One night, he was disturbed by the horrible and heartrending shrieks of the female prisoner, who had contrived to gain access to his cell. There was something about this mysterious person that inspired him with unaccountable dread; and though he was satisfied she was a being of this world, the conviction did not serve to lessen his fears. After making the dungeon ring with her cries for some time, she became silent, and as he heard no sound and could distinguish nothing, he concluded she must have departed. Just then the unlocking of a distant door and a gleam of sickly light on the walls of the stone passage announced the approach of Nightgall, and the next moment he entered the cell. The light fell upon a crouching female figure in one corner. The jailor started; and his angry ejaculations caused the poor creature to raise her head.
Cholmondeley had never beheld anything so ghastly as her countenance, and he half doubted whether he did not look upon a tenant of the grave. Her eyes were sunken and lustreless; her cheeks thin and rigid, and covered with skin of that deadly paleness which is seen in plants deprived of light; her flesh shrunken to the bone, and her hands like those of a skeleton. But in spite of all this emaciation, there was something in her features that seemed to denote that she had once been beautiful, and her condition in life exalted. The terror she exhibited at the approach of the jailor proved the dreadful usage she had experienced. In answer to his savage ejaculations to her to follow him, she flung herself on her knees, and raised her hands in the most piteous supplication. Nothing moved by this, Nightgall was about to seize her and drag her away, when with a piercing scream she darted from him, and took refuge behind Cholmondeley.
“Save me! – save me from him!” she shrieked; “he will kill me.”
“Pshaw!” cried the jailor. “Come with me quietly, Alexia, and you shall have a warmer cell, and better food.”
“I will not go,” she replied. “I will not answer to that name. Give me my rightful title and I will follow you.”
“What is your title?” asked Cholmondeley, eagerly.
“Beware!” interposed Nightgall, raising his hand menacingly. “Beware!”
“Heed him not!” cried Cholmondeley; “he shall not harm you. Tell me how you are called?”
“I have forgotten,” replied the terrified woman, evasively. “I had another name once. But I am called Alexia now.”
“What has become of your child?” asked Cholmondeley.
“My child!” she echoed, with a frightful scream. “I have lost her in these dungeons. I sometimes see her before me running and clapping her little hands. Ah! there she is – coming towards us. She has long fair hair – light blue eyes – blue as the skies I shall never behold again. Do you not see her?”
“No,” replied Cholmondeley, trembling. “How is she named?”
“She died unbaptised,” replied the female. “But I meant to call her Angela. Ah! see! she answers to the name – she approaches. Angela! my child! – my child!” And the miserable creature extended her arms, and seemed to clasp a phantom to her bosom.
“Alexia!” roared the jailor, fiercely, “follow me, or I will have you scourged by the tormentor.”
“He dare not – he will not,” – cried Cholmondeley, to whom the wretched woman clung convulsively. “Do not go with him.”
“Alexia,” reiterated the jailor, in a tone of increased fury.
“I must go,” she cried, breaking from the esquire, “or he will kill me.” And with a noiseless step she glided after Nightgall.
Cholmondeley listened intently, and as upon a former occasion, heard stifled groans succeeded by the clangour of a closing door, and then all was hushed. The jailor returned no more that night. When he appeared again, it was with a moodier aspect than ever. He set down the provisions, and instantly departed.
While meditating upon various means of escape, an idea at length occurred to the young esquire upon which he resolved to act. He determined to feign death. Accordingly, though half famished, he left his provisions untouched; and when Nightgall next visited the cell, he found him stretched on the ground, apparently lifeless. Uttering a savage laugh, the jailor held the light over the supposed corpse, and exclaimed, “At last I am fairly rid of him. Cicely will now be mine. I will fling him into the burial-vault near the moat. But first to unfasten this chain.”
So saying, he took a small key from the bunch at his girdle and unlocked the massive fetters that bound Cholmondeley to the wall. During this operation the esquire held his breath, and endeavoured to give his limbs the semblance of death. But the jailor’s suspicions were aroused.
“He cannot have been long dead,” he muttered, “perhaps he is only in a trance. This shall make all secure.” And drawing his dagger, he was about to plunge it in the bosom of the esquire, when the latter being now freed from his bondage, suddenly started to his feet, and flung himself upon him.
The suddenness of the action favoured its success. Before Nightgall recovered from his surprise, the poniard was wrested from his grasp and held at his throat. In the struggle that ensued, he received a wound which brought him senseless to the ground; and Cholmondeley, thinking it needless to despatch him, contented himself with chaining him to the wall.
Possessing himself of the jailor’s keys, he was about to depart, when Nightgall, who at that moment regained his consciousness, and with it all his ferocity, strove to intercept him. On discovering his situation, he uttered a torrent of impotent threats and execrations. The only reply deigned by the esquire to his menaces, was an assurance that he was about to set free the miserable Alexia.
Quitting the cell, Cholmondeley turned off on the left, in the direction whence he imagined the shrieks had proceeded. Here he beheld a range of low strong doors, the first of which he unlocked with one of the jailor’s keys. The prison was unoccupied. He opened the next, but with no better success. It contained nothing except a few rusty links of chain attached to an iron staple driven into the floor. In the third he found a few mouldering bones; and the fourth was totally empty. He then knocked at the doors of others, and called the miserable captive by her name in a loud voice. But no answer was returned.
At the extremity of the passage he found an open door, leading to a small circular chamber, in the centre of which stood a heavy stone pillar. From this pillar projected a long iron bar, sustaining a coil of rope, terminated by a hook. On the ground lay an immense pair of pincers, a curiously-shaped saw, and a brasier. In one corner stood a large oaken frame, about three feet high, moved by rollers. At the other was a ponderous wooden machine, like a pair of stocks. Against the wall hung a broad hoop of iron, opening in the middle with a hinge – a horrible instrument of torture, termed “The Scavenger’s Daughter.” Near it were a pair of iron gauntlets, which could be contracted by screws till they crushed the fingers of the wearer. On the wall also hung a small brush to sprinkle the wretched victims who fainted from excess of agony, with vinegar; while on a table beneath it were placed writing materials and an open volume, in which were taken down the confessions of the sufferers.
Cholmondeley saw at once that he had entered the torture-chamber, and hastily surveying these horrible contrivances, was about to withdraw, when he noticed a trap-door in one corner. Advancing towards it, he perceived a flight of steps, and thinking they might lead him to the cell he was in search of, he descended, and came to a passage still narrower and gloomier than that he had quitted. As he proceeded along it, he thought he heard a low groan, and hurrying in the direction of the sound, arrived at a small door, and knocking against it, called “Alexia,” but was answered in the feeble voice of a man.
“I am not Alexia, but whoever you are, liberate me from this horrible torture, or put me to death, and so free me from misery.”
After some search, Cholmondeley discovered the key of the dungeon and unlocking it, beheld an old man in a strange stooping posture, with his head upon his breast, and his back bent almost double. The walls of the cell, which was called the Little Ease, were so low, and so contrived, that the wretched inmate could neither stand, walk, sit, nor he at full length within them.
With difficulty, –