THE PHANTOM COACH: Collected Ghost Stories (4 page)

‘I see something!’ cried he. ‘Something dark, wedged in the teeth of the crevasse, a great way down!’

They all saw it—a mere indistinguishable mass, almost closed over by the ice-walls at their feet. My brother offered a hundred francs to the man who would go down and bring it up. They all hesitated.

‘We don’t know what it is,’ said one.

‘Perhaps it is only a dead chamois,’ suggested another.

Their apathy enraged him.

‘It is no chamois,’ he said, angrily. ‘It is the body of Christien Baumann, native of Kandersteg. And, by Heaven, if you are all too cowardly to make the attempt, I will go down myself!’

The youngest guide threw off his hat and coat, tied a rope about his waist, and took a hatchet in his hand. ‘I will go, monsieur,’ said he; and without another word, suffered himself to be lowered in.

My brother turned away. A sickening anxiety came upon him, and presently he heard the dull echo of the hatchet far down in the ice. Then there was a call for another rope, and then—the men all drew aside in silence, and my brother saw the youngest guide standing once more beside the chasm, flushed and trembling, with the body of Christien lying at his feet.

Poor Christien! They made a rough bier with their ropes and Alpenstocks, and carried him, with great difficulty, back to Steinberg. There, they got additional help as far as Stechelberg, where they laid him in the char, and so brought him on to Lauterbrunnen. The next day, my brother made it his sad business to precede the body to Kandersteg, and prepare his friends for its arrival. To this day, though all these things happened thirty years ago, he cannot bear to recall Marie’s despair, or all the mourning that he innocently brought upon that peaceful valley. Poor Marie has been dead this many a year; and when my brother last passed through the Kander Thal on his way to the Gemmi, he saw her grave, beside the grave of Christien Baumann, in the village burial-ground.

This is my brother’s Ghost Story.

The Eleventh of March

(
From a Pocket-book of Forty Years ago
.)

FORTY YEARS AGO!

An old pocket-book lies before me, bound in scarlet morocco, and fastened with a sliver clasp. The leather is mildewed; the silver tarnished; the paper yellow; the ink faded. It has been hidden away at the back of an antique oaken bureau since the last day of the year during which I had it in use; and that was forty years ago. Aye, here is a page turned down—turned down at Wednesday, March the eleventh, eighteen hundred and twenty-six. The entry against that date is brief and obscure enough.

‘Wednesday, March 11
th
— Walked from Frascati to Palazzuola, the ancient site of Alba Longa, on the Alban lake. Lodged at Franciscan convent. Brother Geronimo. Dare one rely on the testimony of the senses?
Dieu sait tout
.’

Brief as it is, however, that memorandum fires a train of long-dormant memories, and brings back with painful vividness all the circumstances to which it bears reference. I will endeavour to relate them as calmly and succinctly as possible.

I started on foot from Frascati immediately after breakfast, and rested midway in the shade of a wooded ravine between Marino and the heights of Alba Longa. I seem to remember every trivial incident of that morning walk. I remember how the last year’s leaves crackled under my feet, and how the green lizards darted to and fro in the sunlight. I fancy I still hear the slow drip of the waters that trickled down the cavernous rocks on either hand. I fancy I still smell the heavy perfume of the violets among the ferns. It was not yet noon when I emerged upon the upper ridge, and took the path that leads to Monte Cavo. The woodcutters were busy among the chestnut slopes of Palazzuola. They paused in their work, and stared at me sullenly as I passed by. Presently a little turn in the footway brought the whole lake of Albano before my eyes. Blue, silent, solitary, set round with overhanging woods, it lay in the sunshine, four hundred feet below, like a sapphire at the bottom of a malachite vase. Now and then, a soft breath from the west ruffled the placid mirror, and blurred the pictured landscape on its surface. Now and then, a file of mules, passing unseen among the forest-paths, sent a faint sound of tinkling bells across the lake. I sat down in the shade of a clump of cork-trees, and contemplated the panorama. To my left, on a precipitous platform at the verge of the basin, with Monte Cavo towering up behind, stretched the long white façade of the Convent of Palazzuola; on the opposite height, standing clear against the sky, rose the domes and pines of Castel Gondolfo; to the far right, in the blinding sunshine of the Campagna, lay Rome and the Etruscan hills.

