very aristocratic assembly.
I was myself almost the only nobody present. My dear

(02:10:23):
child was looking quite beautiful. She wore no mask. Her
excitement and delight added an unspeakable charm to her features.
Always lovely, I remarked. A young lady, dressed magnificently but
wearing a mask, who appeared to me to be observing
my ward with extraordinary interest. I had seen her earlier

(02:10:46):
in the evening in the Great Hall, and again for
a few minutes walking near us on the terrace under
the castle windows. Similarly employed, a lady, also masked, richly
and gravely dressed and with a stately air, like a
person of rank, accompanied her as a chaperone. Had the

(02:11:08):
young lady not worn a mask, I could of course
have been much more certain upon the question whether she
was really watching my poor darling. I am now well
assured that she was. We were now in one of
the salons. My poor dear child had been dancing and
was resting a little in one of the chairs near

(02:11:30):
the door. I was standing near the two ladies I
have mentioned had approached, and the younger took the chair
next my ward, while her companion stood by me, and
for a little time addressed herself in low tone to
her charge, availing herself of the privilege of her mask.
She turned to me, and, in the tone of an

(02:11:52):
old friend, and calling me by name, opened a conversation
with me, which piqued my curiosity again. Deal she referred
to many scenes where she had met me, at court
and at distinguished houses. She alluded to little incidents which
I had long ceased to think of, but which I
found had only lain in abeyance in my memory, for

(02:12:16):
they instantly started into life at her touch. I became
more and more curious to ascertain who she was. Every
moment she parried my attempts to discover very adroitly and pleasantly.
The knowledge she showed of many passages in my life
seemed to me all but unaccountable, and she appeared to
take a not unnatural pleasure in foiling my curiosity and

(02:12:40):
in seeing me flounder in my eager perplexity from one
conjecture to another. In the meantime, the young lady, whom
her mother called by the odd name of Millarca, when
she once or twice addressed her had with the same ease,
and grace got into conversation with my ward. She introduced

(02:13:01):
herself by saying that her mother was a very old
acquaintance of mine. She spoke of the agreeable audacity which
a mask rendered practicable. She talked like a friend. She
admired her dress, and insinuated very prettily her admiration of
her beauty. She amused her with laughing criticisms upon the

(02:13:22):
people who crowded the ball room and laughed at my
poor child's fun. She was very witty and lively when
she pleased, and after a time they had grown very
good friends. And the young stranger lowered her mask, displaying
a remarkably beautiful face. I had never seen it before,

(02:13:42):
neither had my dear child, But though it was new
to us, the features were so engaging as well as lovely,
that it was impossible not to feel the attraction powerfully.
My poor girl did so. I never saw any one
taken with another at first sight, unless indeed it was

(02:14:04):
the stranger herself, who seemed quite to have lost her
heart to her. In the meantime, availing myself of the
license of a masquerade, I put not a few questions
to the elder lady. You have puzzled me utterly, I said, laughing.
Is that not enough? Won't you now consent to stand

(02:14:28):
on equal terms and do me the kindness to remove
your mask? Can any request be more unreasonable, she replied,
ask a lady to yield an advantage. Besides, how do
you know you should recognize me? Years make changes as

(02:14:50):
you see, I said, with a bow. And I suppose
a rather melancholy little laugh, as philosophers tell us, she said,
And how do you know that a sight of my
face would help you? I should take chance for that,
I answered. It is vain trying to make yourself out

(02:15:11):
an old woman. Your figure betrays you. Years nevertheless have
passed since I saw you, rather since you saw me.
For that is what I am considering. Millarca, there is
my daughter. I cannot then be young, even in the
opinion of people whom time has taught to be indulgent.

(02:15:33):
And I may not like to be compared with what
you remember me. You have no mask to remove. You
can offer me nothing in exchange. My petition is to
your pity to remove it, and mine to yours to
let it stay where it is, She replied, Well, then

(02:15:55):
at least you will tell me whether you are French
or German. You speak both languge is so perfectly. I
don't think I shall tell you that general, you intend
a surprise and are meditating the particular point of attack
at all events. You won't deny this. I said that,

(02:16:15):
being honored by your permission to converse, I ought to
know how to address you? Shall I say, Madame la comtesse?
She laughed, and she would no doubt have met me
with another evasion, If indeed, I can treat any occurrence
in an interview, every circumstance of which was pre arranged,
as I now believe with the profoundest cunning, as liable

(02:16:39):
to be modified by accident. As to that, she began,
But she was interrupted almost as she opened her lips
by a gentleman dressed in black, who looked particularly elegant
and distinguished with this drawback that his face was the
most deadly pale I ever saw, except in death. He

(02:17:03):
was in no masquerade, in the plain evening dress of
a gentleman. And he said, without a smile, but with
a courtly and unusually low bow, will Madame la comtesse
permit me to say a very few words which may
interest her. The lady turned quickly to him and touched

(02:17:24):
her lip in a token of silence. She then said
to me keep my place for me. General, I shall
return when I have said a few words. And with
this injunction playfully given, she walked a little aside with
the gentleman in black and talked for some minutes, apparently
very earnestly. They then walked away slowly together in the crowd,

(02:17:50):
and I lost them for some minutes. I spent the
interval in cudgeling my brains for a conjecture as to
the identity of the lady who seemed to remember me
so kindly, And I was thinking of turning about and
joining in the conversation between my pretty ward and the
countess's daughter, and trying whether by the time she returned,

(02:18:10):
I might not have a surprise in store for her
by having her name, title, chateau and estates at my
fingers ends. But at this moment she returned, accompanied by
the pale man in black, who said, I shall return
and inform Madame la comtesse when her carriage is at
the door. He withdrew with a bow end of chapter eleven,

(02:18:41):
Chapter twelve A petition. Then we are to lose Madame
la comtesse. But I hope for only a few hours,
I said, with a low bow. It may be that only,
or it may be a few weeks. It was very
unlucky his speaking to me just now as he did.

