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night." As we travel on the rough road, for a road of an ancient and
imperfect kind there was, I held down my head and slept. Again I waked
with a sense of guilt and of time passed, and found Madam Mina still
sleeping, and the sun low down. But all was indeed changed; the frowning
mountains seemed further away, and we were near the top of a
steep-rising hill, on summit of which was such a castle as Jonathan tell
of in his diary. At once I exulted and feared; for now, for good or ill,
the end was near.
I woke Madam Mina, and again tried to hypnotise her; but alas!
unavailing till too late. Then, ere the great dark came upon us--for
even after down-sun the heavens reflected the gone sun on the snow, and
all was for a time in a great twilight--I took out the horses and fed
them in what shelter I could. Then I make a fire; and near it I make
Madam Mina, now awake and more charming than ever, sit comfortable amid
her rugs. I got ready food: but she would not eat, simply saying that
she had not hunger. I did not press her, knowing her unavailingness. But
I myself eat, for I must needs now be strong for all. Then, with the
fear on me of what might be, I drew a ring so big for her comfort, round
where Madam Mina sat; and over the ring I passed some of the wafer, and
I broke it fine so that all was well guarded. She sat still all the
time--so still as one dead; and she grew whiter and ever whiter till the
snow was not more pale; and no word she said. But when I drew near, she
clung to me, and I could know that the poor soul shook her from head to
feet with a tremor that was pain to feel. I said to her presently, when
she had grown more quiet:--
"Will you not come over to the fire?" for I wished to make a test of
what she could. She rose obedient, but when she have made a step she
stopped, and stood as one stricken.
"Why not go on?" I asked. She shook her head, and, coming back, sat
down in her place. Then, looking at me with open eyes, as of one waked
from sleep, she said simply:--
"I cannot!" and remained silent. I rejoiced, for I knew that what she
could not, none of those that we dreaded could. Though there might be
danger to her body, yet her soul was safe!
Presently the horses began to scream, and tore at their tethers till I
came to them and quieted them. When they did feel my hands on them, they
whinnied low as in joy, and licked at my hands and were quiet for a
time. Many times through the night did I come to them, till it arrive to
the cold hour when all nature is at lowest; and every time my coming was
with quiet of them. In the cold hour the fire began to die, and I was
about stepping forth to replenish it, for now the snow came in flying
sweeps and with it a chill mist. Even in the dark there was a light of
some kind, as there ever is over snow; and it seemed as though the
snow-flurries and the wreaths of mist took shape as of women with
trailing garments. All was in dead, grim silence only that the horses
whinnied and cowered, as if in terror of the worst. I began to
fear--horrible fears; but then came to me the sense of safety in that
ring wherein I stood. I began, too, to think that my imaginings were of
the night, and the gloom, and the unrest that I have gone through, and
all the terrible anxiety. It was as though my memories of all Jonathan's
horrid experience were befooling me; for the snow flakes and the mist
began to wheel and circle round, till I could get as though a shadowy
glimpse of those women that would have kissed him. And then the horses
cowered lower and lower, and moaned in terror as men do in pain. Even
the madness of fright was not to them, so that they could break away. I
feared for my dear Madam Mina when these weird figures drew near and
circled round. I looked at her, but she sat calm, and smiled at me; when
I would have stepped to the fire to replenish it, she caught me and held
me back, and whispered, like a voice that one hears in a dream, so low
it was:--
"No! No! Do not go without. Here you are safe!" I turned to her, and
looking in her eyes, said:--
"But you? It is for you that I fear!" whereat she laughed--a laugh, low
and unreal, and said:--
"Fear for _me_! Why fear for me? None safer in all the world from them
than I am," and as I wondered at the meaning of her words, a puff of
wind made the flame leap up, and I see the red scar on her forehead.
Then, alas! I knew. Did I not, I would soon have learned, for the
wheeling figures of mist and snow came closer, but keeping ever without
the Holy circle. Then they began to materialise till--if God have not
take away my reason, for I saw it through my eyes--there were before me
in actual flesh the same three women that Jonathan saw in the room, when
they would have kissed his throat. I knew the swaying round forms, the
bright hard eyes, the white teeth, the ruddy colour, the voluptuous
lips. They smiled ever at poor dear Madam Mina; and as their laugh came
through the silence of the night, they twined their arms and pointed to
her, and said in those so sweet tingling tones that Jonathan said were
of the intolerable sweetness of the water-glasses:--
"Come, sister. Come to us. Come! Come!" In fear I turned to my poor
Madam Mina, and my heart with gladness leapt like flame; for oh! the
terror in her sweet eyes, the repulsion, the horror, told a story to my
heart that was all of hope. God be thanked she was not, yet, of them. I
seized some of the firewood which was by me, and holding out some of the
Wafer, advanced on them towards the fire. They drew back before me, and
laughed their low horrid laugh. I fed the fire, and feared them not; for
I knew that we were safe within our protections. They could not
approach, me, whilst so armed, nor Madam Mina whilst she remained within
the ring, which she could not leave no more than they could enter. The
horses had ceased to moan, and lay still on the ground; the snow fell on
them softly, and they grew whiter. I knew that there was for the poor
beasts no more of terror.