"I know that, and I am sorry that this jade--and she is a handsome jade, they say--should have gained such a cursed influence over him. That, however, is not the question. We must think of nothing now but his recovery. The strictest attention ought to be paid to him; and as it has occurred to me that there is no female under this roof who understands the management of a sick bed, we ought, under these circ.u.mstances, to provide a nurse for him."

"Well, indeed, that is true enough, Harry, and it is very kind and considerate of you to think of it; but who will we get? The women here are very ignorant and stupid."

"I have been making inquiries," he replied, "and I am told there is a woman in Rathfillan, named Collins, niece to a religious herbalist or herb doctor, who possesses much experience in that way. It is just such a woman we want."

"Well, then, let her come; do you go and engage her; but see that she will not extort dishonest terms from you, because there is nothing but fraud and knavery among these wretches."

Harry lost little time in seeming the services of Caterine Collins, who was that very day established as nurse-tender in Charles Lindsay's sick room.

Alice's illness was now such as left little expectation of her recovery.

She was stated, and with good reason, to be in a condition absolutely hopeless; and nothing could exceed the regret and sorrow which were felt for the benevolent and gentle girl. We say benevolent, because, since her accession to her newly-acquired property, her charities to the poor and distressed were bountiful and generous, almost beyond belief; and even during her illness she const.i.tuted her father as the agent--and a willing one he was--of her beneficence. In fact, the sorrow for her approaching death was deep and general, and the sympathy felt for her parents such as rarely occurs in life.

Of course it is unnecessary to say that these tidings of her hopeless illness did not reach the Lindsays. On the second morning after Harry's visit he asked for a private interview with his mother, which was accorded to him.

"Mother," said he, "you must pay the Goodwins another visit--a visit, mark you, of sympathy and condolence. You forget all the unpleasant circ.u.mstances that have occurred between the families. You forget everything but your anxiety for the recovery of poor, dear Alice."

"But," replied his mother, "I do not wish to go. Why should I go to express a sympathy which I do not feel? Her death is only a judicial punishment on them for having inveigled your silly old uncle to leave them the property which would have otherwise come to you as the natural heir."

"Mother," said her dutiful son, "you have a nose, and beyond that nose you never yet have been able to look with anything like perspicuity. If you don't visit them, your good-natured noodle of a husband will, and perhaps the result of that visit may cut us out of the property forever.

At breakfast this morning you will propose the visit, which, mark you, is to be made in the name and on behalf of all the family. You, consequently, being the deputation on this occasion, both your husband and Maria will not feel themselves called upon to see them. You can, besides, say that her state of health precludes her from seeing any one out of her own family, and thus all risk of an explanation will be avoided. It is best to make everything safe; but that she can't live I know, because I feel that my power and influence are upon her, and that the force of this Evil Eye of mine has killed her. I told you this before, I think."

"Even so," said his mother; "it is only what I have said, a judicial punishment for their villany. Villany, Harry, never prospers."

"Egad, my dear mother," he replied, "I know of nothing so prosperous: look through life and you will see the villain thrive upon his fraud and iniquity, where the honest man--the man of integrity, who binds himself by all the principles of what are called honor and morality--is elbowed out of prosperity by the knave, the swindler, and the hypocrite. O, no, my dear mother, the two worst pa.s.sports to independence and success in life are truth and honesty."

"Well, Harry, I am a bad logician, and will not dispute it with you; but I am far from well, and I don't think I shall be able to visit them for two or three davs at least."

"But, in the meantime, express your intention to do so--on behalf of the family, mark; a.s.sume your right as the proprietor of this place, and as its representative, and then your visit will be considered as the visit of the whole family. In the meantime, mark me, the girl is dead. I have accomplished that gratifying event, so that, after all, your visit will be a mere matter of form. When you reach their house you will probably find it the house of death."

"And then," replied his mother, "the twelve hundred a year is yours for life, and the property of your children after you. Thank G.o.d!"

That morning at breakfast she expressed her determination to visit the Goodwins, making it, she said, a visit from the family in general; such a visit, she added, as might be proper on their (the Lindsays) part, but yet such an act of neighborhood that, while it manifested sufficient respect for them, would preclude all hopes of any future intercourse between them.

