The Lair of the White Worm, Bram Stoker [novels to read .TXT] 📗

speaking with a rush, as if he wanted to come to the crucial point.

“Mr. Watford had not come in, but Lilla and Mimi were at home, and they made me feel very welcome.  They have all a great regard for my uncle.  I am glad of that any way, for I like them all—much.  We were having tea, when Mr. Caswall came to the door, attended by the negro.  Lilla opened the door herself.  The window of the living-room at the farm is a large one, and from within you cannot help seeing anyone coming.  Mr. Caswall said he had ventured to call, as he wished to make the acquaintance of all his tenants, in a less formal way, and more individually, than had been possible to him on the previous day.  The girls made him welcome—they are very sweet girls those, sir; someone will be very happy some day there—with either of them.”

“And that man may be you, Adam,” said Mr. Salton heartily.

A sad look came over the young man’s eyes, and the fire his uncle had seen there died out.  Likewise the timbre left his voice, making it sound lonely.

“Such might crown my life.  But that happiness, I fear, is not for me—or not without pain and loss and woe.”

“Well, it’s early days yet!” cried Sir Nathaniel heartily.

The young man turned on him his eyes, which had now grown excessively sad.

“Yesterday—a few hours ago—that remark would have given me new hope—new courage; but since then I have learned too much.”

The old man, skilled in the human heart, did not attempt to argue in such a matter.

“Too early to give in, my boy.”

“I am not of a giving-in kind,” replied the young man earnestly.  “But, after all, it is wise to realise a truth.  And when a man, though he is young, feels as I do—as I have felt ever since yesterday, when I first saw Mimi’s eyes—his heart jumps.  He does not need to learn things.  He knows.”

There was silence in the room, during which the twilight stole on imperceptibly.  It was Adam who again broke the silence.

“Do you know, uncle, if we have any second sight in our family?”

“No, not that I ever heard about.  Why?”

“Because,” he answered slowly, “I have a conviction which seems to answer all the conditions of second sight.”

“And then?” asked the old man, much perturbed.

“And then the usual inevitable.  What in the Hebrides and other places, where the Sight is a cult—a belief—is called ‘the doom’—the court from which there is no appeal.  I have often heard of second sight—we have many western Scots in Australia; but I have realised more of its true inwardness in an instant of this afternoon than I did in the whole of my life previously—a granite wall stretching up to the very heavens, so high and so dark that the eye of God Himself cannot see beyond.  Well, if the Doom must come, it must.  That is all.”

The voice of Sir Nathaniel broke in, smooth and sweet and grave.

“Can there not be a fight for it?  There can for most things.”

“For most things, yes, but for the Doom, no.  What a man can do I shall do.  There will be—must be—a fight.  When and where and how I know not, but a fight there will be.  But, after all, what is a man in such a case?”

“Adam, there are three of us.”  Salton looked at his old friend as he spoke, and that old friend’s eyes blazed.

“Ay, three of us,” he said, and his voice rang.

There was again a pause, and Sir Nathaniel endeavoured to get back to less emotional and more neutral ground.

“Tell us of the rest of the meeting.  Remember we are all pledged to this.  It is a fight à l’outrance, and we can afford to throw away or forgo no chance.”

“We shall throw away or lose nothing that we can help.  We fight to win, and the stake is a life—perhaps more than one—we shall see.”  Then he went on in a conversational tone, such as he had used when he spoke of the coming to the farm of Edgar Caswall: “When Mr. Caswall came in, the negro went a short distance away and there remained.  It gave me the idea that he expected to be called, and intended to remain in sight, or within hail.  Then Mimi got another cup and made fresh tea, and we all went on together.”

“Was there anything uncommon—were you all quite friendly?” asked Sir Nathaniel quietly.

“Quite friendly.  There was nothing that I could notice out of the common—except,” he went on, with a slight hardening of the voice, “except that he kept his eyes fixed on Lilla, in a way which was quite intolerable to any man who might hold her dear.”

“Now, in what way did he look?” asked Sir Nathaniel.

“There was nothing in itself offensive; but no one could help noticing it.”

“You did.  Miss Watford herself, who was the victim, and Mr. Caswall, who was the offender, are out of range as witnesses.  Was there anyone else who noticed?”

“Mimi did.  Her face flamed with anger as she saw the look.”

“What kind of look was it?  Over-ardent or too admiring, or what?  Was it the look of a lover, or one who fain would be?  You understand?”

“Yes, sir, I quite understand.  Anything of that sort I should of course notice.  It would be part of my preparation for keeping my self-control—to which I am pledged.”

“If it were not amatory, was it threatening?  Where was the offence?”

Adam smiled kindly at the old man.

“It was not amatory.  Even if it was, such was to be expected.  I should be the last man in the world to object, since I am myself an offender in that respect.  Moreover, not only have I been taught to fight fair, but by nature I believe I am just.  I would be as tolerant of and as liberal to a rival as I should expect him to be to me.  No, the look I mean was nothing of that kind.  And so long as it did not lack proper respect, I should not of my own part condescend to notice it.  Did you ever study the eyes of a hound?”

“At rest?”

