Varney the Vampire by Thomas Preskett Prest

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"Yes, yes."

"Who may I have the honour to say, sir, wants to see him?"

"Admiral Bell."

"Certainly, admiral, certainly. You'll find him a very conversible,
nice, gentlemanly little man, sir."

"And tell him as Jack Pringle is here, too," cried the seaman.

"Oh, yes, yes--of course," said the landlord, who was in such a state of
confusion from the digs in the ribs he had received and the noise his
guests had already made in his house, that, had he been suddenly put
upon his oath, he would scarcely have liked to say which was the master
and which was the man.

"The idea now, Jack," said the admiral, "of coming all this way to see a
lawyer."

"Ay, ay, sir."

"If he'd said he was a lawyer, we would have known what to do. But it's
a take in, Jack."

"So I think. Howsomdever, we'll serve him out when we catch him, you
know."

"Good--so we will."

"And, then, again, he may know something about Master Charles, sir, you
know. Lord love him, don't you remember when he came aboard to see you
once at Portsmouth?"

"Ah! I do, indeed."

"And how he said he hated the French, and quite a baby, too. What
perseverance and sense. 'Uncle,' says he to you, 'when I'm a big man,
I'll go in a ship, and fight all the French in a heap,' says he. 'And
beat 'em, my boy, too,' says you; cos you thought he'd forgot that; and
then he says, 'what's the use of saying that, stupid?--don't we always
beat 'em?'"

The admiral laughed and rubbed his hands, as he cried aloud,--

"I remember, Jack--I remember him. I was stupid to make such a remark."

"I know you was--a d----d old fool I thought you."

"Come, come. Hilloa, there!"

"Well, then, what do you call me no seaman for?"

"Why, Jack, you bear malice like a marine."

"There you go again. Goodbye. Do you remember when we were yard arm to
yard arm with those two Yankee frigates, and took 'em both! You didn't
call me a marine then, when the scuppers were running with blood. Was I
a seaman then?"

"You were, Jack--you were; and you saved my life."

"I didn't."

"You did."

"I say I didn't--it was a marlin-spike."

"But I say you did, you rascally scoundrel.--I say you did, and I won't
be contradicted in my own ship."

"Call this your ship?"

"No, d--n it--I--"

"Mr. Crinkles," said the landlord, flinging the door wide open, and so
at once putting an end to the discussion which always apparently had a
tendency to wax exceedingly warm.

"The shark, by G--d!" said Jack.

A little, neatly dressed man made his appearance, and advanced rather
timidly into the room. Perhaps he had heard from the landlord that the
parties who had sent for him were of rather a violent sort.

"So you are Crinkles, are you?" cried the admiral. "Sit down, though you
are a lawyer."

"Thank you, sir. I am an attorney, certainly, and my name as certainly
is Crinkles."

"Look at that."

The admiral placed the letter in the little lawyer's hands, who said,--

"Am I to read it?"

"Yes, to be sure."

"Aloud?"

"Read it to the devil, if you like, in a pig's whisper, or a West India
hurricane."

"Oh, very good, sir. I--I am willing to be agreeable, so I'll read it
aloud, if it's all the same to you."

He then opened the letter, and read as follows:--

"To Admiral Bell.

"Admiral,--Being, from various circumstances, aware that you take
a warm and a praiseworthy interest in your nephew, Charles
Holland, I venture to write to you concerning a matter in which
your immediate and active co-operation with others may rescue him
from a condition which will prove, if allowed to continue, very
much to his detriment, and ultimate unhappiness.

"You are, then, hereby informed, that he, Charles Holland, has,
much earlier than he ought to have done, returned to England, and
that the object of his return is to contract a marriage into a
family in every way objectionable, and with a girl who is highly
objectionable.

"You, admiral, are his nearest and almost his only relative in
the world; you are the guardian of his property, and, therefore,
it becomes a duty on your part to interfere to save him from the
ruinous consequences of a marriage, which is sure to bring ruin
and distress upon himself and all who take an interest in his
welfare.

"The family he wishes to marry into is named Bannerworth, and the
young lady's name is Flora Bannerworth. When, however, I inform
you that a vampyre is in that family, and that if he marries into
it, he marries a vampyre, and will have vampyres for children, I
trust I have said enough to warn you upon the subject, and to
induce you to lose no time in repairing to the spot.

"If you stop at the Nelson's Arms at Uxotter, you will hear of
me. I can be sent for, when I will tell you more.

"Yours, very obediently and humbly,

"JOSIAH CRINKLES."