(02:19:04):
Do you now know me? I assured her. I did not.
You shall know me, she said, but not at present.
We are older and better friends than perhaps you, suspect
I cannot yet declare myself. I shall in three weeks
pass your beautiful schloss, about which I have been making enquiries.

(02:19:29):
I shall then look in upon you for an hour
or two and renew a friendship which I never think
of without a thousand pleasant recollections. This moment, a piece
of news has reached me like a thunderbolt. I must
set out now and travel by a devious route nearly
a hundred miles, with all the despatch that I can
possibly make. My perplexities multiply. I am only deterred by

(02:19:54):
the compulsory reserve I practice, as to my name, from
making a very singular request of you. My poor child
has not quite recovered her strength. Her horse fell with
her at a hunt which she had ridden out to witness.
Her nerves have not yet recovered the shock, and our
physician says that she must on no account exert herself

(02:20:15):
for some time to come. We came here in consequence
by very easy stages, hardly six leagues a day. I
must now travel day and night on a mission of
life and death, a mission the critical and momentous nature
of which I shall be able to explain to you
when we meet, as I hope we shall in a

(02:20:36):
few weeks, without the necessity of any concealment. She went
on to make her petition, and it was in the
tone of a person from whom such a request amounted
to conferring, rather than seeking a favor. This was only
in manner, and as it seemed quite unconsciously then the

(02:20:57):
terms in which it was expressed, nothing could be more deprecatory.
It was simply that I would consent to take charge
of her daughter during her absence. This was, all things
considered a strange, not to say, an audacious request. She
in some sort disarmed me by stating and admitting everything

(02:21:20):
that could be urged against it, and throwing herself entirely
upon my chivalry. At the same moment, by a fatality
that seemed to have predetermined all that happened, my poor
child came to my side and, in an undertone, besought
me to invite her new friend, Millarca to pay us
a visit. She had just been sounding her and thought

(02:21:43):
if her Mamma would allow her, she would like it extremely.
At another time, I should have told her to wait
a little until at least we knew who they were.
But I had not a moment to think in the
two ladies assailed me together, and I must confess, the
refined and beautiful face of the young lady, about which

(02:22:06):
there was something extremely engaging, as well as the elegance
and fire of high birth, determined me, and quite overpowered,
I submitted and undertook too easily the care of the
young lady, whom her mother called Millarca. The Countess beckoned
to her daughter, who listened with grave attention, while she

(02:22:27):
told her in general terms, how suddenly and peremptorily she
had been summoned, and also of the arrangement she had
made for her under my care, adding that I was
one of her earliest and most valued friends. I made,
of course, such speeches as the case seemed to call for,
and found myself, on reflection in a position which I

(02:22:48):
did not half like. The gentleman in black returned and
very ceremoniously conducted the lady from the room. The demeanor
of this gentleman was such as to impress me with
the conviction that the Countess was a lady of very
much more importance than her modest title alone might have
led me to assume. Her last charge to me was

(02:23:10):
that no attempt was to be made to learn more
about her than I might have already guessed. Until her return.
Our distinguished host, whose guest she was, knew her reasons.
But here she said, neither I nor my daughter could
safely remain for more than a day. I removed my

(02:23:31):
mask imprudently for a moment about an hour ago, and
too late I fancied you saw me, so I resolved
to seek an opportunity of talking a little to you.
Had I found out that you had seen me, I
would have thrown myself on your high sense of honor
to keep my secret some weeks. As it is, I

(02:23:52):
am satisfied that you did not see me. But if
you now suspect or on reflection, should suspect who I am.
I commit myself in like manner entirely to your honor.
My daughter will observe the same secrecy, and I well
know that you will, from time to time remind her

(02:24:12):
lest she should thoughtlessly disclose it. She whispered a few
words to her daughter, kissed her hurriedly twice, and went away,
accompanied by the pale gentleman in black, and disappeared in
the crowd. In the next room, said Malarka, there is
a window that looks upon the hall door. I should

(02:24:34):
like to see the last of Mamma, and to kiss
my hand to her. We assented, of course, and accompanied
her to the window. We looked out and saw a handsome,
old fashioned carriage with a troop of couriers and footmen.
We saw the slim figure of the pale gentleman in
black as he held a thick velvet cloak and placed

(02:24:55):
it about her shoulders and threw the hood over her head.
She nodded to him and just touched his hand with hers.
He bowed low repeatedly as the door closed and the
carriage began to move. She is gone, said Malarka, with
a sigh. She is gone. I repeated to myself for

