Theudelinde was much impressed by her strange visitor. His confidence infused courage into her weak mind, while his masterful ways influenced her like a spell. He addressed her from such a superior height that she felt it would be almost desecration not to place the utmost faith in his promises, and, nevertheless, he had promised to perform an impossible thing. How could she reconcile the two, unless, indeed, she had to do with a being of another world? She saw from the window the carriage drive away with the two clergymen. She watched them get in; she remained at her post until the carriage returned empty.

The female Jehu showed to the other servants the _pourboire_ she had received; it was a new silver piece. It pa.s.sed from hand to hand. What a miracle! Of the fifteen million inhabitants of Hungary, fourteen million five hundred thousand had never seen such a thing as a silver piece of money. There was a clergyman for you, of a very different pattern from that other, who gave, every Sunday, a fourpenny piece wrapped carefully in a piece of paper, to be _divided_ among the waitresses!

The time pa.s.sed slowly to the countess; the clock seemed to go with leaden weights. She wandered through all the rooms, her mind revolving in what possible manner, by what possible entrance a man could find his way into the castle. When it had struck seven o'clock she saw herself that every door which communicated with her wing was carefully locked; then she sat herself down in her own room. She took out the plan of the castle, which had been prepared by the Florentine artist who had built it. It was not the first time she had studied it; when she had received the castle as a present from her father, she had made herself mistress of every particular concerning it. The building was three times larger than her income could afford to maintain. She had, therefore, to choose which wing she would occupy. In the centre there were fine reception-rooms, a banqueting-hall, an armory, and a museum for pictures and curiosities. This portion was out of the question. Also, from this portion of the castle a concealed staircase led to a subterranean pa.s.sage. This could be used as a means of escape, and had no doubt served such a purpose when the old castle had been besieged by the Turks. The grandfather of the countess had walled up these steps, and no one could now get into the secret pa.s.sage. The left wing, which was similarly constructed to the one which the countess inhabited, had served as a sort of pleasure residence to her pleasure-loving ancestors. There were all manner of secret holes and corners in it, communications of all kinds connecting the rooms, doors behind pictures, concealed alcoves, and the like. The architect's plan showed these without any reticence. Theudelinde naturally turned away in horror from the idea of inhabiting this tainted wing, so full of sinful a.s.sociations; she set up her Lares and Penates in the less handsome, but more homely, right wing, where were a few good rooms fitted for domestic life, an excellent library, and the family vault below. It contained no other secret staircase than the one which led to the tombs of the departed members of the family. For the rest, Countess Theudelinde had taken care to wall up all the pa.s.sages which led to either the centre or left wing of the castle, and there was no means of communication between them and her apartments. All the chimneys had iron gates to shut off any possible entrance that way; every window was provided with strong iron bars. It would have been impossible for even a cat to effect an entrance into this enchanted castle.

The countess, meditating on all these precautions, came to the conclusion that there was only one way by which the Abbe Samuel could introduce himself into the house, and that was by a secret understanding with some one of her household. But again, setting altogether aside the high character borne by the priest, which would render such an act upon his part improbable, the very nature of the circ.u.mstances attending his visit made it impossible. He had never been absent from the countess for a minute, except during his short walk to the carriage, and then Herr Mahok had been his companion.

Theudelinde, therefore, dismissed the idea from her mind. She sent her household early to bed; she complained to Fraulein Emerenzia of suffering from pains on one side of her head. Immediately that sympathetic companion complained of pains on the other side of her head. When the countess thought she would try to sleep, Emerenzia felt the like desire; she wrapped her whole head up in warm cotton wool, and snored without mercy.

Theudelinde shut herself up in her bedroom and counted the minutes.