Mr. Lindsay did not relish this much; but as he had no particular wish, in consequence of Charles's illness, to oppose her motives in making the visit, he said she might manage it as she wished--he would not raise a fresh breeze about it. He only felt that he was sincerely, sorry for the loss which the Goodwins were about to experience.

CHAPTER XV. The Banshee.--Disappearance of Grace Davoren.

In the meantime it was certainly an unquestionable fact that Grace Davoren had disappeared, and not even a trace of her could be found. The unfortunate girl, alarmed at the tragic incident of that woful night, and impressed with a belief that Charles Lindsay had been murdered by Shawn-na-Middogue, had betaken herself to some place of concealment which no search on behalf of her friends could discover. In fact, her disappearance was involved in a mystery as deep as the alarm and distress it occasioned. But what astonished the public most was the fact that Charles, whose whole life had been untainted by a single act of impropriety, much less of profligacy, should have been discovered in such a heartless and unprincipled intrigue with the daughter of one of his father's tenants, an innocent girl, who, as such, was ent.i.tled to protection rather than injury at his hands.

Whilst this tumult was abroad, and the country was in an unusual state of alarm and agitation, Harry Woodward took, matters very quietly. That he seemed to feel deeply for the uncertain and dangerous state of his brother, who lay suspended, as it were, between life and death, was evident to every individual of his family. He frequently took Caterine Collins's place, attended him personally, with singular kindness and affection, gave him his drinks and decoctions with his own hand; and, when the surgeon came to make his daily visit, the anxiety he evinced in ascertaining whether there was any chance of his recovery was most affectionate and exemplary. Still, as usual, he was out at night; but the mystery of his whereabouts, while absent, could never be penetrated.

On those occasions he always went armed--a fact which he never attempted to conceal. On one of these nights it so happened that Barney Casey was called upon to attend at the wake of a relation, and, as his master's family were apprised of this circ.u.mstance, they did not of course expect him home until a late hour. He left the wake, however, earlier than he had proposed to do, for he found it a rather dull affair, and was on his way home when, to his astonishment, or rather to his horror, he saw Harry Woodward--also on his way home--in close conversation with the supernatural being so well known by description as the _Shan-dhinne-dhuv_; or Black Spectre. Now, Barney was half cowardly and half brave--that is to say, had he lived in an enlightened age he would have felt little terror of supernatural appearances; but at the period of our story such was the predominance of a belief in ghosts, fairies, evil spirits, and witches, that he should have been either less or more than man could he have shaken off the prevailing superst.i.tions, and the gross credulity of the times in which he lived. As it was, he knew not what to think. He remembered the character which had been whispered abroad about Harry Woodward, and of his intercourse with supernatural beings--he was known to possess the Evil Eye; and it was generally understood that those who happened to be endowed with that accursed gift were aided in the exercises of it by the powers of darkness and of evil.

What, then, was he to do? There probably was an opportunity of solving the mystery which hung around the midnight motions of Woodward. If there was a spirit before him, there was also a human being, in living flesh and blood--an acquaintance, too--an individual whom he personally knew, ready to sustain him, and afford, if necessary, that protection which, under such peculiar circ.u.mstances, one fellow-creature has a right to expect from another. Now Barney's way home led him necessarily--and a painful necessity it was--near the Haunted House; and he observed that the place where they stood, for they had ceased walking, was about fifty yards above that much dreaded mansion. He resolved, however, to make the plunge and advance, but deemed it only good manners to give some intimation of his approach. He was now within about twenty yards from them, and made an attempt at a comic song, which, however, quivered off into as dismal and cowardly a ditty as ever proceeded from human lips.

Harry and the Spectre, both startled by the voice, turned round to observe his approach, when, to his utter consternation, the Shan-dhinne-dhuv sank, as it were, into the earth and disappeared. The hair rose upon Barney's head, and when Woodward called out:

"Who comes there?"

He could scarcely summon voice enough to reply:

"It's me, sir," said he; "Barney Casey."

"Come on, Barney," said Woodward, "come on quickly;" and he had scarcely spoken when Barney joined him.