(02:25:19):
the first time in the hurried moments that had elapsed
since my consent, reflecting upon the folly of my act.
She did not look up, said the young lady plaintively.
The Countess had taken off her mask, perhaps and did
not care to show her face, I said, And she

(02:25:40):
could not know that she were in the window. She
sighed and looked in my face. She was so beautiful
that I relented. I was sorry, I had, for a
moment repented of my hospitality, and I determined to make
her amends for the unavowed churlishness of my reception. The

(02:26:00):
young lady, replacing her mask, joined my ward in persuading
me to return to the grounds where the concert was
soon to be renewed. We did so and walked up
and down the terrace that lies under the castle windows.
Millarka became very intimate with us and amused us with
lively descriptions and stories of most of the great people

(02:26:21):
whom we saw upon the terrace. I liked her more
and more every minute. Her gossip, without being ill natured,
was extremely diverting to me, who had been so long
out of the great world. I thought, what life she
would give to our sometimes lonely evenings at home. This

(02:26:42):
ball was not over until the morning sun had almost
reached the horizon. It pleased the Grand Duke to dance
till then, so loyal people could not go away or
think of bed. We had just got through a crowded
saloon when my ward asked me what had become of Millarca.
I thought she had been by her side, and she

(02:27:03):
fancied she was by mine. The fact was we had
lost her. All my efforts to find her were in vain.
I feared that she had mistaken, in the confusion of
a momentary separation from us other people for her new friends,
and had possibly pursued and lost them in the extensive

(02:27:25):
grounds which were thrown open to us. Now in its
full force, I recognized a new folly in my having
undertaken the charge of a young lady without so much
as knowing her name, and fettered as I was by
promises of the reasons for imposing which I knew nothing.
I could not even point my inquiries by saying that

(02:27:45):
the missing young lady was the daughter of the countess
who had taken her departure in a few hours before
morning broke. It was clear daylight before I gave up
my search. It was not till near two o'clock next
day that we heard anything of my missing charge. At
about that time a servant knocked at my niece's door

(02:28:08):
to say that he had been earnestly requested by a
young lady who appeared to be in great distress to
make out where she could find the General Baron Spielsdorf
and the young lady his daughter in whose charge she
had been left by her mother. There could be no doubt,
notwithstanding the slight inaccuracy, that our young friend had turned up,

(02:28:29):
and so she had would to heaven we had lost her.
She told my poor child a story to account for
her having failed to recover us for so long, very late.
She said she had got to the housekeeper's bedroom in
despair of finding us, and had then fallen into a
deep sleep, which, long as it was, had hardly sufficed

(02:28:52):
to recruit her strength. After the fatigues of the ball
that day, Millarka came home with us. I was only
too happy, after all, to have secured so charming a
companion for my dear girl. End of Chapter twelve. Chapter thirteen,

(02:29:18):
the woodman. There Soon, however, appeared some drawbacks. In the
first place, Millarka complained of extreme languor the weakness that
remained after her late illness, and she never emerged from
her room till the afternoon was pretty far advanced. In
the next place, it was accidentally discovered, although she always

(02:29:42):
locked her door on the inside and never disturbed the
key from its place till she admitted the maid to
assist at her toilet, that she was undoubtedly sometimes absent
from her room in the very early morning, and at
various times later in the day before she wished it
to be understood that she was stirring. She was repeatedly
seen from the windows of the Schloss in the first

(02:30:04):
faint gray of the morning, walking through the trees in
an easterly direction and looking like a person in a trance.
This convinced me that she walked in her sleep. But
this hypothesis did not solve the puzzle. How did she
pass out from her room leaving the door locked on
the inside. How did she escape from the house without

(02:30:25):
unbarring door or window. In the midst of my perplexities,
an anxiety of a far more urgent kind presented itself.
My dear child began to lose her looks and health,
and that in a manner so mysterious and even horrible,
that I became thoroughly frightened. She was at first visited

(02:30:48):
by appalling dreams. Then as she fancied by a specter,
sometimes resembling millarca, sometimes in the shape of a beast,
indistinctly seen walking round the foot of her bed from
side to side. Lastly came sensations. One not unpleasant, but
very peculiar, she said, resembled the flow of an icy

(02:31:10):
stream against her breast. At a later time, she felt
something like a pair of large needles pierce her a
little below the throat, with a very sharp pain. A
few nights after followed a gradual and convulsive sense of strangulation.
Then came unconsciousness. I could hear distinctly every word the

(02:31:33):
kind old general was saying, because by this time we
were driving upon the short grass that spreads on either
side of the road as you approached the roofless village,
which had not shown the smoke of a chimney for
more than half a century. You may guess how strangely
I felt as I heard my own symptoms so exactly
described in those which had been experienced by the poor girl, who,

(02:31:55):
but for the catastrophe which followed, would have been at
that moment a visit her at my father's chateau. You
may suppose also how I felt as I heard him
detail habits and mysterious peculiarities which were in fact those
of our beautiful guest Carmilla. A vista opened in the forest.