"P.S. I enclose you Dr. Johnson's definition of a vampyre, which
is as follows:

"VAMPYRE (a German blood-sucker)--by which you perceive how many
vampyres, from time immemorial, must have been well entertained
at the expense of John Bull, at the court of St. James, where no
thing hardly is to be met with but German blood-suckers."

[Illustration]

* * * * *

The lawyer ceased to read, and the amazed look with which he glanced at
the face of Admiral Bell would, under any other circumstances, have much
amused him. His mind, however, was by far too much engrossed with a
consideration of the danger of Charles Holland, his nephew, to be amused
at anything; so, when he found that the little lawyer said nothing, he
bellowed out,--

"Well, sir?"

"We--we--well," said the attorney.

"I've sent for you, and here you are, and here I am, and here's Jack
Pringle. What have you got to say?"

"Just this much," said Mr. Crinkles, recovering himself a little, "just
this much, sir, that I never saw that letter before in all my life."

"You--never--saw--it?"

"Never."

"Didn't you write it?"

"On my solemn word of honour, sir, I did not."

Jack Pringle whistled, and the admiral looked puzzled. Like the admiral
in the song, too, he "grew paler," and then Mr. Crinkles added,--

"Who has forged my name to a letter such as this, I cannot imagine. As
for writing to you, sir, I never heard of your existence, except
publicly, as one of those gallant officers who have spent a long life in
nobly fighting their country's battles, and who are entitled to the
admiration and the applause of every Englishman."

Jack and the admiral looked at each other in amazement, and then the
latter exclaimed,--

"What! This from a lawyer?"

"A lawyer, sir," said Crinkles, "may know how to appreciate the deeds of
gallant men, although he may not be able to imitate them. That letter,
sir, is a forgery, and I now leave you, only much gratified at the
incident which has procured me the honour of an interview with a
gentleman, whose name will live in the history of his country. Good day,
sir! Good day!"

"No! I'm d----d if you go like that," said Jack, as he sprang to the
door, and put his back against it. "You shall take a glass with me in
honour of the wooden walls of Old England, d----e, if you was twenty
lawyers."

"That's right, Jack," said the admiral. "Come, Mr. Crinkles, I'll think,
for your sake, there may be two decent lawyers in the world, and you one
of them. We must have a bottle of the best wine the ship--I mean the
house--can afford together."

"If it is your command, admiral, I obey with pleasure," said the
attorney; "and although I assure you, on my honour, I did not write that
letter, yet some of the matters mentioned in it are so generally
notorious here, that I can afford you information concerning them."

"Can you?"

"I regret to say I can, for I respect the parties."

"Sit down, then--sit down. Jack, run to the steward's room and get the
wine. We will go into it now starboard and larboard. Who the deuce could
have written that letter?"

"I have not the least idea, sir."

"Well--well, never mind; it has brought me here, that's something, so I
won't grumble much at it. I didn't know my nephew was in England, and I
dare say he didn't know I was; but here we both are, and I won't rest
till I've seen him, and ascertained how the what's-its-name--"

"The vampyre."

"Ah! the vampyre."

"Shiver my timbers!" said Jack Pringle, who now brought in some wine
much against the remonstrances of the waiters of the establishment, who
considered that he was treading upon their vested interests by so
doing.--"Shiver my timbers, if I knows what a _wamphigher_ is, unless
he's some distant relation to Davy Jones!"

"Hold your ignorant tongue," said the admiral; "nobody wants you to make
a remark, you great lubber!"

"Very good," said Jack, and he sat down the wine on the table, and then
retired to the other end of the room, remarking to himself that he was
not called a great lubber on a certain occasion, when bullets were
scuttling their nobs, and they were yard arm and yard arm with God knows
who.

"Now, mister lawyer," said Admiral Bell, who had about him a large share
of the habits of a rough sailor. "Now, mister lawyer, here is a glass
first to our better acquaintance, for d----e, if I don't like you!"

"You are very good, sir."

"Not at all. There was a time, when I'd just as soon have thought of
asking a young shark to supper with me in my own cabin as a lawyer, but
I begin to see that there may be such a thing as a decent, good sort of
a fellow seen in the law; so here's good luck to you, and you shall
never want a friend or a bottle while Admiral Bell has a shot in the
locker."

"Gammon," said Jack.

"D--n you, what do you mean by that?" roared the admiral, in a furious
tone.

"I wasn't speaking to you," shouted Jack, about two octaves higher.
"It's two boys in the street as is pretending they're a going to fight,
and I know d----d well they won't."