She tried to play Patience, but the cards would not come right; her mind was too much disturbed. She took out her Bible, splendidly ill.u.s.trated by Dore. She looked at all the pictures; she counted the figures of the different men and women upon those two hundred and thirty large plates; then the horses and the camels, till she came to the scenes of murders. Then she tried to pa.s.s the time by reading the text. She counted which letter of the alphabet was repeated the most frequently upon one side of the page. For the greater part the letter _a_ was the favorite, _e_ came next, then _o_, also _u_; _i_ was the worst represented. This was in the French print. In the Hungarian text _e_ had the majority, then _a_, _o_, and _i_, and, last of all, _b_ and _u_. But of this she also wearied. Then she sat down to the piano, and tried to calm her agitation by playing dreamy fantasias; neither did this succeed. Her hands trembled, and she could not sustain herself at the instrument, she was so wearied; and as the fatal hour of midnight drew nearer she gave up making efforts to distract her mind, and abandoned herself to thoughts of the impending ghostly tumult. She found herself altogether under the influence of her ancestral spectres, for she was always consumed with _ennui_ until the noise began. Then a sort of fever would come to her; she would undress herself, crawl into bed, draw the coverings over her head until she broke into a perspiration, and then fall into a deep sleep. The next morning, when she awoke, she really believed that she had witnessed the scenes of which she had only dreamed.

This night she drew forth her talisman, the photograph of the abbe, and tried to find some strength by considering it. She placed it before her on the reading-desk and sat gazing at it. Was he really a superior being, at whose command the doors of the castle would fly open, spectres would vanish, and the gates of h.e.l.l would close upon them? It could not be that such things would happen. The more the night advanced the greater grew her nervous fears. Her heart beat loudly. It was not so much the nightly ghosts that she dreaded, but this new and equally unearthly visitor. What was he? A wizard, an enchanter like Merlin of old, or a saint come to exorcise and banish her tormentors?

The weary lagging hours went by, until at last the pendulum of the old clock began to vibrate, and its iron tongue gave out midnight. The countess counted every stroke. Its vibration had hardly ceased when, punctual to its usual time, the infernal noise began; from the vault below the tones of the ma.s.s reached Theudelinde's ears. She was, however, listening for another sound, listening with feverish anxiety to catch a stealthy footfall in the adjoining room, to hear the rattle of a key surrept.i.tiously moving in the lock. Nothing! She came to the door, and, putting her head to the keyhole, strained her ears in vain.

All was still. It was now a quarter past midnight; the tumult in the vault below was in full swing--the witches' Sabbath, as it might be called, with its yells, shouts, songs, prayers; it was as if all the devils of h.e.l.l had given one another rendezvous in the company of the countess's ancestors.

"He will not come," she thought, and trembled in every limb of her fever-stricken body. It was folly to expect it. How could a man accomplish what is only permitted to spirits?

She retired to the alcove and prepared to lie down. At this moment she heard a tap at the door of her sitting-room, and, after a moment, a low voice spoke in firm tones--

"In nomine Domini aperientur portae fidelium."

It was the signal given by the abbe. Theudelinde gave a shriek; she nearly lost her senses from fright, but gathered herself together with a supreme effort. It was real; no hallucination, no dream! He was at the door, her deliverer. Forward!

The countess ran to the door and opened it. The crisis gave her unusual strength. This might be a trap, and instead of a deliverer she might find herself opposite to a robber or murderer. Under the carpet lay concealed the trap-door; the midnight visitor stood on the very spot. One pressure of the secret spring and down he went into the abyss below. Theudelinde had her foot on the spring as she undid the door.

There stood the abbe before her. No appearance of his clerical calling was to be seen. He wore a long coat, which reached to his feet, and carried neither bell, book, nor candle, wherewith to exorcise the spirits. In his right hand he held a thick stick made of rhinoceros'

skin, and in the left a dark lantern.

"Remain where you are," said the countess, in a commanding voice.

"Before you set foot in this room you shall tell me how you got here.

Was it with the help of G.o.d, of man, or of the devil?"

"Countess," returned the abbe, "look about you. Do you not see that every door in your castle stands open? Through these open doors I have pa.s.sed easily. How I pa.s.sed through the court is another thing. I will tell you that later."

"And my household, who sleep in those rooms?" said the countess, in an incredulous voice.

"The curtains hang round every bed; I have not raised them. If your household be asleep, they will no doubt sleep as the just do, without waking."

The countess listened, only half believing what she heard; she was growing nerveless again. She led the abbe into the sitting-room, and sank exhausted upon the sofa.

The tumult in the vault was indescribable.

