The Mysteries of the Court of London — page 353: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

SE TI in LTT = me ee ee ee ee ey — oe THE MYSTERIES OF THE COURT. 33: denly gifted with the power to cast off the spell of the trance, fling her arms around his neck, weep upon his breast, and prove that she was alive! That was a moment—a single moment of beatific feeling forthe unfortunate Ariadne: but the darkest, deep- est, blackest despair suddenly seized upon her soul as she felt herself still tied down to that couch—still en- chained in motionless rigidity—still cold and lifeless as marble in body, though with a mind that was every instant flaming up with the accumulated vio- lence of a thousand voleanos! Then she felt the tear-drop upon her cheek. Heavens! it seemed to sink down into her very heart. Oh! that tear!—that tear! it was a pledge of love——Good God! what mockery for her to dream of such bliss as that which is concentrated in the word love! Deeper—yes, deeper, deeper down into the lowest abyss of despair was she plunged, as all hopé abandoned her. Then she felt the tear wiped away from her face: then the kiss was imprinted upon her brow;—and then there were sounds of hurried retreating steps—and the door closed agvain—and she was once more alone. Yes: and once more did she relapse into that stupor which gave her mental energies the means and the lei- sure to repose, and regain their strength in order to put forth their excruciating vitality again ! When she next awoke she became aware that there wasa candle oralampinthe room. Through her closed eyelids could she distinguish where it was; andthenshe heard several heavy feet moving about the chamber, though with an evident endea- vour that their tread should be as light as possible. A horrible suspicion sprang up in the poor girl’s mind; and it was almost immediately confirmed by other sounds which struck upon her ears. These sounds were those of wood coming in con- tact with wood—one thing being lifted upon an- other: and then she knew that the undertaker's men were in the room placing the shell upen the tressels! It instantaneously struck her that if ever the excruciation of her mental agonies should become. sufficiently keen to inspire her physical being with new life, this must be themoment. If the asphyxia should now prove stronger than that anguish which was torturing her soul to such an extent as appa- rently to render it capable of inspiring marble itself with motion, then in that ease did it seem as if all hope might be really abandoned. She felt her mind struggling within—or rather she made it struggle with all the violence of desperation to force it as it were to give vent to its feelings in any one of the numerous evidences ef life: such as a shudder—a shriek—a stretching forth of the arms—a turning of the head—an opening of the eyelids—or even a quivering of the lips. But no: nothing of all this could she accomplish. Her mind was imprisoned in a form rigid and imprac- ticable as marble: and it seemed to her as if she herself were vainly struggling for emancipation from the interior of a stone sepulchre in which, like a Roman vestal of ancient times, she was walled up! But we cannot describe the full horror of her thouhts on this head: we must leave the reader much to imagine and depict unto himself. For now the moment—the dread moment had come when Ariadne was to be placed inthe shell. It —— nan - - - --- was from habit that the undertaker and his men trod as gently as possible in the room — from habit that they spoke in under-tones suited to the chamber of death—from habit that they laid their hands upon her gently and delicately. It was habit all: for in their nature they were no more susceptible of sympathy than other men. On the contrary—from being in the frequent companion- ship of the dead, they knew neither awe nor pity. Indeed, their feelihgs were much blunted and their hearts much brutalized by their avocation: and if a proof of this were wanting, it might have been found in the fact that the housekeeper, knowing their predilection, at this moment entered the room with a tray containing a bottle of spirits and several glasses. Thereupon the undertaker and his men turned away from the couch, and approached the toilette-table where the housekeeper deposited the tray. * Now, ma’am, will you jine in?” asked Mr. Stimson, as he filled all the glasses round. * Well, Pll just take a leetie drop, so as not to seem unfriendly,” said the honsekeeper. “That's right, ma'am. Aad now,” continued Stimson, raising a brimming glass to his lips, “here’s your wery good health, ma’am—and here’s his lordship’s health too—and wishing us all good luck :”—with which benediction the undertaker screwed up his eyes, as if to shut out the fume of the liquor as he tossed it d>wn his throat. Having refreshed themselves with & dram, the servitors of death returned to the couch, and once more resumed their hold upon Ariadne. Not the concentrated anguish of ten thousand racks—not the essence powerfully condensed of all the most refined excruciations of the Inquisition—can con- vey any adequate idea of the agony of agonies which the young girl now endured. All such ideas as the coiling of fiery serpents around the form—of burning alive in candescent flames—-of tearing off the scalp and dropping boiling oil upon the brain laid bare—of flaying alive and searing the excoriated flesh with red-hot iron—of passing red-hot needles through the eyes, all such ideas as these, we say, fell incomparably short of the illimitable agony endured by the poor girl as the undertaicer and his men lifted her from the bed and put her into the narrow shell. This being done, the men retraced their way to the toilette-table, aud regaled themselves with another dram. “JY never did see a corpse keep so fresh,” ob- served Stimson: “there’s no oozing out of the mouth—no discolouring under the eyes—not even any particular blueness of the nails. And then, too, she felt as limp and supple as if only ina fit.” * But I shouldn’t like to be only half as dead for all that,” said one of the men. ‘Poor thing,” he continued, with the mechanical utterance of the sympathetic ejaculation: “she'll be discoloured and blue enough in a few days—and she'll get stark and stiff enough, too, before she’s put into her coffin and screwed down.” Serewed down! good heavens, what dreadful words—overwhelming as a torreut, devouring as a conflagration, crushing as a thunderbolt! Life appeared now to be really ebbing away from the statue-like form of Ariadne Varian: and oh! how she wished that she might be really dying —that — —_—_—— —__—_——_—_— ——-.e oe ee aww eC + + ae ia ee Conn (C VOOKS (CO) *