LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume V, Issue 543, 15 March 1876, Page 3

LITERATURE.

FLITTERMOUSE WELL. (From Chamber's Journal.) {Continued.) After this, insatiable curiosity drew me each night towards this haunt. Sometimes I fancied I could descry two figures; sometimes, when I gazed down the well, rays of light shone from its inmost recesses, enticing me into its mysterious depths. I then saw that it was perilously deep, and that the bottom of it shelved down on one side to what appeared to be a passage. It was from this deep passage that the light seemed to shine. All these circumstances, and the absence of any trace of human interference, strengthened my belief in the supernatural tenants of Flittermouse "Well. I kept all my discoveries strictly to myself, and positively revelled in them. ' I will find out more yet,' I thought; ' I will brave the phantom, and compel it to disclose to me the mysteries of its existence.' I can well recall myself to mind as I was then—a haggard wild-looking boy, pale and attenuated with keeping night-watches, when I should have been enjoying the healthy sleep of childhood, crouched down, as well as my awkwardly long limbs would allow, with my hands clasped round my knees, and my long black hair hanging over the ever vigilant eyes whichTkept guard over the secret of the well.

Time passed, and the monotonous life of our household at the manor went on much as usual, and my mind was ever full of the excitement of my nightly adventure. I remember noticing, however, about this time, that one or two yeomen from neighbouring homesteads came to the manor, and that on these visits my grandfather roused himself a little from his usual apathy ; and after they were gone, he sat muttering half-iucoherently as he gazed into the red embers from his arm-chair by the hearth. After one of these visitors had come and gone, I was commissioned to carry a letter over the hill to Farmer Horwood. It was of importance, so my aunt informed me, and I was on no account to delay or loiter on the way. When I arrived at Blackness, Janet Horwood was busy as usual in the kitchen ; but this time she was not singing hymns, and her face, as she turned and saw me, wore a look which I had never seen on it before. It was a vindictive look, and one which sent an unpleasant chill to my heart. I explained my errand, which was to deliver the letter to the iarmer himself ; and instead of inviting me in, as was her custom, she left me standing at the door, and hurried away without a word. Her face Avas pale, and her lips compressed ; and I was wondering whether she were ill, when she presently returned, •and beckoned to me, still without speaking, to follow her. I followed, through the kitchen and along a dim white-washed passage, till we reached a musty room, where sat Farmer Horwood at his desk with pen and papers before him. I gave him the letter, and the message which accompanied it, and stood by whilst he read the former. When he had read it, he threw it down, and struck his list violently on the desk. 'At last,' said he, 'those villains shall be served as they deserve ! I have not forgotten the day when this house was broken into, or when the two best horses in my stable were stolen, to furnish means of escape to the wretches, when hard pressed. Thank goodness, I am not too old or decrepit to have my thare in their just punishment.' He seemed to be speaking more to himself than to us; but I heard what he said, and so did Janet, for her face grew still paler, and she drew near her father and touched his arm.

' The smugglers ! O father, there is not going to be another attack on them ?' she cried in a tone of great alarm. ' Surely we have been avenged enough. They have been quiet lately.' 'Pshaw ! nonsense,' said the farmer, rising hastily, on being reminded that he had spoken aloud; then, as Janet was about to speak again, he pushed her roughly to the door with a gesture of impatience. ' Peace, girl!' said he; ' what do women know of such things. You had better mind your own work.' Thus summarily ejected, we found ourselves once more in the white-washed passage; when Janet took me by the arm, and gazing into my face with a glance full of scornful anger, she said in a low voice: ' Boy, beware how you meddle with other folks' matters ! It leads to no . good, and your fooleries may be the ruin of those worth more than you.' With a look that emphasised her words, she turned towards a dark staircase, leaving me to find my way out of the house as best I could. Chapter 11. Once in the "open air, I was not long in hurrying away from Blackness, feeling more repugnance to Janet Horwood than ever ; but all the way home her face haunted me, and her words kept running in my ears. What had I done to deserve her warning ? She must have imagined, I at last concluded, that I had tampered with the letter I gave to her father ; and it did not detract from my dislike of the girl to feel that I had merited no such suspicion. It was a few nights after my visit to Blackness, that 1 chanced to go earlier than usual to my rendezvous at Flitter mouse Well. It was a dark and cold night, but I cared little for that, and concealed myself as usual to watch. Presently—yes ! did I not see in the black darkness a gray something moving ! I held my breath; and a minute after the bright rays streamed out as before round the edge of the well, and the outline of a bending figure came between me and the light. I had resolved that night, 'that if the apparition came again, I would rush out and challenge it. The moment was nearing; I would Avait but a few seconds longer. I waited, and the figure moved. It seemed to be twining something in its long arms. What did it mean ? Surely it must be some spell, some weird incantation. I gazed fas'-inatcd, whilst the wreathing arms went on twining and winding. The eerie notes of the screechowl fell on the stillness of the night, and the bats—from which the well derives its name —Avhirled closer and closer round the light. At length the movement ceased, and there followed a pause. The tigure appeared to bend over the brink, then- a second figure rose slowly from the well's mouth. This was too much for my feelings. ' Be it ghost or be it man,' I muttered, ' I am determined to find out what it is ;' and springing up, I rushed impetuously forward and clutched at the gray figure. The shock caused it to come into collision with the other form I had seen, and at the same moment I heard