(02:32:18):
We were on a sudden under the chimneys and gables
of the ruined village, and the towers and battlements of
the dismantled castle, round which gigantic trees are grouped overhung
us from a slight eminence. In a frightened dream, I
got down from the carriage and in silence, for we
had each abundant matter for thinking. We soon mounted the

(02:32:40):
ascent and were among the spacious chambers, winding stairs, and
dark corridors of the castle. And this was once the
palatial residence of the Carnsteins, said the old general at length,
as from a great window he looked out across the
village and saw the wide, ungj relating expanse of forest.

(02:33:03):
It was a bad family, and here its blood stained
annals were written, he continued, it is hard that they should,
after death, continue to plague the human race with their
atrocious lusts. That is the chapel of the Carnsteins. Down there,
he pointed, down to the gray walls of the Gothic building,

(02:33:25):
partly visible through the foliage a little way down the steep,
and I hear the acts of a woodman, he added,
busy among the trees that surround it. He possibly may
give us the information of which I am in search,
and point out the grave of Mercalla, Countess of Carnstein.

(02:33:45):
These rustics preserve the local traditions of great families, whose
stories die out among the rich and titled so soon
as the families themselves become extinct. We have a portrait
at home of Mrcalla, the Countess karneih Stein. Should you
like to see it? Asked my father. Time enough, dear friend,

(02:34:07):
replied the general, I believe that I have seen the original,
And one motive which has led me to you earlier
than I first intended, was to explore the chapel which
we are now approaching. What see the Countess Mercalla, exclaimed
my father. Why she has been dead more than a century,

(02:34:30):
not so dead as you fancy, I am told, answered
the general. I confess, General, you puzzle me, utterly, replied
my father, looking at him. I fancied for a moment
with a return of the suspicion I detected before. But
although there was anger and detestation at times in the
old General's manner, there was nothing flighty. There remains to me,

(02:34:57):
he said, as we passed under the heavy arch of
the Gothic church, for its dimensions would have justified its
being so styled. But one object which can interest me
during the few years that remained to me on earth,
and that is to wreckon her the vengeance which I,
thank God, may still be accomplished by a mortal man.

(02:35:20):
What vengeance can you mean, asked my father, in increasing amazement.
I mean to decapitate the monster, he answered, with a
fierce flush and a stamp that echoed mournfully through the
hollow ruin. And his clenched hand was at the same
moment raised as if it grasped the handle of an axe,

(02:35:41):
while he shook it ferociously in the air. What exclaimed
my father, more than ever bewildered, to strike her head off?
Cut her head off? I with a hatchet, with a spade,
or with anything that can cleave through her mind. Murderous throat,

(02:36:01):
you shall hear, he answered, trembling with rage, and hurrying forward,
he said that beam will answer for a seat. Your
dear child is fatigued. Let her be seated, and I will,
in a few sentences close my dreadful story. The squared

(02:36:22):
block of wood, which lay on the grass grown pavement
of the chapel, formed a bench on which I was
very glad to seat myself. And in the meantime the
General called to the woodman, who had been removing some
boughs which leaned upon the old walls, and axe in hand.
The hearty old fellow stood before us. He could not
tell us anything of these monuments. But there was an

(02:36:45):
old man, he said, a ranger of this forest at
present sojourning in the house of the priest, about two
miles away, who could point out every monument of the
old Carnstein family. And for a trifle he undertook to
bring him back with him if we would lend him
one of our horses. In little more than half an hour.

(02:37:05):
Have you been long employed about this forest, asked my
father of the old man. I have been a woodman here,
he answered, in his patois under the forester all my days,
so has my father before me, and so on as
many generations as I can count up, I could show
you the very house in the village here in which

(02:37:26):
my ancestors live. How came the village to be deserted?
Asked the general. It was troubled by revenance, Sir. Several
were tracked to their graves there, detected by the usual tests,
and extinguished in the usual way by decapitation by the
stake and by burning. But not until many of the

(02:37:48):
villagers were killed. But after all these proceedings according to law,
he continued. So many graves opened, and so many vampires
deprived of their horrible animation. The ville village was not relieved.
But a Moravian nobleman who happened to be traveling this
way heard how matters were, and, being skilled as many

(02:38:09):
people are in his country in such affairs, he offered
to deliver the village from its tormentor He did so thus,
there being a bright moon that night, he ascended shortly
after sunset the towers of the chapel here, from whence
he could distinctly see the churchyard beneath him. You can
see it from that window. From this point, he watched

(02:38:31):
until he saw the vampire come out of his grave
and placed near it the linen clothes in which he
had been folded, and then glide away towards the village
to plague its inhabitants. The stranger, having seen all this,
came down from the steeple, took the linen wrappings of
the vampire, and carried them up to the top of
the tower, which he again mounted. When the vampire returned

(02:38:53):
from his prowlings and missed his clothes, he cried furiously
to the Moravian, whom he saw at the summit of
the tower, and who in reply beckoned him to ascend
and take them. Whereupon the vampire, accepting his invitation, began
to climb the steeple, and so soon as he had
reached the battlements, the Moravian, with a stroke of his sword,

(02:39:14):
clove his skull and twain, hurling him down to the churchyard,
whither descending by the winding stairs. The stranger followed and
cut his head off, and next day delivered it and
the body to the villagers, who duly impaled and burnt
them this Moravian nobleman had authority from the then head
of the family to remove the tomb of Mercalla, Countess Carnstein,

