Part 15

There was no resisting this second appeal, so after a little delay in getting ready, they mounted their horses, and with a boy riding a pony and carrying a lantern in advance, they set off on their journey homeward.

The snow lay thick on hill and tree, and they made but slow progress. The lantern gave but little light; it bobbed about hither and thither like an _ignis fatuus_, and finally the boy’s pony stumbled, and boy, pony, and lantern were buried in a deep snow-drift. The boy scrambled out quickly, but by the squire’s orders did not light his lantern again. They crossed the bridge and picked their uncertain way along the snow-covered path by the torrent’s brink.

Suddenly the squire drew rein as a man rode quickly and silently past them, over the snow, going in the same direction as themselves.

“How like Old Maggie,” said the squire half aloud; “and if I did not know to the contrary, I could have sworn that the rider was poor Benwell!”

The squire supported Julia with his left arm as she rode by his side, cheering her as best he could.

“Who was that, father?” she asked. “How strange he did not speak as he passed us by.”

“It was indeed, my dear,” he rejoined; “but probably he was a stranger, and unaccustomed to our hearty West Country greetings. But see, he has stopped and dismounted.”

They beheld him in the moonlight standing by his horse’s side, but for some reason the squire’s horse and his daughter’s both stopped of their own accord, while the boy’s pony wheeled round and dashed back towards Stoke.

The strange horseman patted his steed’s neck, tightened the saddle-girth, and was about to remount, when another man suddenly bounded forward, with a drawn sword, and making a lunge at the unfortunate traveller, thrust him, from behind, right through the neck.

Then the murderer searched the dying man, taking a large bundle of papers from the saddle-bags, and transferring them to his own pockets.

Turning once more to his victim, who was not dead, but feebly struggling in the snow to regain his feet, he again stabbed him, this time clean through the heart. Then, with a malignant smile he turned away, strode to his own horse, which was tethered to a tree hard by, mounted, and in a trice galloped close past the spellbound onlookers.

As he galloped silently by, the squire beheld, to his astonishment, the features of Wynne Clarge!

Thus was re-enacted, in phantom-vision, the murder of Charles Benwell, as it took place twelve months before.

Trembling in every limb Mr. Simmonds turned to his daughter. But Julia was no more, _his arm encircled her lifeless clay_.

* * * * *

An old man and feeble was John Simmonds, when, two months after the above events, he left his bed, slowly recovering from brain fever; but although he was able occasionally to wander listlessly in his garden in the warm days of the summer, he lingered only till the first days of autumn tinged the foliage with gold and red, then drooped like the flowers, and like the flowers he died.

By his daughter’s side, upon that hillside in the west, the old man sleeps, and to this day their tombs are pointed out; the one known as “the Good Squire’s Tomb,” and the other is called “Julia’s Grave.”

* * * * *

When the next Christmas Eve came round, bold Will Rayner organized a little party to watch the spot where the murder took place. They did not keep their dread vigil in vain, for a little after darkness set in they all saw the phantom horseman ride up, dismount to tighten his saddle-girth, and pat his tired horse on the neck. They saw the dastardly rush of his rival: they saw the deed enacted before their eyes, as Mr. Simmonds and Julia had seen it in a marvellous manner, and Will had difficulty in restraining his comrades from rushing upon the murderous Wynne, although they knew him to be but the phantasm of a man.

Their purpose, however, in watching was to _follow_ the ghost, and as it mounted its shadowy horse they all gave chase.

It was a wild sight to see these young men following the apparition, who pursued his course through the wild woods apparently unconscious that he was being followed.

For three miles he rode, and then drew rein by a low cliff which overhung the stream. He dismounted, took the bundle of papers from under his cloak, and hid them beneath the stump of a tree, whose roots flung themselves in fantastic shapes from the side of the cliff. Then he mounted his horse again, with a smile of triumph on his ghastly face, rode up the precipitous bank, and had nearly gained the brink, when his horse missed its footing, rolled over backwards with its rider, and both disappeared into the turbid water below.

The ghostly horse quickly emerged and galloped away, but the shade of Wynne Clarge, its rider, rose no more.

A search was made in the low cliff for the missing documents relating to the Benwell estate, and they were easily found; but having lain in a damp cavity impregnated with lime for two years, they fell to pieces as Rayner grasped them, and all that remained in his hand was an undecipherable pulp.

CONCLUSION.

The Wise and Foolish Virgins among them carried ten lamps; and strangely enough, that number coincides with the number of stories in this volume. In five lamps no oil was poured, so that the lamps gave forth no light, but the remaining lamps were well filled and shed forth light on all around. Such may, I trust, be the case with my stories; some of them may to my readers appear dull and uninteresting, but in the remaining moiety I trust some gleams of pleasure may be found, which, if not shedding forth the electric rays of a Poe, may yet give forth enough intellectual light to cause the writer to be seen and appreciated by the public as one who has not wholly failed to use his pen to the pleasure of his indulgent readers.

Probably my penchant for listening to stories wrung from unwilling guests is highly reprehensible; but I am sorry to say that my hobby has quite taken the bit between its teeth, and, instead of my riding and controlling, it has mastered me.

Some of my friends, probably my truest friends, prophesy, and I must say with some grounds for their forecasts, that I stand a good chance of seeing the interior of a gaol--my crime that of divulging the secrets of persons whose brains I have used as a kind of mental sponge. These good friends regard me as an ogre, prowling over the country on wheels, and robbing those to whom I have given sanctuary and shown hospitality in my humble caravan home.

Probably they are right; but why in these days of dearth of original and uncommon stories, should persons be allowed to carry such interesting narratives about with them in a dog-in-the-manger style, when by the exercise of a little ingenuity I am able to obtain their hoarded narratives, and use them for the public good? Surely the end justifies the means, from a literary point of view.

The hypnotic seizure of tales untold is a simple art, and if any of my readers (those having secret family skeletons preferred) will call upon me, I will with pleasure show them how to hunt for a story. The hunter and the quarry only are needed; noisy hounds to worry the poor quarry are not required, the hunter does it all quietly and effectively by himself, just as that watchful assassin, the spider, interviews the interesting and toothsome fly.

THE END.

_Jarrod & Sons, Printers, Norwich, Yarmouth, and London._

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:

Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.

Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.

Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.

Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.