a muttered oath, and then fell back stunned by a blow dealt heavily against my chest. When I awoke to consciousness, I also awoke to a sensation of pain. I must have been a considerable time on the grass, for though the morning had not dawned, the moon had risen, and the first objects on which my eyes rested were the swaying willow branches. For some time I was at a loss to collect my thoughts ; until, on stretching out my hands, I felt a precipice on one side of me, and on the other the dewy grass. This brought me to myself, and I found that I was lying in a perilous position close beside the well, with my feet hanging over its brink. With some difficulty, owing to the pain in my chest and the weary numbness of my limbs; I managed at length to rise ; and the remembrance of the night's events returning to my mind, I peered into the well. It looked dark and fathomless as ever ; but attached to the roots of the willow which hung over its mouth was a coarse rope, knotted together so as to form a rough sort of ladder. Several of the strands were broken, but it had evidently been used to assist some one to ascend or descend. Probably the second figure I had seen had just clambered up by it, when I caused so sudden and fell an interruption. So T thought: and I furthermore came to two conclusions. First, that ghosts would neither use rope-ladders nor administer such substantial blows as the one I had received; and that they must therefore have been human beings with whom I came in contact. Secondly, that I had most probably precipitated both, by my violence, to the bottom of the well. A horrible thought succeeded these reflections. They might be both lying there now, dead ; and if so, I was their murderer ! These ideas werfc too dreadful for me; a motive of concealment led me to take the next step—namely, to collect all the clods and bits of broken earth which lay scattered about the grass, and throw them, together with the rope-ladder, to the bottom of the well. Then, without waiting to hear the .sound of their fall, I lied, as fast as the pain in my limbs would allow me, away down the hill to my home. Arrived there, I crept in, as I had so often done before, at the casement, closed it, and sci'amWed into bed just as I was, drew the bed-clothes tightly round me, and remained there until the morning. What a night I passed! I shudder now when T think of it. At last, when morning dawned, I fell into a heavy slumber; and when 1 awoke, it was past noon. Unable to bear the weight of my solitary thoughts, I then crept down-stairs. I found an unusual stir in the generally stagnant household. My grandfather, Deborah, and even my aunt Barbara, were all talking of some stirring events, tidings of which had just been brought them by a man riding across conntry from Blackness to G .. These events, as far as I could gather, were as follows. It appeared that at daybreak that morning there had been a fray between the smugglers and the preventive men, aided by Farmer Horwood and other farmers and peasants. It had ended, after a long conflict and pursuit —-as it often did end—in the escape of all the smugglers' gang. As the farmer and his men were passing along the shore on the way home, however, they had heard groans, as of some one in great pain, issuing from among the rocks hard by. On following the direction of the sounds, they found, not far from the mouth of a small cave, one of the leaders of the smuggling party, whose absence at the late conflict had been remarked. The man was lying on the ground in a helpless state, and it was supposed that he had fallen over some obstacle on his way through the hidden recesses of the cave. On finding whom his groans had summoned, the poor fellow made a desperate though vain resistence, and was at length forced to yield to his captors, who bound him, and then proceeded to search further, in the hope of finding some of his associates. Instead of this, what was the farmer's horror, on perceiving the form of his daughter Janet lying insensible upon the rocky floor, with a terrible wound across her face ! The poor father, not knowing what to think or how to act, had both Janet and the prisoner conveyed to Blackness Farm, where their wounds were dressed by the surgeon, who was always at hand on the occasion of an engagement with the smugglers. On being restored to consciousness, the first thing which met the eyes of Janet Horwood was the lifeless form of the smuggler, who still lay where he had been set down in a state of insensibility. Supposing him dead, she uttered a piercing shriek, and breaking from those around her, threw herself down beside him, murmuring words of passionate grief and endearment. The father's horror at the confirmation of his worst fears can be better imagined than described. The girl was forcibly torn from her lover—for such the smuggler Avas —and, had it not been that the doctor positively forbade her removal until she should be sufficiently recovered to bear it with safety, the enraged parent would have cast her forth from his house at once. As it was, he denounced and disowned her with bitter words. In spite of many efforts, neither threats, entreaties, nor exhortations could force from the miserable girl one word concerning what had passed; and it was the same with the smuggler when at last he came to himself. (It was afterwards discovered that Janet had long been in the habit of meeting this man under cover of darkness, at Flittermouse Well, when he delivered into her safe keeping some of the contraband goods which fell to his share, receiving in exchange food and other necessaries,"vhich helped to support him and his comrades whilst they remained in hiding in the caves along the shore.) | To be continued.']