(02:39:39):
which he did effectually, so that in a little while
its sight was quite forgotten. Can you point out where
it stood? Asked the general eagerly. The forester shook his
head and smiled. Not a soul living can tell you that, now,
he said. Besides, they say her body was removed, but

(02:40:00):
no one is sure of that either. Having thus spoken,
as time pressed, he dropped his axe and departed, leaving
us to hear the remainder of the General's strange story.
End of chapter thirteen, Chapter fourteen. The meeting my beloved child,

(02:40:29):
he resumed, was now growing rapidly worse. The physician who
attended her had failed to produce the slightest impression on
her disease. For such I then supposed it to be.
He saw my alarm and suggested a consultation. I called
in an abler physician from Grots. Several days elapsed before

(02:40:51):
he arrived. He was a good and pious as well
as a learned man. Having seen my poor ward, together
they withdrew to my library to confer and discuss. I
from the adjoining room, where I awaited their summons, heard
these two gentlemen's voices raised in something sharper than a
strictly philosophical discussion. I knocked at the door and entered.

(02:41:14):
I found the old physician from Grots maintaining his theory.
His rival was combating it with undisguised ridicule, accompanied with
bursts of laughter. This unseemly manifestation subsided, and the altercation
ended on my entrance, Sir, said my first physician, my
learned brother seems to think that you want a conjuror

(02:41:37):
and not a doctor. Pardon me, said the old physician
from Grot's, looking displeased. I shall state my own view
of the case in my own way another time. I grieve,
monsieur le General, that by my skill and science, I
can be of no use. Before I go, I shall
do myself the honor to suggest something to you. He

(02:42:01):
seemed thoughtful, and sat down at a table and began
to write. Profoundly disappointed, I made my bow, and as
I turned to go, the other doctor pointed over his
shoulder to his companion who was writing, and then, with
a shrug, significantly touched his forehead. This consultation then left

(02:42:21):
me precisely where I was. I walked out into the grounds,
all but distracted the doctor from grots In ten or
fifteen minutes overtook me. He apologized for having followed me,
but said that he could not conscientiously take his leave
without a few words more. He told me that he
could not be mistaken. No natural disease exhibited the same symptoms,

(02:42:44):
and that death was already very near. There remained, however,
a day or possibly two of life. If the fatal
seizure were at once arrested with great care and skill,
her strength might possibly return. But all hung now upon
the cocks of the irrevocable. One more assault might extinguish

(02:43:04):
the last spark of vitality, which is every moment ready
to die. And what is the nature of the seizure
you speak of? I entreated? I have stated all fully
in this note which I place in your hands, upon
the distinct condition that you send for the nearest clergyman
and open my letter in his presence, and on no

(02:43:27):
account read it till he is with you. You would
despise it else. And it is a matter of life
and death. Should the priest fail you, then, indeed you
may read it, He asked me, before taking his leave, finally,
whether I would wish to see a man curiously learned
upon the very subject which, after I had read his letter,

(02:43:48):
would probably interest me above all others. And he urged
me earnestly to invite him to visit him there, and
so took his leave. The ecclesiastic was absent, and I
read the letter by myself at another time, or in
another case it might have excited my ridicule. But into
what quackeries will not people rush for a last chance,

(02:44:11):
where all accustomed means have failed, and the life of
a beloved object is at stake. Nothing you will say
could be more absurd than the learned man's letter. It
was monstrous enough to have consigned him to a madhouse.
He said that the patient was suffering from the visits
of a vampire. The punctures which she described as having

(02:44:33):
occurred near the throat were he insisted, the insertion of
those two long, thin and sharp teeth, which it is
well known are peculiar to vampires. And there could be
no doubt, he added, as to the well defined presence
of the small livid mark which all concurred in describing
as that induced by the demon's lips, and every symptom

(02:44:54):
described by the sufferer was an exact conformity with those
recorded in every case of a similar visitation. Being myself
wholly skeptical as to the existence of any such portent
as the vampire, the supernatural theory of the good Doctor furnished,
in my opinion, but another instance of learning and intelligence

(02:45:15):
oddly associated with some one hallucination. I was so miserable, however,
that rather than try nothing, I acted upon the instructions
of the letter. I concealed myself from the dark dressing
room that opened upon the poor patient's room, in which
a candle was burning, and watched there till she was

(02:45:35):
fast asleep. I stood at the door, peeping through the
small crevice, my sword laid on the table beside me,
as my directions prescribed, until a little after one I
saw a large black object, very ill defined, crawl, as
it seemed to me, over the foot of the bed,
and swiftly spread itself up to the poor girl's throat,

(02:45:57):
where it swelled in a moment into a great palpitating mass.
For a few moments I had stood petrified. I now
sprang forward with my sword in my hand. The black
creature suddenly contracted towards the foot of the bed, glided
over it, and standing on the floor about a yard
below the foot of the bed, with a glare of

(02:46:19):
skulking vorocity and horror fixed on me. I saw Milarka speculating.
I know not what. I struck at her instantly with
my sword, but I saw her standing near the door, unscathed. Horrified,
I pursued and struck again. She was gone, and my
sword flew to shivers against the door. I can't describe