In this spot I established myself for the day’s sketching. Of so vast a scene, I could, necessarily, only select a portion. I chose the Convent, with its background of mountain, and its foreground of precipice and lake; and proceeded patiently to work out, first the leading features, and next the minuter details of the subject. Thus occupied (with an occasional pause to watch the passing of a cloud-shadow, or listen to the chiming of a distant chapel-bell), I lingered on, hour after hour, till the sun hung low in the west, and the woodcutters were all gone to their homes. I was now at least three miles from either the town of Albano or the village of Castel Gondolfo, and was, moreover, a stranger to the neighbourhood. I looked at my watch. There remained but one half hour of good daylight, and it was important that I should find my way before the dusk closed in. I rose reluctantly, and, promising myself to return to the same spot on the morrow, packed away my sketch, and prepared for the road.

At this moment, I saw a monk standing in an attitude of meditation upon a little knoll of rising ground some fifty yards ahead. His back was turned towards me; his cowl was up, his arms were folded across his breast. Neither the splendour of the heavens, nor the tender beauty of the earth, was anything to him. He seemed unconscious even of the sunset.

I hurried forward, eager to inquire my nearest path along the woods that skirt the lake; and my shadow lengthened out fantastically before me as I ran. The monk turned abruptly. His cowl fell. He looked at me face to face. There were not more than eighteen yards between us. I saw him as plainly as I now see the page on which I write. Our eyes met . . . My God! shall I ever forget those eyes?

He was still young, still handsome, but so lividly pale, so emaciated, so worn with passion, and penance, and remorse, that I stopped involuntarily, like one who finds himself on the brink of a chasm. We stood thus for a few seconds—both silent, both motionless. I could not have uttered a syllable, had my life depended on it. Then, as abruptly as he had turned towards me, he turned away and disappeared among the trees. I remained for some minutes gazing after him. My heart throbbed painfully. I shuddered, I knew not why. The very air seemed to have grown thick and oppressive; the very sunset, so golden a moment since, had turned suddenly to blood.

I went on my way, disturbed and thoughtful. The livid face and lurid eyes of the monk haunted me. I dreaded every turn of the path, lest I should again encounter them. I started when a twig fell, or a dead leaf fluttered down beside me. I was almost ashamed of the sense of relief with which I heard the sound of voices some few yards in advance, and, emerging upon an open space close against the convent, saw some half dozen friars strolling to and fro in the sunset. I inquired my way to Albano, and learned that I was still more than two miles distant.

‘It will be quite dark before the Signore arrives,’ said one, courteously. ‘The Signore would do well to accept a cell at Palazzuola for the night.’

I remembered the monk, and hesitated.

‘There is no moon now,’ suggested another; ‘and the paths are unsafe for those who do not know them.’

While I was yet undecided, a bell rang, and three or four of the loiterers went in.

‘It is our supper hour,’ said the first speaker. ‘The Signore will at least condescend to share our simple fare; and afterwards, if he still decides to sleep at Albano, one of our younger brethren shall accompany him as far as the Cappucini, at the entrance to the town.’

I accepted this proposition gratefully, followed my entertainers through the convent gates, and was ushered into a stone hall, furnished with a long dining table, a pulpit, a clock, a double row of deal benches, and an indifferent copy of the ‘Last Supper’ of Leonardo da Vinci. The Superior advanced to welcome me.

‘You have come among us, Signore,’ he said, ‘on an evening when our table is but poorly provided. Although this is not one of the appointed fast-days of the Church, we have been abstaining at Palazzuola in memory of certain circumstances connected with our own brotherhood. I hope, however, that our larder may be found to contain something better suited to a traveller’s appetite than the fare you now see before you.’

Saying thus, he placed me at his right hand at the upper end of the board, and there stood till the monks were all in their places. He then repeated a Latin grace; after which each brother took his seat and began. They were twenty-three in number, twelve on one side, and eleven on the other; but I observed that a place was left vacant near the foot of the table, as if the twelfth man were yet to come. The twelfth, I felt sure, was he whom I had encountered on the way. Once possessed with this conviction, I could not keep from watching the door. Strange! I so dreaded and loathed his coming, that I almost felt as if his presence would be less intolerable than the suspense in which I awaited it!

