Complete Works of Bram Stoker (348 page)

RUPERT’S JOURNAL  — 
Continued
.

April
16, 1907.

The only relief I have had from the haunting anxiety regarding the Lady of the Shroud has been in the troubled state of my adopted country.  There has evidently been something up which I have not been allowed to know.  The mountaineers are troubled and restless; are wandering about, singly and in parties, and holding meetings in strange places.  This is what I gather used to be in old days when intrigues were on foot with Turks, Greeks, Austrians, Italians, Russians.  This concerns me vitally, for my mind has long been made up to share the fortunes of the Land of the Blue Mountains.  For good or ill I mean to stay here:
J’y suis
,
j’y reste
.  I share henceforth the lot of the Blue Mountaineers; and not Turkey, nor Greece, nor Austria, nor Italy, nor Russia  —  no, not France nor Germany either; not man nor God nor Devil shall drive me from my purpose.  With these patriots I throw in my lot!  My only difficulty seemed at first to be with the men themselves.  They are so proud that at the beginning I feared they would not even accord me the honour of being one of them!  However, things always move on somehow, no matter what difficulties there be at the beginning.  Never mind!  When one looks back at an accomplished fact the beginning is not to be seen  —  and if it were it would not matter.  It is not of any account, anyhow.

I heard that there was going to be a great meeting near here yesterday afternoon, and I attended it.  I think it was a success.  If such is any proof, I felt elated as well as satisfied when I came away.  Aunt Janet’s Second Sight on the subject was comforting, though grim, and in a measure disconcerting.  When I was saying good-night she asked me to bend down my head.  As I did so, she laid her hands on it and passed them all over it.  I heard her say to herself:

“Strange!  There’s nothing there; yet I could have sworn I saw it!”  I asked her to explain, but she would not.  For once she was a little obstinate, and refused point blank to even talk of the subject.  She was not worried nor unhappy; so I had no cause for concern.  I said nothing, but I shall wait and see.  Most mysteries become plain or disappear altogether in time.  But about the meeting  —  lest I forget!

When I joined the mountaineers who had assembled, I really think they were glad to see me; though some of them seemed adverse, and others did not seem over well satisfied.  However, absolute unity is very seldom to be found.  Indeed, it is almost impossible; and in a free community is not altogether to be desired.  When it is apparent, the gathering lacks that sense of individual feeling which makes for the real consensus of opinion  —  which is the real unity of purpose.  The meeting was at first, therefore, a little cold and distant.  But presently it began to thaw, and after some fiery harangues I was asked to speak.  Happily, I had begun to learn the Balkan language as soon as ever Uncle Roger’s wishes had been made known to me, and as I have some facility of tongues and a great deal of experience, I soon began to know something of it.  Indeed, when I had been here a few weeks, with opportunity of speaking daily with the people themselves, and learned to understand the intonations and vocal inflexions, I felt quite easy in speaking it.  I understood every word which had up to then been spoken at the meeting, and when I spoke myself I felt that they understood.  That is an experience which every speaker has in a certain way and up to a certain point.  He knows by some kind of instinct if his hearers are with him; if they respond, they must certainly have understood.  Last night this was marked.  I felt it every instant I was talking and when I came to realise that the men were in strict accord with my general views, I took them into confidence with regard to my own personal purpose.  It was the beginning of a mutual trust; so for peroration I told them that I had come to the conclusion that what they wanted most for their own protection and the security and consolidation of their nation was arms  —  arms of the very latest pattern.  Here they interrupted me with wild cheers, which so strung me up that I went farther than I intended, and made a daring venture.  “Ay,” I repeated, “the security and consolidation of your country  —  of
our
country, for I have come to live amongst you.  Here is my home whilst I live.  I am with you heart and soul.  I shall live with you, fight shoulder to shoulder with you, and, if need be, shall die with you!”  Here the shouting was terrific, and the younger men raised their guns to fire a salute in Blue Mountain fashion.  But on the instant the Vladika   held up his hands and motioned them to desist.  In the immediate silence he spoke, sharply at first, but later ascending to a high pitch of single-minded, lofty eloquence.  His words rang in my ears long after the meeting was over and other thoughts had come between them and the present.

