LITERATURE.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1247, 6 March 1878, Page 3

LITERATURE.

IN THE DRAT) OF NIGHT. a ghost story. By Edmund Yates. [From the World."] (Con eluded.) ' All dark save where the rays of the unveiled lantern threw a streak, of light along the floor and the opposite wall, on which I c >uld see great of damn standing I lifted the lantern, and the light shifted at once, radiating on a porti n of the huge staircase and daucing - n the dim carvings of the balustrades. !u our most momen s we are always open to a t"Uch of the ridiculous and grotesque; and I protest to you that as I stood alone in that cavern 'us hall, with my heart beating almost audibly with ; n me, I thought of Mr Pickwick and his adv< ntures with the dark lantern and smiled involuntarily at the drollery of the reminisce" ce. Then taking my lantern in one hind, and gathering U|> the articles which my servant had left from the floor with the other, I started to ascend the stairs I had scarcely moved when the breath of damp salt air again blew coldly over me. more powerful this time, racing the hdr from my cheeks and fluttering the paper in which pouie of my things were wrapped ; and at the same time I heard, as plainly a? I havo ever heard anything in my life, the pattering s':undof a pair of fett small naked feet they seemed to my li-teu ing ear—dropping one after the other just in front o p me. I stopped, lowered t'>e lantern, and gazed intently in advance, but c >uld see nothing ; ihe footsteps had stopped too; but when I moved again, they recommeuced patter, patter; just the t-onnd < ne heirs at bed ime or in early morning on a nursery fh'or.

'.! Dassed my hand over my eyes and went on, the foot'teps precedii g me, till I reached the first floor I had previously detetmined to make this my resting-place f >r the night; and stopping at the drawing-room door heard the little feet go pattering up the staircase until the sound was lost in ihe distance. It had been strange and mysterious, this pattering sound ; but I. had found nothing territyii g in it, and there was a sense of regret when I felt myself des* rted i>y my unseen child-companion. Next moment I opened the door, and, entering, relieved myself of mv burd n. and to look round. A la l ge square room, with three windows, looking, as I imagined, on to the square, hung with hv*ge curtains of faded damask, overlapping the long pier-glas-ss which stretched from floor to ceil ing between thrm. The paintless shutters were closed, the bolts and hinges rusty. ver the sculptured mantel itce. which stood nearly six feet high, and half way between it and the ceiling, was a large circular mirror with two scones, covered with girandoles on either side, in the thousand facets <>f which the light of the lantern wa.i brilliantly reflected. On the hearth were some half burnt logs, which had never been cleared away since the time of the last tenant; and with these, and the bundle t of wood I had brought with me, I set about to make a ' re. The damp wood crackled and sputtered angrilv at fist; but eventua'ly it blazed up, and aided materially in dispelling ihe gloom which hung round the vst apartment, and in which the feeble light of the two candles my servant had : eft with me was as nothing Bub I p'aced them, with a volume of Wordsworth, a brandy-liisk, and my cigar-case on a sma'l table in the middle of the room; ami with the dark lantern in oue hand and a fix-barrelled Derringer in the other, I continued my survey of the a artment. < pposite the windows were two large folding-doors, one of them partly open Passing through the aperture I found myse'f in another itpartment, *-imilar in style and size, and hung on th r ee sides with fadeii tapestry; on the fourth, facing the foldingdoors by which I had entered was a large .■il painting. Raising the lantern to it, I found it to bo a portrait, p ob'a ! »y by Sir JoHhua or one of his closest imitators—a portrait of a woman, young and beautiful, dressed in a rose coloured brocaded saeque with a gray-silk quilted petthoat, from unde neath ' which peeped hr grey-silk stockings with r*d clocks, and her tiny shoes with high red hee's. H r dark chestnut hair, which she wore without powder, was massed upou her forehead, and fell in luxurious curls over her shoulders. The face was one of much beauty combined with great power—the eye-i gray, the nose aquiline, the lips full, the jaw set and firm. A strange face truly, the eyes gazing out from the canvas at me as 1 100-edatthem with a glance of superb scorn. Again and again I returned to a contemplation of this pcture. until at Jaht it s< emed to me as though its subject were endowed with life, as though the haughty glam-e grew haughtier still, and the outstretched ha d, holding the peacock fan, were waving me oil from further inves titration. I had made a round of the room, and was about to return to my first" pitch," when, through a portion of the tapestry, I perceived something like the outline of a door; and on pulling the masked curtaiu aside I discove ed a small square exit, lilting most ingeniously into the woodwork of the wall, passing through which I found myself about midway on the spiral staircase, which, as Norton has told you, traversed the building from the roof to the basement, with a means of communication to each of the diffceni floors It was at once obvious to me that if any trickery were to be expected at all, it wou'd be oa r ried out most effectua ly by this means ; and 1 took the precaution on my return, not merely to turn the rusty key in the lock on the inside, but to barricade it with a heavy ottoman which stood in the centre of the back room.

'I returned to the front drawing-room, where *he lire was now blazing brightlyi shut and locked the folding behind me, and seated myself at a lictle tabJe, with the idea of reading until I felt inclined to sleep. At that moment my senses were o ear, my mind well balanced, my brain in its normal active state. 1 laid my watch on the table, and checked t e beating of my pulse by it BfirVTeiity.five to the minute', its ordinary tate.