"Barney," said he, "I am in a state of great terror. I have felt ever since I pa.s.sed that Haunted House as if there was an evil spirit in my company. The feeling was dreadful, and I am very weak in consequence of it. Give me you arm."

"But did you see nothing, sir?" said Barney; "didn't it become visible to you?"

"No," replied the other; "but I felt as if I was in the presence of a supernatural being, and an evil one, too."

"G.o.d protect us, Mr. Harry! then, if you didn't see it I did."

"You did!" replied the other, startled; "and pray what was it like?"

"Why, a black ould man, sir; and, by all accounts that ever I could hear of it, it was nothing else than the Shan-dhinne-dhuv. For G.o.d's sake let us come home, sir, for this, if all they say be true, is unholy and cursed ground we're standin' on."

"And where did it disappear?" asked Woodward, leading him by a circuit from the spot where it had vanished.

"Just over there, sir," replied Barney, pointing to the place. "But, in G.o.d's name, let us make for home as fast as we can. I'll think every minute an hour till we get safe undher our own roof."

"Barney," said Woodward, solemnly, "I have a request to make of you, and it is this--the common report is, that the spirit in question follows our family--I mean by my mother's side. Now I beg, as you expect my good will and countenance, that, for my sake, and out of respect for the family in general, you will never breathe a syllable of what you have seen this night. It could answer no earthly purpose, and would only send abroad idle and unpleasant rumors throughout the country. Will you promise this?"

"Of course I promise it," replied Barney; "what object could I gain by repeatin' it?"

"None whatsoever. Well, then, be silent on the subject, and let us reach home as soon as we can."

It would be difficult to describe honest Barney's feelings as they went along. He imagined that he felt Harry's arm tremble within his, and when he thought of the reports concerning the evil spirit, and its connection with Mrs. Lindsay's family, his sensations were anything but comfortable. He tossed and tumbled that night for hours in his bed before he was able to sleep, and when he did sleep the _Shan-dhinne-dhuv_ rendered his dreams feverish and frightful.

Precisely at this period, before Mrs. Lindsay had recovered from her indisposition, and could pay her intended visit to the Goodwins, a circ.u.mstance occurred which suggested to Harry Woodward one of the most remorseless and Satanic schemes that ever was concocted in the heart of man. He was in the habit occasionally of going down to the kitchen to indulge in a smoke and a piece of banter with the servants. One evening, whilst thus amusing himself, the conversation turned upon the prevailing superst.i.tions of the day. Ghosts, witches, wizards; astrologers, fairies, leprechauns, and all that could be termed supernatural, or even related to or aided by it, were discussed at considerable length, and with every variety of feeling. Amongst the rest the Banshee was mentioned--a spirit of whose peculiar office and character Woodward, in consequence of his long absence from the country, was completely ignorant.

"The Banshee!" he exclaimed; "what kind of a spirit is that? I have never heard of it."

"Why, sir," replied Barney, who was present, "the Banshee--the Lord prevent us from hearin' her--is always the forerunner of death. She attends only certain families--princ.i.p.ally the ould Milesians, and mostly Catholics, too; although, I believe, it's well known that she sometimes attends Protestants whose families have been Catholics or Milesians, until the last of the name disappears. So that, afther all, it seems she's not over-scrupulous about religion."

"But what do you mean by attending families?" asked Woodward; "what description of attendance or service does she render them?"

"Indeed, Mr. Harry," replied Barney, "anything but an agreeable attendance. By goxty, I believe every family she follows would be very glad to dispense with her attendance if they could."

"But that is not answering my question, Casey."

"Why, sir," proceeded Barney, "I'll answer it. Whenever the family that she follows is about to have a death in it, she comes a little time before the death tikes place, sits either undher the windy of the sick bed or somewhere near the house, and wails and cries there as if her very heart would break. They say she generally names the name of the party that is to die; but there is no case known of the sick person ever recoverin' afther she has given the warnin' of death."

"It is a strange and wild superst.i.tion," observed Woodward.

"But a very true one, sir," replied the cook; "every one knows that a Banshee follows the Goodwin family."

"What! the Goodwins of Beech Grove?" said Harry.