Varney the Vampire. James Malcolm Rymer

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СКАЧАТЬ that if I mentioned such a thing to the Bannerworths, they would endeavour all in their power to pursuade me against it."

      "Yes, no doubt; because they are all impressed with a strange fear of this fellow's vampyre powers. Besides, if a man is going to fight, the fewer people he mentions it to most decidedly the better, Charles."

      "I believe that is the fact, uncle. Should I overcome Varney, there will most likely be at once an end to the numerous and uncomfortable perplexities of the Bannerworths as regards him; and if he overcome me, why, then, at all events, I shall have made an effort to rescue Flora from the dread of this man."

      "And then he shall fight me," added the admiral, "so he shall have two chances, at all events, Charles."

      "Nay, uncle, that would, you know, scarcely be fair. Besides, if I should fall, I solemnly bequeath Flora Bannerworth to your good offices. I much fear that the pecuniary affairs of poor Henry—from no fault of his, Heaven knows—are in a very bad state, and that Flora may yet live to want some kind and able friend."

      "Never fear, Charles. The young creature shall never want while the old admiral has got a shot in the locker."

      "Thank you, uncle, thank you. I have ample cause to know, and to be able to rely upon your kind and generous nature. And now about the challenge?"

      "You write it, boy, and I'll take it."

      "Will you second me, uncle?"

      "To be sure I will. I wouldn't trust anybody else to do so on any account. You leave all the arrangements with me, and I'll second you as you ought to be seconded."

      "Then I will write it at once, for I have received injuries at the hands of that man, or devil, be he what he may, that I cannot put up with. His visit to the chamber of her whom I love would alone constitute ample ground of action."

      "I should say it rather would, my boy."

      "And after this corroborative story of the wound, I cannot for a moment doubt that Sir Francis Varney is the vampyre, or the personifier of the vampyre."

      "That's clear enough, Charles. Come, just you write your challenge, my boy, at once, and let me have it."

      "I will, uncle."

      Charles was a little astonished, although pleased, at his uncle's ready acquiescence in his fighting a vampyre, but that circumstance he ascribed to the old man's habits of life, which made him so familiar with strife and personal contentions of all sorts, that he did not ascribe to it that amount of importance which more peaceable people did. Had he, while he was writing the note to Sir Francis Varney, seen the old admiral's face, and the exceedingly cunning look it wore, he might have suspected that the acquiescence in the duel was but a seeming acquiescence. This, however, escaped him, and in a few moments he read to his uncle the following note:—

      "To SIR FRANCIS VARNEY.

      "Sir—The expressions made use of towards me by you, as well as general circumstances, which I need not further allude to here, induce me to demand of you that satisfaction due from one gentleman to another. My uncle, Admiral Bell, is the bearer of this note, and will arrange preliminaries with any friend you may choose to appoint to act in your behalf. I am, sir, yours, &c.

      "CHARLES HOLLAND."

      "Will that do?" said Charles.

      "Capital!" said the admiral.

      "I am glad you like it."

      "Oh, I could not help liking it. The least said and the most to the purpose, always pleases me best; and this explains nothing, and demands all you want—which is a fight; so it's all right, you see, and nothing can be possibly better."

      Charles did glance in his uncle's face, for he suspected, from the manner in which these words were uttered, that the old man was amusing himself a little at his expense. The admiral, however, looked so supernaturally serious that Charles was foiled.

      "I repeat, it's a capital letter," he said.

      "Yes, you said so."

      "Well, what are you staring at?"

      "Oh, nothing."

      "Do you doubt my word?"

      "Not at all, uncle; only I thought there was a degree of irony in the manner in which you spoke."

      "None at all, my boy. I never was more serious in all my life."

      "Very good. Then you will remember that I leave my honour in this affair completely in your hands."

      "Depend upon me, my boy."

      "I will, and do."

      "I'll be off and see the fellow at once."

      The admiral bustled out of the room, and in a few moments Charles heard him calling loudly—

      "Jack—Jack Pringle, you lubber, where are you?—Jack Pringle, I say."

      "Ay, ay, sir," said Jack, emerging from the kitchen, where he had been making himself generally useful in assisting Mrs. Bannerworth, there being no servant in the house, to cook some dinner for the family.

      "Come on, you rascal, we are going for a walk."

      "The rations will be served out soon," growled Jack.

      "We shall be back in time, you cormorant, never fear. You are always thinking of eating and drinking, you are, Jack; and I'll be hanged if I think you ever think of anything else. Come on, will you; I'm going on rather a particular cruise just now, so mind what you are about."

      "Aye, aye, sir," said the tar, and these two originals, who so perfectly understood each other, walked away, conversing as they went, and their different voices coming upon the ear of Charles, until distance obliterated all impression of the sound.

      Charles paced to and fro in the room where he had held this brief and conclusive conversation with his uncle. He was thoughtful, as any one might well be who knew not but that the next four-and-twenty hours would be the limit of his sojourn in this world.

      "Oh, Flora—Flora!" he at length said, "how happy we might to have been together—how happy we might have been! but all is past now, and there seems nothing left us but to endure. There it but one chance, and that is in my killing this fearful man who is invested with so dreadful an existence. And if I do kill him in fair and in open fight, I will take care that his mortal frame has no power again to revisit the glimpses of the moon."

      It was strange to imagine that such was the force of many concurrent circumstances, that a young man like Charles Holland, of first-rate abilities and education, should find it necessary to give in so far to a belief which was repugnant to all his best feelings and habits of thought, as to be reasoning with himself upon the best means of preventing the resuscitation of the corpse of a vampyre. But so it was. His imagination had yielded to a succession of events which very few persons indeed could have held out against.

      "I have heard and read," he said, as he continued his agitated and uneasy walk, "of how these dreadful beings are to be in their graves. I have heard of stakes being driven through the body so as to pin it to the earth СКАЧАТЬ