“Silence!” he thundered.  “Make no echoes in the forest or through the hills at this dire time of stress and threatened danger to our land.  Bethink ye of this meeting, held here and in secret, in order that no whisper of it may be heard afar.  Have ye all, brave men of the Blue Mountains, come hither through the forest like shadows that some of you, thoughtless, may enlighten your enemies as to our secret purpose?  The thunder of your guns would doubtless sound well in the ears of those who wish us ill and try to work us wrong.  Fellow-countrymen, know ye not that the Turk is awake once more for our harming?  The Bureau of Spies has risen from the torpor which came on it when the purpose against our Teuta roused our mountains to such anger that the frontiers blazed with passion, and were swept with fire and sword.  Moreover, there is a traitor somewhere in the land, or else incautious carelessness has served the same base purpose.  Something of our needs  —  our doing, whose secret we have tried to hide, has gone out.  The myrmidons of the Turk are close on our borders, and it may be that some of them have passed our guards and are amidst us unknown.  So it behoves us doubly to be discreet.  Believe me that I share with you, my brothers, our love for the gallant Englishman who has come amongst us to share our sorrows and ambitions  —  and I trust it may be our joys.  We are all united in the wish to do him honour  —  though not in the way by which danger might be carried on the wings of love.  My brothers, our newest brother comes to us from the Great Nation which amongst the nations has been our only friend, and which has ere now helped us in our direst need  —  that mighty Britain whose hand has ever been raised in the cause of freedom.  We of the Blue Mountains know her best as she stands with sword in hand face to face with our foes.  And this, her son and now our brother, brings further to our need the hand of a giant and the heart of a lion.  Later on, when danger does not ring us round, when silence is no longer our outer guard; we shall bid him welcome in true fashion of our land.  But till then he will believe  —  for he is great-hearted  —  that our love and thanks and welcome are not to be measured by sound.  When the time comes, then shall be sound in his honour  —  not of rifles alone, but bells and cannon and the mighty voice of a free people shouting as one.  But now we must be wise and silent, for the Turk is once again at our gates.  Alas! the cause of his former coming may not be, for she whose beauty and nobility and whose place in our nation and in our hearts tempted him to fraud and violence is not with us to share even our anxiety.”

Here his voice broke, and there arose from all a deep wailing sound, which rose and rose till the woods around us seemed broken by a mighty and long-sustained sob.  The orator saw that his purpose was accomplished, and with a short sentence finished his harangue: “But the need of our nation still remains!”  Then, with an eloquent gesture to me to proceed, he merged in the crowd and disappeared.

How could I even attempt to follow such a speaker with any hope of success?  I simply told them what I had already done in the way of help, saying:

“As you needed arms, I have got them.  My agent sends me word through the code between us that he has procured for me  —  for us  —  fifty thousand of the newest-pattern rifles, the French Ingis-Malbron, which has surpassed all others, and sufficient ammunition to last for a year of war.  The first section is in hand, and will soon be ready for consignment.  There are other war materials, too, which, when they arrive, will enable every man and woman  —  even the children  —  of our land to take a part in its defence should such be needed.  My brothers, I am with you in all things, for good or ill!”

It made me very proud to hear the mighty shout which arose.  I had felt exalted before, but now this personal development almost unmanned me.  I was glad of the long-sustained applause to recover my self-control.

I was quite satisfied that the meeting did not want to hear any other speaker, for they began to melt away without any formal notification having been given.  I doubt if there will be another meeting soon again.  The weather has begun to break, and we are in for another spell of rain.  It is disagreeable, of course; but it has its own charm.  It was during a spell of wet weather that the Lady of the Shroud came to me.  Perhaps the rain may bring her again.  I hope so, with all my soul.

RUPERT’S JOURNAL  — 
Continued
.

April
23, 1907.

The rain has continued for four whole days and nights, and the low-lying ground is like a quagmire in places.  In the sunlight the whole mountains glisten with running streams and falling water.  I feel a strange kind of elation, but from no visible cause.  Aunt Janet rather queered it by telling me, as she said good-night, to be very careful of myself, as she had seen in a dream last night a figure in a shroud.  I fear she was not pleased that I did not take it with all the seriousness that she did.  I would not wound her for the world if I could help it, but the idea of a shroud gets too near the bone to be safe, and I had to fend her off at all hazards.  So when I doubted if the Fates regarded the visionary shroud as of necessity appertaining to me, she said, in a way that was, for her, almost sharp:

“Take care, laddie.  ‘Tis ill jesting wi’ the powers o’ time Unknown.”