"Hold your noise."

"I'm going. I wasn't told to hold my noise, when our nobs were being
scuttled off Beyrout."

"Never mind him, mister lawyer," added the admiral. "He don't know what
he's talking about. Never mind him. You go on and tell me all you know
about the--the--"

"The vampyre!"

"Ah! I always forget the names of strange fish. I suppose, after all,
it's something of the mermaid order?"

"That I cannot say, sir; but certainly the story, in all its painful
particulars, has made a great sensation all over the country."

"Indeed!"

"Yes, sir. You shall hear how it occurred. It appears that one night
Miss Flora Bannersworth, a young lady of great beauty, and respected and
admired by all who knew her was visited by a strange being who came in
at the window."

"My eye," said Jack, "it waren't me, I wish it had a been."

"So petrified by fear was she, that she had only time to creep half out
of the bed, and to utter one cry of alarm, when the strange visitor
seized her in his grasp."

"D--n my pig tail," said Jack, "what a squall there must have been, to
be sure."

"Do you see this bottle?" roared the admiral.

"To be sure, I does; I think as it's time I seed another."

"You scoundrel, I'll make you feel it against that d----d stupid head of
yours, if you interrupt this gentleman again."

"Don't be violent."

"Well, as I was saying," continued the attorney, "she did, by great good
fortune, manage to scream, which had the effect of alarming the whole
house. The door of her chamber, which was fast, was broken open."

"Yes, yes--"

"Ah," cried Jack.

"You may imagine the horror and the consternation of those who entered
the room to find her in the grasp of a fiend-like figure, whose teeth
were fastened on her neck, and who was actually draining her veins of
blood."

"The devil!"

"Before any one could lay hands sufficiently upon the figure to detain
it, it had fled precipitately from its dreadful repast. Shots were fired
after it in vain."

"And they let it go?"

"They followed it, I understand, as well as they were able, and saw it
scale the garden wall of the premises; there it escaped, leaving, as you
may well imagine, on all their minds, a sensation of horror difficult to
describe."

"Well, I never did hear anything the equal of that. Jack, what do you
think of it?"

"I haven't begun to think, yet," said Jack.

"But what about my nephew, Charles?" added the admiral.

"Of him I know nothing."

"Nothing?"

"Not a word, admiral. I was not aware you had a nephew, or that any
gentleman bearing that, or any other relationship to you, had any sort
of connexion with these mysterious and most unaccountable circumstances.
I tell you all I have gathered from common report about this vampyre
business. Further I know not, I assure you."

"Well, a man can't tell what he don't know. It puzzles me to think who
could possibly have written me this letter."

"That I am completely at a loss to imagine," said Crinkles. "I assure
you, my gallant sir, that I am much hurt at the circumstance of any one
using my name in such a way. But, nevertheless, as you are here, permit
me to say, that it will be my pride, my pleasure, and the boast of the
remainder of my existence, to be of some service to so gallant a
defender of my country, and one whose name, along with the memory of his
deeds, is engraved upon the heart of every Briton."

"Quite ekal to a book, he talks," said Jack. "I never could read one
myself, on account o' not knowing how, but I've heard 'em read, and
that's just the sort o' incomprehensible gammon."

"We don't want any of your ignorant remarks," said the admiral, "so you
be quiet."

"Ay, ay, sir."

"Now, Mister Lawyer, you are an honest fellow, and an honest fellow is
generally a sensible fellow."

"Sir, I thank you."

"If so be as what this letter says is true, my nephew Charles has got a
liking for this girl, who has had her neck bitten by a vampyre, you
see."

"I perceive, sir."

"Now what would you do?"

"One of the most difficult, as well, perhaps, as one of the most
ungracious of tasks," said the attorney, "is to interfere with family
affairs. The cold and steady eye of reason generally sees things in such
very different lights to what they appear to those whose feelings and
whose affections are much compromised in their results."

"Very true. Go on."

"Taking, my dear sir, what in my humble judgment appears to be a
reasonable view of this subject, I should say it would be a dreadful
thing for your nephew to marry into a family any member of which was
liable to the visitations of a vampyre."

"It wouldn't be pleasant."

"The young lady might have children."

"Oh, lots," cried Jack.

"Hold your noise, Jack."

"Ay, ay, sir."

"And she might herself actually, when after death she became a vampyre,
come and feed on her own children."

"Become a vampyre! What, is she going to be a vampyre too?"