(02:46:42):
to you all that passed on that horrible night. The
whole house was up and stirring. The specter. Malarka was gone,
but her victim was sinking fast, and before the morning
dawned she died. The old general was agitated. We did
not speak to him. My father walked to some little

(02:47:06):
distance and began reading the inscriptions on the tombstones, and
thus occupied, he strolled into the door of a side
chapel to prosecute his researches. The General leaned against the wall,
dried his eyes, and sighed heavily. I was relieved on
hearing the voices of Carmila and Madame, who were at
that moment approaching the voices, died away in this solitude,

(02:47:33):
having just listened to so strange a story, connected as
it was, with the great and titled dead, whose monuments
were moldering among the dust and ivy around us, and
every instant of which bore so awfully upon my own
mysterious case. In this haunted spot, darkened by the towering
foliage that rose on every side, dense and high above

(02:47:54):
its noiseless walls, a horror began to steal over me,
and my heart sank as I thought that my friends were,
after all, not about to enter and disturb this trieste
and ominous scene. The old General's eyes were fixed on
the ground as he leaned with his hand upon the
basement of a shattered monument under a narrow arched doorway,

(02:48:18):
surmounted by one of those demonical grotesques in which the
cynical and ghastly fancy of old Gothic carving delights. I
saw very gladly the beautiful face and figure of Carmilla
entering the shadowy chapel. I was just about to rise
and speak, and nodded, smiling in answer to her peculiarly
engaging smile, when with a cry, the old man by

(02:48:42):
my side caught up the woodman's hatchet and started forward.
On seeing him, a brutalized change came over her features.
It was an instantaneous and horrible transformation. As she made
a crouching step backwards. Before I could utter a scream,
he struck at her with all his force, but she
dived under his blow and, unscathed, caught him in her

(02:49:05):
tiny grasp by the wrist. He struggled for a moment
to release his arm, but his hand opened, The axe
fell to the ground, and the girl was gone. He
staggered against the wall. His gray hair stood upon his head,
and a moisture shone over his face, as if he
were at the point of death. The frightful scene had

(02:49:27):
passed in a moment. The first thing I recollect after
is Madame standing before me and impatiently repeating again and
again the question, where is Mademoiselle Carmella. I answered at length,
I don't know. I can't tell she went there, and
I pointed to the door through which Madame had just

(02:49:48):
entered only a minute or two since. But I have
been standing there in the passage ever since Mademoiselle Carmella entered,
and she did not return. She then began to call
Carmilla through every door and passage and from the windows,
but no answer came. She called herself. Carmilla asked the General,

(02:50:11):
still agitated Carmilla, Yes, I answered ay. He said, that
is Millarca. That is the same person who long ago
was called Mercalla, Countess Carnstein. Depart from this accursed ground,
my poor child, as quickly as you can. Drive to

(02:50:33):
the clergyman's house and stay there till we come. Be gone.
May you never behold Carmilla more. You will not find
her here. End of Chapter fourteen. Chapter fifteen, Ordeal and Execution.

(02:50:57):
As he spoke, one of the strangest looking men I
ever beheld entered the chapel at the door through which
Carmila had made her entrance in her exit. He was tall,
narrow chested, stooping, with high shoulders, and dressed in black.
His face was brown and dried in with deep furrows.

(02:51:17):
He wore an oddly shaped hat with a broad leaf.
His hair, long and grizzled, hung on his shoulders. He
wore a pair of gold spectacles and walked slowly with
an odd shambling gait, with his face sometimes turned up
to the sky and sometimes bowed down towards the ground.
Seemed to wear a perpetual smile. His long, thin arms

(02:51:41):
were swinging, and his lank hands in old black gloves
ever so much too wide for them, waving and gesticulating
in utter abstraction. The very man exclaimed the general, advancing
with manifest delight, my dear Baron, how happy I am
to see you. I had no hope of meeting you

(02:52:02):
so soon. He signed to my father, who had by
this time returned and leading the fantastic old gentleman, whom
he called the baron to meet him. He introduced him formally,
and they at once entered into earnest conversation. The stranger
took a roll of paper from his pocket and spread

(02:52:23):
it on the worn surface of a tomb that stood by.
He had a pencil case in his fingers, with which
he traced imaginary lines from point to point on the paper, which,
from their often glancing from it together at certain points
of the building I concluded to be a plan of
the chapel. He accompanied what I may term his lecture

(02:52:43):
with occasional readings from a dirty little book, whose yellow
leaves were closely written over. They sauntered together down the
side aisle opposite to the spot where I was standing,
conversing as they went. Then they began measuring distances by pay,
And finally they all stood together facing a piece of

(02:53:04):
the side wall, which they began to examine with great minuteness,
pulling off the ivy that clung over it and wrapping
the plaster with the ends of their sticks, Scraping here
and knocking there. At length they ascertained the existence of
a broad marble tablet with letters carved in relief upon it,

(02:53:24):
with the assistance of the woodman, who soon returned, a
monumental inscription and carved escutcheon were disclosed. They proved to
be those of the long lost monument of Mercalla, Countess Carnstein.
The old General, though not I fear given to the
praying mood, raised his hands and eyes to Heaven in