Since I had first heard the pattering noise on the stairs in front of me, when f commenced my asce t from the 1 wer hall I had felt n> fear, tnough the strange expression of the female port ait in the further room still haunted n-e unpleasantly, and would not he banished from my mental glared np r, n me from the walls fro>n the floor, from the pages of my h *ok which I had taken up, and was about to lay down in despair, when the iron tongues of the neighbouring church clocks clanged out 'he h"nr of midnight. The s und had scarcely ceased, thu air was still resounding with the vibration, when I heard a h>ng low cr>, a cry as if a child in ag ny or distress. It seemed to in the ha emeut, and to row in f rce and ex item' nt as it came sweeping up the stirs unt lit found articulation —" _ elp ! help !" —in api rein i childlike s'riek. I s zed my revolver and sprang to my feet. Then, as if jX a bias: from the damp salt air which Dime whirling into the chamber again, the dour flew open, the candles were extinguished, and the flamei f the burning legs threw a lurid light over the mom. ""elp! help!" The pitreing a peal was echoing on tbe landing. And now came atrrin the pattering of the childish feet, this time into the room and cose by the spot where I stood. hey pa sed me close, quicker and mire agitated than they had been at first; and after them were more footsteps, heavier th : s time those < f a man with a str ng determined stride ' Help ! help !" The cry waxed fainter. It skeined to pass through iuto the further ro in, the door swung heavily back of its own ace rd, and I sank into my chair with the cold drops of sweat standing on my brow ' How huiJ I remained thus, 1 know not. I imagine, however, that I but a few minutes to steady my nerves and regain my composure ; for when the clocks outside struck the half-hour I was sufficiently my self to be awa-e of the advantage of a light, and was creeping about for the match box, with the inteuion of re-lighting the extinguished candle. T dropped on my hands and knees for I thought I had heard the box fall under the table when I was sta tied with the sound of three loud knocks—loud, but muffled as it were by distance -heavy andßtrong. with an interval between each; the sound coming apparently from the basementfloor, yet far in the rear of the house. Instantly the descripti n which I hid hoard from Hort n of the closed cellar bey nd the servant*' stone hall flashed into my mind. It was thence the noise proceeded; it was thence whatever jugglery might have been at work - for up to that moment I refused to ascribe aU I had beard to supernatural agency—must have originated. I knew not its exact whereabouts, but from what I had heard I should probably easily discover it. I remembered the spiral staircaase outside ; the secret door in the back draring-ro->m would probably conduct me somewhere near it. I had still my trusted lantern to give me light. Taking it in my hand, and again seizi g my revolver, I open-d the foldingdoors. which I had pr vi msly ca'efully locked, and went into the back room. Involuntarily my first glance was at 'he oortrait. Great G-od, it was gone! The frame was still here, but empty; and the e, with her back to me, bending o er the old-fa-hion d escritoie. was the lady in the roseco'oured sacqne But what a chauge ! The h ur, falling dishevelled over her shoulders, was now thin and gray, her back was bent, her arms—s > much as I could see of them - yellow and wrinkled. I stood spell-bound. I longed to fly—for somehow 1 felt iutuitively 3 that if I looked upon her face I should die—but I was rooted to the spot. Still she pored over the empty desk, still her hands rummaged fruitlessly among the drawers as though in quest of papers, when suddenly through the dread silence came again the pattering of the naked feet, and the piteou-dy childish cry for help echoed along he staircase. At that moment the female raised its head, and, turnng slowly round, looked fully at me. The face of the portrait was no longer there, but in its place an aged wrinkled mask, bearing the imprint of every conceivable vice-faded Lust, active Hate, gnawing Revenue, and ungovernable Rage; aud round the wrinkled throat was a deep-blue line, and on either side beneath the ears the purple marks of the death grip. I saw her eye* glare, I saw her make one sto >t > wards me Then my sense 3 failed, and I fell heavily to the ground ' ******

• All your fault, you stupid idiot, for broa:hing the subjeot,'said George May to Tommy Tupman pushing over a huge bumper of claret towards Mr Wofrey, who, as he ceased speaking, suffered his head to upon Ms hands, and seemed about to faint; but he recover, d instantly, and though his words falter.-d and his ntther lip twitched a little, he soo ■ looked rouud with his soft grave smile, and said, 'Thanks ; don't trouble yourself about me; I am all right agaiu—recovered sooner than I did in Severn sijuatv. At eight o'clock the uexb morning my servant duly came with th* key, and found ma stretched on the flo>r in the back room still in a swoon ; the extinsuised candles and the brandy-flask and the b >ok were on the table as I had left the u, and there was the portrait exactly as I remembered r, so that there was no question of ocular dcceptiou. Wha* I saw I saw, and the truth of it I wdl attest to my dying day ' ' And have you ever hoard the footntep B*nee, may I inqure ?' asked one of the armymen. ' Yes ; or seen that horrible old woman !" inquired the other. * I was afraid you would ask me that,' said Wolfroy, more gravely than ever, ' and to both questions I must answer yes. <>n several occasions T have heard t!>e footsteps and I have seen the portrait, always on the si me date, and In the Dead of Nubt.'