"My dear sir, don't you know that it is a remarkable fact, as regards
the physiology of vampyres, that whoever is bitten by one of those
dreadful beings, becomes a vampyre?"

"The devil!"

"It is a fact, sir."

"Whew!" whistled Jack; "she might bite us all, and we should be a whole
ship's crew o' _wamphighers_. There would be a confounded go!"

"It's not pleasant," said the admiral, as he rose from his chair, and
paced to and fro in the room, "it's not pleasant. Hang me up at my own
yard-arm if it is."

"Who said it was?" cried Jack.

"Who asked you, you brute?"

"Well, sir," added Mr. Crinkles, "I have given you all the information I
can; and I can only repeat what I before had the honour of saying more
at large, namely, that I am your humble servant to command, and that I
shall be happy to attend upon you at any time."

"Thank ye--thank ye, Mr.--a--a--"

"Crinkles."

"Ah, Crinkles. You shall hear from me again, sir, shortly. Now that I am
down here, I will see to the very bottom of this affair, were it deeper
than fathom ever sounded. Charles Holland was my poor sister's son; he's
the only relative I have in the wide world, and his happiness is dearer
to my heart than my own."

Crinkles turned aside, and, by the twinkle of his eyes, one might
premise that the honest little lawyer was much affected.

"God bless you, sir," he said; "farewell."

"Good day to you."

"Good-bye, lawyer," cried Jack. "Mind how you go. D--n me, if you don't
seem a decent sort of fellow, and, after all, you may give the devil a
clear berth, and get into heaven's straits with a flowing sheet,
provided as you don't, towards the end of the voyage, make any lubberly
blunders."

The old admiral threw himself into a chair with a deep sigh.

"Jack," said he.

"Aye, aye, sir."

"What's to be done now?"

Jack opened the window to discharge the superfluous moisture from an
enormous quid he had indulged himself with while the lawyer was telling
about the vampyre, and then again turning his face towards his master,
he said,--

"Do! What shall we do? Why, go at once and find out Charles, our _nevy_,
and ask him all about it, and see the young lady, too, and lay hold o'
the _wamphigher_ if we can, as well, and go at the whole affair
broadside to broadside, till we make a prize of all the particulars,
after which we can turn it over in our minds agin, and see what's to be
done."

"Jack, you are right. Come along."

"I knows I am. Do you know now which way to steer?"

"Of course not. I never was in this latitude before, and the channel
looks intricate. We will hail a pilot, Jack, and then we shall be all
right, and if we strike it will be his fault."

"Which is a mighty great consolation," said Jack. "Come along."

CHAPTER XVI.

THE MEETING OF THE LOVERS IN THE GARDEN.--AN AFFECTING SCENE.--THE
SUDDEN APPEARANCE OF SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.

[Illustration]

Our readers will recollect that Flora Bannerworth had made an
appointment with Charles Holland in the garden of the hall. This meeting
was looked forward to by the young man with a variety of conflicting
feelings, and he passed the intermediate time in a most painful state of
doubt as to what would be its result.

The thought that he should be much urged by Flora to give up all
thoughts of making her his, was a most bitter one to him, who loved her
with so much truth and constancy, and that she would say all she could
to induce such a resolution in his mind he felt certain. But to him the
idea of now abandoning her presented itself in the worst of aspects.

"Shall I," he said, "sink so low in my own estimation, as well as in
hers, and in that of all honourable-minded persons, as to desert her now
in the hour of affliction? Dare I be so base as actually or virtually to
say to her, 'Flora, when your beauty was undimmed by sorrow--when all
around you seemed life and joy, I loved you selfishly for the increased
happiness which you might bestow upon me; but now the hand of misfortune
presses heavily upon you--you are not what you were, and I desert you?
Never--never--never!"

Charles Holland, it will be seen by some of our more philosophic
neighbours, felt more acutely than he reasoned; but let his errors of
argumentation be what they may, can we do other than admire the nobility
of soul which dictated such a self denying generous course as that he
was pursuing?

As for Flora, Heaven only knows if at that precise time her intellect
had completely stood the test of the trying events which had nearly
overwhelmed it.

The two grand feelings that seemed to possess her mind were fear of the
renewed visit of the vampyre, and an earnest desire to release Charles
Holland from his repeated vows of constancy towards her.

Feeling, generosity, and judgment, all revolted holding a young man to
such a destiny as hers. To link him to her fate, would be to make him to
a real extent a sharer in it, and the more she heard fall from his lips
in the way of generous feelings of continued attachment to her, the more
severely did she feel that he would suffer most acutely if united to
her.