"Do you hear _it_?" she said, in a whisper.

"I do hear, and I know whence it comes. I am here to face those who cause this unseemly riot."

"Have you the weapons that Holy Church has provided for such a task?"

asked Theudelinde, anxiously.

The priest for all answer held towards her the strong staff he carried.

"I have this good stick, countess."

"Do you hear above all the tumult that strident voice? It is my uncle Ladislaus," cried the countess, grasping the abbe's arm with both her hands. "Do you hear that horrible laugh? It is my uncle's laugh."

"We will soon learn the author of that unpleasant cachinnation,"

remarked the priest, quietly.

"Why, what do you propose to do?"

"I shall go down and join the worshipful society below."

"You will descend into the vault? What to do?"

"To pa.s.s judgment upon that unruly gang, countess. You promised to accompany me."

"I promised!" and Theudelinde retreated from him, her eyes staring wildly, her hands pressed to her breast.

"It was your own wish."

"True, true! I am so confused; my thoughts are all astray. I cannot recollect them. You here, and that fearful noise below! I am terribly afraid."

"How? You who had the courage to go among the ghosts by yourself, are you afraid now that _I_ am with you? Give me your hand."

The countess placed her trembling fingers in the abbe's hand, and as she felt the firm, manly clasp, an unusual sense of strength and protection possessed her; she ceased to shake and shiver, her eyes no longer saw shapes and fantasies moving before them; her heart began to beat steadily. The bare touch of this man's hand gave her new life.

"Come with me," he said, in a decided voice, while he stuck his whip under his left arm, and with the right drew the countess after him.

"Where are the keys of the secret staircase, and of the room through which we must pa.s.s?"

Theudelinde felt that she could not let go his hand for one minute.

She was for the moment, so to speak, mesmerized by his superior mind.

She crawled after him submissively; she should follow him, were it to the very gates of h.e.l.l itself. Without a word she pointed to the key cabinet, an antique piece of furniture which would have made the joy of a bric-a-brac collector, and in which there was a drawer full of keys.

Without a moment's hesitation the priest put his hand on the ones that were wanted. It was no miracle that he should do so, although to the weakened mind of his companion it appeared to be miraculous; on one of the keys there was the well-known sign of a vault key, the crucifix.

The abbe now drew aside the curtain which concealed the secret pa.s.sage to the library, and here, at the first step, he was met by a certain proof, if such were wanting, to show him the credit to be given to the countess's statements that she was in the habit of descending to the vault: as he opened the door a ma.s.s of cobwebs blew into his face. The countess, however, was firm in her hallucination. It is a phase of such nervous disorders as hers to believe that what they have dreamed is actual fact; they can even supply small details.

As the countess went up the steps she whispered to her companion--

"A window is broken here, and the wind whistles through it." And as they turned the angle of the steps there was a narrow slip-window which in the daytime gave light to the staircase, the panes of which were actually broken. She had never seen this. When they came to the door of the library she confided to the abbe that she was always frightened to pa.s.s the threshold.

"It is such a ghostly place!" she said. "When the moon shines through the shutter of the upper window it throws white specks upon the mosaic pattern of the marble floor, which makes it look like some mysterious writing. In one of the corners between two presses there is a gla.s.s case with a skeleton in it; in another case the wax impression, taken after death, of Ignatius Loyola."

Everything was precisely as the countess related. The moon shone through the upper panes of gla.s.s, the skeleton stood in his gla.s.s case, the waxen head of the dead saint lay in the other, but the countess had never crossed the threshold. In her childhood her nurse had told her these tales of the Bondavara Castle, and when she had become its mistress her first care had been to lock these rooms. Ten years' dust lay on the carpets, on the chairs and tables; cobwebs hung from the ceilings, mice played games in the deep wainscots, for no one ever came here.

At the moment in which the countess and her companion entered the library a certain peace reigned in the vault below. The tumult seemed lulled; there were neither shrieks nor demoniacal songs to be heard.

From the mortuary chapel, however, the notes of the organ reached the ears of the two listeners. It sounded like the prelude which is played in church before ma.s.s begins, only the chords of the prelude were all discords; it was as if the organ were played by a condemned spirit.