Perhaps it was that her talk put the subject in my mind.  The woman needed no such aid; she was always there; but when I locked myself into my room that night, I half expected to find her in the room.  I was not sleepy, so I took a book of Aunt Janet’s and began to read.  The title was “On the Powers and Qualities of Disembodied Spirits.”  “Your grammar,” said I to the author, “is hardly attractive, but I may learn something which might apply to her.  I shall read your book.”  Before settling down to it, however, I thought I would have a look at the garden.  Since the night of the visit the garden seemed to have a new attractiveness for me: a night seldom passed without my having a last look at it before turning in.  So I drew the great curtain and looked out.

The scene was beautiful, but almost entirely desolate.  All was ghastly in the raw, hard gleams of moonlight coming fitfully through the masses of flying cloud.  The wind was rising, and the air was damp and cold.  I looked round the room instinctively, and noticed that the fire was laid ready for lighting, and that there were small-cut logs of wood piled beside the hearth.  Ever since that night I have had a fire laid ready.  I was tempted to light it, but as I never have a fire unless I sleep in the open, I hesitated to begin.  I went back to the window, and, opening the catch, stepped out on the terrace.  As I looked down the white walk and let my eyes range over the expanse of the garden, where everything glistened as the moonlight caught the wet, I half expected to see some white figure flitting amongst the shrubs and statues.  The whole scene of the former visit came back to me so vividly that I could hardly believe that any time had passed since then.  It was the same scene, and again late in the evening.  Life in Vissarion was primitive, and early hours prevailed  —  though not so late as on that night.

As I looked I thought I caught a glimpse of something white far away.  It was only a ray of moonlight coming through the rugged edge of a cloud.  But all the same it set me in a strange state of perturbation.  Somehow I seemed to lose sight of my own identity.  It was as though I was hypnotised by the situation or by memory, or perhaps by some occult force.  Without thinking of what I was doing, or being conscious of any reason for it, I crossed the room and set light to the fire.  Then I blew out the candle and came to the window again.  I never thought it might be a foolish thing to do  —  to stand at a window with a light behind me in this country, where every man carries a gun with him always.  I was in my evening clothes, too, with my breast well marked by a white shirt.  I opened the window and stepped out on the terrace.  There I stood for many minutes, thinking.  All the time my eyes kept ranging over the garden.  Once I thought I saw a white figure moving, but it was not followed up, so, becoming conscious that it was again beginning to rain, I stepped back into the room, shut the window, and drew the curtain.  Then I realised the comforting appearance of the fire, and went over and stood before it.

Hark!  Once more there was a gentle tapping at the window.  I rushed over to it and drew the curtain.

There, out on the rain-beaten terrace, stood the white shrouded figure, more desolate-appearing than ever.  Ghastly pale she looked, as before, but her eyes had an eager look which was new.  I took it that she was attracted by the fire, which was by now well ablaze, and was throwing up jets of flame as the dry logs crackled.  The leaping flames threw fitful light across the room, and every gleam threw the white-clad figure into prominence, showing the gleam of the black eyes, and fixing the stars that lay in them.

Without a word I threw open the window, and, taking the white hand extended to me, drew into the room the Lady of the Shroud.

As she entered and felt the warmth of the blazing fire, a glad look spread over her face.  She made a movement as if to run to it.  But she drew back an instant after, looking round with instinctive caution.  She closed the window and bolted it, touched the lever which spread the grille across the opening, and pulled close the curtain behind it.  Then she went swiftly to the door and tried if it was locked.  Satisfied as to this, she came quickly over to the fire, and, kneeling before it, stretched out her numbed hands to the blaze.  Almost on the instant her wet shroud began to steam.  I stood wondering.  The precautions of secrecy in the midst of her suffering  —  for that she did suffer was only too painfully manifest  —  must have presupposed some danger.  Then and there my mind was made up that there should no harm assail her that I by any means could fend off.  Still, the present must be attended to; pneumonia and other ills stalked behind such a chill as must infallibly come on her unless precautions were taken.  I took again the dressing-gown which she had worn before and handed it to her, motioning as I did so towards the screen which had made a dressing-room for her on the former occasion.  To my surprise she hesitated.  I waited.  She waited, too, and then laid down the dressing-gown on the edge of the stone fender.  So I spoke: