CHAPTER XXXV.

THE MIDNIGHT FUNERAL.

Ernestine had been watching our approach from a window. It was some time before she recovered from the stupefaction into which the appearance of the body of Gabrielle, and the relation of our terrible narrative (which then wanted the unity that after inquiries have enabled me to give it), had plunged her. As yet one of the principal actors had not come forward; thus, the cause of Gabrielle's death was involved in a mystery, alike perplexing and impenetrable.

"All is over now," said Ernestine; "all is over now! My father--my father--let me reach my father's side, and then die too!"

Grief affected her by alternate fits of bitterness and calmness. At one time she was somewhat composed in her woe; at others, she flung herself upon her knees beside the bed on which the body lay (the same bed whereon her sister's slayer so nearly assassinated herself), and fondly kissed her again and again, playing with the masses of golden-coloured hair, that streamed over the pillow, with the pretty but pallid fingers that still yielded to her touch--arranging, and re-arranging her dress, uttering the while many a piteous endearing epithet, with many of those pious and beautiful exclamations of hope and woe, which the prayers of her Catholic preceptor had taught her.

"It is my own Gabrielle come back to me, after all! God has sent her to me, that once more I might take a sister's fond farewell of her. But God has been very cruel to me! Oh! what do I say? No, no--he has taken you to himself--you are now among the angels in heaven, sister; you were too good for this bad world! You are happy, and I must not grudge you to Him, who will one day require me too."

"She will know how kind you are to her," said Phadrig Mhor, who, being a Catholic, had earnestly begged leave to say his prayers at the foot of the bed, where he knelt down, and behind his bonnet was making very wry faces to conceal his sorrow, for grief easily affects the hearts of the brave and honest; "she will indeed, lady, for the dead know all that passes here."

There is something sacred in grief. We all withdrew, and at her own request left Ernestine along with the body for a time.

With a delicacy of sentiment that charmed me, she would not allow either the hostess of the inn, or any other woman, to assist her in arranging the remains of the poor child (for in many things Gabrielle was but a child) for the grave. She knew whose hands Gabrielle would have preferred to perform this sad and solemn, this last duty of affection; and thus unaided, she lifted and laid her in the coffin, tying her consecrated medals round her neck, laying a chaplet of white roses on her brow, and a crucifix upon her breast; she concluded, by repeatedly reading aloud, with a broken voice, those prayers which the church, in whose tenets she had been reared, directed shall be said for the dead.

These little offices, the pleasing dictates of mingled affection and religion, soothed and occupied her mind; and I could not help thinking how much the ideas inculcated by the ancient faith (whether derived from paganrie or not), were calculated to rob the grim tyrant of his terrors, rather, than like our Scottish customs, to invest him with others more appalling.

I beheld her with admiration, and her faith and fervour stirred a thousand deep and pious thoughts within me. The memory of those two days at Hesinge is full of pain; for we spent one day more, Ian delaying his march, in consequence of this melancholy catastrophe, over which I mean to hurry as briefly as possible.

It appeared at times impossible to realise the conviction, that our poor Gabrielle had passed away, or now existed only in memory!

During nearly an entire day I sat with Ernestine beside the body, which was to be buried at midnight in the old village church close by. As the dusk of evening stole on, strange alternations of light and shadow fell on the beautiful face of the dead girl, giving it at times a most lifelike expression. Then it would seem as if the features moved, and, but for her awful placidity, I could have imagined that, in her old spirit of waggery, the pretty Gabrielle was mocking us all. Though my brother-soldiers mourned for the untimely end of the poor young girl, I thought they should all love her as much as I did; for sorrow is sometimes unreasonable; and the easy indifference with which they continued their military duties, made me indignant at them all. But they felt like soldiers. Their first impulse was to have Merodé punished, and after considerable disputation among the officers as to who should have the honour of effecting this, unknown to me lots were cast in Ian's helmet under the _Green-Tree_, and it fell to the stout old Laird of Kildon to challenge Merodé to advance one hundred paces from the gate of Helnœsland, and, after exchanging four pistol-shots on foot or horseback, to decide the contest by the sword; but the necessity for immediately marching by daybreak, prevented this desirable rencontre from taking place. Had it been, sure am I that the white-haired Mackenzie had cut the German count into pieces.

The whole regiment attended the funeral, which the rank of Gabrielle required should take place at midnight.

It was a strange and striking scene! The coffin of that young being, once so happy and so full of life, with a chaplet of white lilies on its lid, borne on the shoulders of four tall Highland soldiers, preceded by the village girls in white, and old Torquil Gorm, with his pipes, pouring to the still midnight a slow and subdued lament; our bronzed and scarred officers in their picturesque arms and garb following close behind, with the veiled form of Ernestine in the midst;--all this was seen, be it remembered, by the lurid and uncertain light of twenty torches carried by Highland soldiers.

The night air was soft and mild; no moon was visible, but occasional red stars shot across the sky, and the pale northern lights were gleaming at the far and flat horizon. The leaves of the old yew-trees, the grass of the graves, and the flowers that bordered the churchyard path, were gleaming in dew; and the grotesque architecture of the massive and ancient porch, the low-browed arches of every window and aisle were bathed in red and wavering light, or rounded into deep and gloomy shadow, as the funeral train swept slowly down the centre of the church, preceded by a minister of the Lutheran faith, a venerable Dane, clad in a white surplice and embroidered stole, with a large brass-bound Bible in his hand. He was an aged and silver-haired man, whose thin wan _haffets_ glittered in the light of the uplifted torches. There was no sound but the sputtering of the latter, and the sobs of Ernestine, who leant upon my arm.

The coffin, which was placed upon a bier above the grave, emitted a hollow sound as it was deposited. Then I felt Ernestine tremble. That faint but terrible sound vibrated among the chords of her desolate heart.

I remember still the words of the burial-service, the solemn and beautiful prayer for the innocent dead; but the memory of that midnight funeral floats before me wavering and indistinctly, like a half-forgotten but impressive dream. The yawning grave and the descending coffin; the sputtering torches and the green tartans; the glittering cuirasses and sunburnt faces of my comrades; the grey and grotesque columns of the old Danish church; the veiled figure that knelt in a paroxysm of prayer and grief beside the closing tomb, from which she would be far away tomorrow; the kind and solemn face of the old village pastor, as he covered it with his sleeve, bowed his aged head, and closed his book; the jarring sound of hasty shovels; the depositation of a large stone; the quiet and slow departure of the many; the lingering of the few, who seemed loth to leave the sobbing and sorrowing sister. The torches by that time were extinguished, and all was over.

All seemed to be a fantasy--a thing that could not be; and the idea that haunted me was, that Gabrielle should meet us at our return. But, alas! there was nothing in the little chamber to indicate her former presence but the outline of her coffin, which still was impressed upon the bed; and, on seeing that, poor Ernestine fainted.

As her elder kinsman, Ian had held the principal cord of the coffin; thus it was by the hand she loved best that the head of poor Gabrielle was lowered into her early grave.

Book the Twelfth.