“No, when he is following his instincts!  Or, better still,” Adam went on, “the eyes of a bird of prey when he is following his instincts.  Not when he is swooping, but merely when he is watching his quarry?”

“No,” said Sir Nathaniel, “I don’t know that I ever did.  Why, may I ask?”

“That was the look.  Certainly not amatory or anything of that kind—yet it was, it struck me, more dangerous, if not so deadly as an actual threatening.”

Again there was a silence, which Sir Nathaniel broke as he stood up:

“I think it would be well if we all thought over this by ourselves.  Then we can renew the subject.”

CHAPTER VII—OOLANGA

Mr. Salton had an appointment for six o’clock at Liverpool.  When he had driven off, Sir Nathaniel took Adam by the arm.

“May I come with you for a while to your study?  I want to speak to you privately without your uncle knowing about it, or even what the subject is.  You don’t mind, do you?  It is not idle curiosity.  No, no.  It is on the subject to which we are all committed.”

“Is it necessary to keep my uncle in the dark about it?  He might be offended.”

“It is not necessary; but it is advisable.  It is for his sake that I asked.  My friend is an old man, and it might concern him unduly—even alarm him.  I promise you there shall be nothing that could cause him anxiety in our silence, or at which he could take umbrage.”

“Go on, sir!” said Adam simply.

“You see, your uncle is now an old man.  I know it, for we were boys together.  He has led an uneventful and somewhat self-contained life, so that any such condition of things as has now arisen is apt to perplex him from its very strangeness.  In fact, any new matter is trying to old people.  It has its own disturbances and its own anxieties, and neither of these things are good for lives that should be restful.  Your uncle is a strong man, with a very happy and placid nature.  Given health and ordinary conditions of life, there is no reason why he should not live to be a hundred.  You and I, therefore, who both love him, though in different ways, should make it our business to protect him from all disturbing influences.  I am sure you will agree with me that any labour to this end would be well spent.  All right, my boy!  I see your answer in your eyes; so we need say no more of that.  And now,” here his voice changed, “tell me all that took place at that interview.  There are strange things in front of us—how strange we cannot at present even guess.  Doubtless some of the difficult things to understand which lie behind the veil will in time be shown to us to see and to understand.  In the meantime, all we can do is to work patiently, fearlessly, and unselfishly, to an end that we think is right.  You had got so far as where Lilla opened the door to Mr. Caswall and the negro.  You also observed that Mimi was disturbed in her mind at the way Mr. Caswall looked at her cousin.”

“Certainly—though ‘disturbed’ is a poor way of expressing her objection.”

“Can you remember well enough to describe Caswall’s eyes, and how Lilla looked, and what Mimi said and did?  Also Oolanga, Caswall’s West African servant.”

“I’ll do what I can, sir.  All the time Mr. Caswall was staring, he kept his eyes fixed and motionless—but not as if he was in a trance.  His forehead was wrinkled up, as it is when one is trying to see through or into something.  At the best of times his face has not a gentle expression; but when it was screwed up like that it was almost diabolical.  It frightened poor Lilla so that she trembled, and after a bit got so pale that I thought she had fainted.  However, she held up and tried to stare back, but in a feeble kind of way.  Then Mimi came close and held her hand.  That braced her up, and—still, never ceasing her return stare—she got colour again and seemed more like herself.”

“Did he stare too?”

“More than ever.  The weaker Lilla seemed, the stronger he became, just as if he were feeding on her strength.  All at once she turned round, threw up her hands, and fell down in a faint.  I could not see what else happened just then, for Mimi had thrown herself on her knees beside her and hid her from me.  Then there was something like a black shadow between us, and there was the nigger, looking more like a malignant devil than ever.  I am not usually a patient man, and the sight of that ugly devil is enough to make one’s blood boil.  When he saw my face, he seemed to realise danger—immediate danger—and slunk out of the room as noiselessly as if he had been blown out.  I learned one thing, however—he is an enemy, if ever a man had one.”

“That still leaves us three to two!” put in Sir Nathaniel.

“Then Caswall slunk out, much as the nigger had done.  When he had gone, Lilla recovered at once.”

“Now,” said Sir Nathaniel, anxious to restore peace, “have you found out anything yet regarding the negro?  I am anxious to be posted regarding him.  I fear there will be, or may be, grave trouble with him.”

“Yes, sir, I’ve heard a good deal about him—of course it is not official; but hearsay must guide us at first.  You know my man Davenport—private secretary, confidential man of business, and general factotum.  He is devoted to me, and has my full confidence.  I asked him to stay on board the West African and have a good look round, and find out what he could about Mr. Caswall.  Naturally, he was struck with the aboriginal savage.  He found one of the ship’s stewards, who had been on the regular voyages to South Africa.  He knew Oolanga and had made a study of him.  He is a man who gets on well with niggers, and they open their hearts to him.  It seems that this Oolanga is quite a great person in the nigger world of the African West Coast.  He has the two things which men of his own colour respect: he can make them afraid, and he is lavish with money.  I don’t know whose money—but that does not matter.  They are always ready to trumpet his greatness.  Evil greatness it is—but neither does that matter.  Briefly, this is his history.  He was originally a witch-finder—about as low an occupation as exists amongst aboriginal