And she was right. The very generosity of feeling which would have now
prompted Charles Holland to lead Flora Bannerworth to the altar, even
with the marks of the vampyre's teeth upon her throat, gave an assurance
of a depth of feeling which would have made him an ample haven in all
her miseries, in all her distresses and afflictions.

What was familiarly in the family at the Hall called the garden, was a
semicircular piece of ground shaded in several directions by trees, and
which was exclusively devoted to the growth of flowers. The piece of
ground was nearly hidden from the view of the house, and in its centre
was a summer-house, which at the usual season of the year was covered
with all kinds of creeping plants of exquisite perfumes, and rare
beauty. All around, too, bloomed the fairest and sweetest of flowers,
which a rich soil and a sheltered situation could produce.

Alas! though, of late many weeds had straggled up among their more
estimable floral culture, for the decayed fortunes of the family had
prevented them from keeping the necessary servants, to place the Hall
and its grounds in a state of neatness, such as it had once been the
pride of the inhabitants of the place to see them. It was then in this
flower-garden that Charles and Flora used to meet.

As may be supposed, he was on the spot before the appointed hour,
anxiously expecting the appearance of her who was so really and truly
dear to him. What to him were the sweet flowers that there grew in such
happy luxuriance and heedless beauty? Alas, the flower that to his mind
was fairer than them all, was blighted, and in the wan cheek of her whom
he loved, he sighed to see the lily usurping the place of the radiant
rose.

"Dear, dear Flora," he ejaculated, "you must indeed be taken from this
place, which is so full of the most painful remembrance; now, I cannot
think that Mr. Marchdale somehow is a friend to me, but that conviction,
or rather impression, does not paralyze my judgment sufficiently to
induce me not to acknowledge that his advice is good. He might have
couched it in pleasanter words--words that would not, like daggers, each
have brought a deadly pang home to my heart, but still I do think that
in his conclusion he was right."

A light sound, as of some fairy footstep among the flowers, came upon
his ears, and turning instantly to the direction from whence the sound
proceeded, he saw what his heart had previously assured him of, namely,
that it was his Flora who was coming.

[Illustration]

Yes, it was she; but, ah, how pale, how wan--how languid and full of the
evidences of much mental suffering was she. Where now was the elasticity
of that youthful step? Where now was that lustrous beaming beauty of
mirthfulness, which was wont to dawn in those eyes?

Alas, all was changed. The exquisite beauty of form was there, but the
light of joy which had lent its most transcendent charms to that
heavenly face, was gone. Charles was by her side in a moment. He had her
hand clasped in his, while his disengaged one was wound tenderly around
her taper waist.

"Flora, dear, dear Flora," he said, "you are better. Tell me that you
feel the gentle air revives you?"

She could not speak. Her heart was too full of woe.

"Oh; Flora, my own, my beautiful," he added, in those tones which come
so direct from the heart, and which are so different from any assumption
of tenderness. "Speak to me, dear, dear Flora--speak to me if it be but
a word."

"Charles," was all she could say, and then she burst into a flood of
tears, and leant so heavily upon his arm, that it was evident but for
that support she must have fallen.

Charles Holland welcomed those, although, they grieved him so much that
he could have accompanied them with his own, but then he knew that she
would be soon now more composed, and that they would relieve the heart
whose sorrows called them into existence.

He forbore to speak to her until he found this sudden gush of feeling
was subsiding into sobs, and then in low, soft accents, he again
endeavoured to breathe comfort to her afflicted and terrified spirit.

"My Flora," he said, "remember that there are warm hearts that love you.
Remember that neither time nor circumstance can change such endearing
affection as mine. Ah, Flora, what evil is there in the whole world that
love may not conquer, and in the height of its noble feelings laugh to
scorn."

"Oh, hush, hush, Charles, hush."

"Wherefore, Flora, would you still the voice of pure affection? I love
you surely, as few have ever loved. Ah, why would you forbid me to give
such utterance as I may to those feelings which fill up my whole heart?"

"No--no--no."

"Flora, Flora, wherefore do you say no?"

"Do not, Charles, now speak to me of affection or love. Do not tell me
you love me now."

"Not tell you I love you! Ah, Flora, if my tongue, with its poor
eloquence to give utterance to such a sentiment, were to do its office,
each feature of my face would tell the tale. Each action would show to
all the world how much I loved you."

"I must not now hear this. Great God of Heaven give me strength to carry
out the purpose of my soul."