(02:53:48):
mute thanksgiving for some moments tomorrow. I heard him say,
the Commissioner will be here, and the inquisition will be
held according to law. Then, turning to the old man
with the gold spectacles whom I have described, he shook
him warmly by both hands, and said, Baron, how can

(02:54:09):
I thank you? How can we all thank you? You
will have delivered this region from a plague that has
scourged its inhabitants for more than a century. The horrible enemy,
thank god, is at last tracked. My father led the
stranger aside, and the general followed. I know that he
had led them out of hearing that he might relate

(02:54:31):
my case, and I saw them glance often quickly at me.
As the discussion proceeded. My father came to me, kissed
me again and again, and, leading me from the chapel,
said it is time to return. But before we go home,
we must add to our party the good priest, who
lives but a little way from this, and persuade him

(02:54:53):
to accompany us to the Schloss. In this quest, we
were successful, and I was glad, being unspeakably fatigued when
we reached home, But my satisfaction was changed to dismay
on discovering that there were no tidings of Carmilla of
the scene that had occurred in the ruined chapel. No

(02:55:13):
explanation was offered to me, and it was clear that
it was a secret which my father for the present
determined to keep from me. The sinister absence of Carmilla
made the remembrance of the scene more horrible to me.
The arrangements for the night were singular. Two servants and
madame were to sit up in my room that night,

(02:55:33):
and the ecclesiastic, with my father, kept watch in the
adjoining dressing room. The priest had performed certain solemn rites
that night, the purport of which I did not understand
any more than I comprehended. The reason of this extraordinary
precaution taken from my safety during sleep, I saw all clearly.
A few days later, the disappearance of Carmilla was followed

(02:55:58):
by the discontinuance of my nightly sufferings. You have heard
no doubt of the appalling superstition that prevails in Upper
and Lower Steria, in Moravia, Silesia, in Turkish Serbia, in Poland,
even in Russia. The superstition, so we must call it,

(02:56:18):
of the vampire. If human testimony taken with every care
and solemnity, judicially before commissions innumerable, each consisting of many members,
all chosen for integrity and intelligence, and constituting reports more voluminous,
perhaps than exist upon any one other class of cases

(02:56:38):
is worth anything, it is difficult to deny or even
to doubt the existence of such a phenomenon as the vampire.
For my part, I have heard no theory by which
to explain what I myself have witnessed and experienced, other
than that supplied by the ancient and well attested belief
of the country. Day the formal proceedings took place in

(02:57:02):
the chapel of Caernstein. The grave of the Countess Mercalla
was opened, and the General and my father recognized each
his perfidious and beautiful guest in the face now disclosed
to view. The features, though a hundred and fifty years
had passed since her funeral, were tinted with the warmth

(02:57:22):
of life. Her eyes were open. No cadaverous smell exhaled
from the coffin. The two medical men, one officially present,
the other on the part of the promoter of the inquiry,
attested the marvelous fact that there was a faint but
appreciable respiration and a corresponding action of the heart. The

(02:57:44):
limbs were perfectly flexible, the flesh elastic, and the leaden
coffin floated with blood. In which to a depth of
seven inches the body lay. Immersed Here then were all
the admitted signs and proofs of vamporism. The body, therefore,

(02:58:06):
in accordance with the ancient practice, was raised, and a
sharp stake driven through the heart of the vampire, who
uttered a piercing shriek at the moment in all respects
such as might escape from a living person. In the
last agony. Then the head was struck off, and a
torrent of blood flowed from the severed neck. The body

(02:58:27):
and head was next placed on a pile of wood
and reduced to ashes, which were thrown upon the river
and borne away. And that territory has never since been
plagued by the visits of a vampire. My father has
a copy of the report of the Imperial Commission, with
the signatures of all who were present at these proceedings

(02:58:48):
attached in verification of the statement. It is from this
official paper that I have summarized my account of this
last shocking scene. End of Chapter fifteen, Chapter sixteen conclusion.

(02:59:15):
I write all this, you suppose, with composure, but far
from it. I cannot think of it without agitation. Nothing
but your earnest desire. So repeatedly expressed, could have induced
me to sit down to a task that has unstrung
my nerves for months to come and reinduced a shadow
of the unspeakable horror, which, years after my deliverance, continued

(02:59:39):
to make my days and nights dreadful and solitude insupportably terrific.
Let me add a word or two about that quaint
Baron Vordenburg, to whose curious lore we were indebted for
the discovery of the Countess Mercalla's grave. He had taken
up his abode in Gratz, where, living upon a mere pittance,

(03:00:02):
which was all that remained to him of the once
princely estates of his family in Upper Steria, he devoted
himself to the minute and laborious investigation of the marvelously
authenticated tradition of vamporism. He had at his fingers ends
all the great and little works upon the subject Magia Postuma, Phlagon,

(03:00:24):
de Mirabilibus, Augustinus de Cura pro Mortuis, Philosophice et Cristiane,
Cogitacionis de Vampiris by John Christopher Herenberg, and a thousand others,
among which I remember only a few of those which
he lent to my father. He had of a luminous

(03:00:45):
digest of all the judicial cases from which he had
extracted a system of principles that appear to govern some
always and others occasionally only the condition of the vampire.
I may mention in passing that the deadly pallor attributed
to that sort of revenance is a mere melodramatic fiction.