In the meantime the monks ate in silence; and even the Superior, whose language and address were those of a well-informed man, seemed constrained and thoughtful. Their supper was of the most frugal description, and consisted of only bread, salad, grapes, and macaroni. Mine was before long reinforced with a broiled pigeon and a flask of excellent Orvieto. I enjoyed my fare, however, as little as they seemed to enjoy theirs. Fasting as I was, I had no appetite. Weary as I was, I only longed to push my plate aside, and resume my journey.

‘The Signore will not think of going farther tonight,’ said the Superior, after an interval of prolonged silence.

I muttered something about being expected at Albano.

‘Nay, but it is already dusk, and the sky hath clouded over suddenly within the last fifteen minutes,’ urged he. ‘I fear much that we have a storm approaching. What sayest thou, brother Antonio?’

‘It will be a wild night,’ replied the brother with whom I had first spoken.

‘Aye, a wild night,’ repeated an old monk, lower down the table; ‘like this night last year—like this night two years ago!’

The superior struck the table angrily with his open hand.

‘Silence!’ he exclaimed authoritatively. ‘Silence there; and let brother Anselmo bring lights.’

It was now so dark that I could scarcely distinguish the features of the last speaker, or those of the monk who rose and left the room. Again the profoundest silence fell upon all present. I could hear the footsteps of brother Anselmo echo down the passage, till they died away; and I remember listening vaguely to the ticking of the clock at the farther end of the refectory, and comparing it in my own mind to the horrible beating of an iron heart. Just at that moment a sharp gust of wind moaned past the windows, bearing with it a prolonged reverberation of distant thunder.

‘Our storms up here in the mountain are severe and sudden,’ said the Prior, resuming our conversation at the point where it had been interrupted; ‘and even the waters of yonder placid lake are sometimes so tempestuous that no boat dare venture across. I fear, Signore, that you will find it impossible to proceed to Albano.’

‘Should the tempest come up, reverend father,’ I replied, ‘I will undoubtedly accept your hospitality, and be grateful for it; but if . . .’

I broke off abruptly. The words failed on my lips, and I pushed away the flask from which I was about to fill my glass.

Brother Anselmo had brought in the lamps, and there, in the twelfth seat at the opposite side of the table, sat the monk. I had not seen him take his place. I had not heard him enter. Yet there he sat, pale and deathlike, with his burning eyes fixed full upon me! No one noticed him. No one spoke to him. No one helped him to the dishes on the table. He neither ate, nor drank, nor held companionship with any of his fellows; but sat among them like an excommunicated wretch, whose penance was silence and fasting.

‘You do not eat, Signore,’ said the prior.

‘I—I thank you, reverend father,’ I faltered. ‘I have dined.’

‘I fear, indifferently. Would you like some other wine? Our cellar is not so ill-furnished as our larder.’

I declined by a gesture.

‘Then we will retire to my room, and take coffee.’

And the superior rose, repeated a brief Latin thanksgiving, and ushered me into a small well-lighted parlour, opening off a passage at the upper end of the hall, where there were some half-dozen shelves of books, a couple of easy chairs, a bright wood fire, and a little table laden with coffee and cakes. We had scarcely seated ourselves when a tremendous peal of thunder seemed to break immediately over the convent, and was followed by a cataract of rain.

‘The Signore is safer here than on the paths between Palazzuola and Albano,’ said the Superior, sipping his coffee.

‘I am, indeed,’ I replied. ‘Do I understand that you had a storm here on the same night last year, and the year before?’

The Prior’s face darkened.

‘I cannot deny the coincidence,’ he said, reluctantly; ‘but it is a mere coincidence, after all. The—the fact is that a very grievous and terrible catastrophe happened to our community on this day two years ago; and the brethren believe that heaven sends the tempest in memory of that event. Monks, Signore, are superstitious; and if we consider their isolated lives, it is not surprising that they should be so.’

I bowed assent. The Prior was evidently a man of the world.

‘Now, with regard to Palazzuola,’ continued he, disregarding the storm, and chatting on quite leisurely; ‘here are twenty-three brethren, most of them natives of the small towns among the mountains hereabout; and of that twenty-three, not ten have been so far as Rome in their lives.’