(03:01:08):
They present in the grave, and when they show themselves
in human society the appearance of healthy life. When disclosed
to light in their coffins, they exhibit all the symptoms
that are enumerated as those which prove the vampire life
of the long dead Countess Carnstein. How they escape from

(03:01:28):
their graves and return to them for certain hours every
day without displacing the clay or leaving any trace of
disturbance in the state of the coffin or the cerements,
has always been admitted to be utterly inexplicable. The amphibious
existence of the vampire is sustained by daily renewed slumber
in the grave. Its horrible lust for living blood supplies

(03:01:51):
the vigor of its waking existence. The vampire is prone
to be fascinated with an engrossing vehemence, resembling the passion
of love by particular persons. In pursuit of these, it
will exercise inexhaustible patience and stratagem for access to a
particular object may be obstructed in a hundred ways. It

(03:02:13):
will never desist until it has satiated its passion and
drained the very life of its coveted victim. But it
will in these cases husband and protract its murderous enjoyment
with the refinement of an epicure, and heighten it by
the gradual approaches of an artful courtship. In these cases,

(03:02:36):
it seems to yearn for something like sympathy and consent.
In ordinary ones, it goes direct to its object, overpowers
with violence and strangles, and exhausts, often at a single feast.
The vampire is apparently subject in certain situations to special conditions.

(03:02:59):
In the particular instance of which I have given you
a relation, Mercalla seemed to be limited to a name which,
if not her real one, should at least reproduce without
the omission or edition of a single letter, those, as
we say anagrammatically, which compose it. Carmilla did this, so

(03:03:19):
did Millarca. My father related to the Baron Vordenburg, who
remained with us for two or three weeks after the
expulsion of Carmila the story about the Moravian nobleman and
the vampire at Carnstein churchyard. And then he asked the
Baron how he had discovered the exact position of the
long concealed tomb of the Countess Mercala. The Baron's grotesque

(03:03:43):
features puckered up into a mysterious smile. He looked down,
still smiling, on his worn spectacle case and fumbled with it. Then,
looking up, he said, I have many journals and other
papers written by that remarkable man. The most curious among
them is one treating of the visit of which you

(03:04:04):
speak to Carnstein. The tradition, of course, discolors and distorts
a little. He might have been termed a Moravian nobleman,
for he had changed his abode to that territory, and
was besides a noble, But he was in truth a
native of Upper Steria. It is enough to say that
in very early youth he had been a passionate and

(03:04:25):
favored lover of the beautiful Mercala, Countess Carnstein. Her early
death plunged him into inconsolable grief. It is the nature
of vampires to increase and multiply. But according to an
ascertained and ghostly law, assume at starting a territory perfectly
free from that pest. How does it begin and how

(03:04:49):
does it multiply itself? I will tell you. A person
more or less wicked puts an end to himself a
suicide under certain so circumstances, becomes a vampire. That specter
visits living people and their slumbers, they die, and almost
invariably in the grave, develop into vampires. This happened in

(03:05:12):
the case of the beautiful Mercala, who was haunted by
one of those demons. My ancestor Vordenburg, whose title I
still bear, soon discovered this, and, in the course of
the studies to which he devoted himself, learned a great
deal more. Among other things, he concluded that suspicion of

(03:05:33):
vamporism would probably fall sooner or later upon the dead countess,
who in life had been his idol. He conceived a
horror be she what she might of her remains being
profaned by the outrage of a posthumous execution. He has
left a curious paper to prove that the vampire, on
its expulsion from its amphibious existence, is projected into a

(03:05:57):
far more horrible life, and he resolved to save his
once beloved Mercala from this. He adopted the stratagem of
a journey here, a pretended removal of her remains and
a real obliteration of her monument. When age had stolen
upon him, and from the veil of years, he looked

(03:06:18):
back on the scenes he was leaving. He considered in
a different spirit what he had done, and a horror
took possession of him. He made the tracings and notes
which have guided me to the very spot, and drew
up a confession of the deception that he had practiced.
If he had intended any further action in this matter,

(03:06:39):
death prevented him, and the hand of a remote descendant has,
too late for many, directed the pursuit to the lair
of the beast. We talked a little more, and among
other things he said, was this. One sign of the
vampire is the power of the hand. The slender hand

(03:07:02):
of Mercalla closed like a vice of steel on the
General's wrist when he raised the hatchet to strike. But
its power is not confined to its grasp. It leaves
a numbness in the limb it seizes, which is slowly,
if ever, recovered. From the following spring, my father took

(03:07:22):
me on a tour through Italy. We remained away for
more than a year. It was long before the terror
of recent events subsided, And to this hour the image
of Carmilla returns to memory with ambiguous alternations. Sometimes the playful,
languid beautiful girl, sometimes the writhing fiend I saw in

(03:07:45):
the ruined church, and often from a reverie I have
started fancying I heard the light step of Carmilla at
the drawing room door. End of Carmilla by Jay Sheridan

(03:08:07):
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Carmilla - Joseph Sheridan le Fanu

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