The storm had lasted several hours, and still, the forked lightning darted in livid streaks from cloud to cloud. The awful thunder filled the air with its hundred echoes, and the wind swept over a scene of desolation, for the smiling corn-fields were no more; the laden fruit trees were levelled with the soil, and many a cottage had its humble thatch torn off, and presented but its bare walls to the moaning blast.
The principle fury of the land storm seemed to have been levelled at a little village which occupied the gentle slope of a beautiful and fertile valley, some few miles from Ashby-de-la-Zouch, and through the lowest portion of which a branch of the river Derwent wound its serpentine course. The village was called Learmont, from the name of a noble family who, since the Norman conquest, had been the owners of the land.
There was scarcely a house, from the humblest cottage to the lordly mansion of the Learmonts, which had not suffered by the hurricane; and to add to the dismay of the inhabitants, who in fear and dread had rushed from their homes, there arose about the hour of midnight the dreadful cry of fire!
That fearful cry struck terror to every heart, and those who had breath to shriek joined the shout, and “fire! fire!” passed from mouth to mouth, in all the different tones and cadences of fear and hopelessness.
All uncertainty as to the precise locality of the fire was soon removed, for the flames from a large irregular building, standing somewhat apart from the other houses, quickly marked it as the spot of the conflagration.
“It’s at the Old Smithy,” cried a dozen voices.
The words had scarcely passed their lips, when a woman darted into the centre of the throng, shrieking wildly—
“Aye—it is at the Old Smithy! The time has come—I knew. I have told you all; you, and you, and you, I’ve told. Ha! Ha! Ha! Heaven has at last forged a bolt for the Old Smithy! Do you stand aghast! Can you put out yon light? No—no—no! I know you cannot. The Old Smithy gone at last. Ha! Ha! I am happy now—happy now! You do not stir. You are right—quite right. Let him, Andrew Britton—that’s his name—let him roast and writhe in the flames—let his skin blacken in curling lights—let his flesh drop from him in the hissing, roaring fire—let his bones whiten, and glow, and crackle into long white splinters, as they will—as I know they will; but I want to see it, my masters—I want to see it. Live—live and shriek, Andrew Britton, till I come. Hark! now. I hear him. Hark!—music—music—’tis music.”
She was about to bound off in the direction of the blazing house, leaving her listeners aghast at her terrible denunciations, when a man of forbidding aspect and Herculean build rushed into the midst of the throng of villagers round her, and with one blow of his clenched hand struck her insensible to the earth.
A cry of “shame! shame!” arose, and a young man stepping forward, exclaimed—
“Unmanly ruffian! How dared you strike the woman? You know as well as all we that she is mad. Andrew Britton, you are a coward, and well you merit your name of ‘The Savage.’ ”
“Down with the savage!” cried several.
“He has killed poor Mad Maud,” said one.
“Is she not always crying out against me?” growled the ruffian. “Is there anything too bad for the old beldame to say of me, Andrew Britton?”
“Not dead! not dead!” suddenly cried she whom the villagers called Mad Maud, springing to her feet. “Mind ye all, Andrew Britton is to die before I do. Ha! Ha!—Not dead! To the Smithy—to the Smithy.”
She darted off in the direction of the blazing house, and, as if by one impulse, the villagers followed her, shouting—
“To the Smithy—to the Smithy!”
The building, which was in flames, had at one time evidently been of a much higher character than its present appearance warranted. It consisted of a large uninhabited house, with two wings, one of which had been converted into a smithy, and was in the occupation of Andrew Britton, the smith, who stood high in favour of the then Squire Learmont, whose property the old house was.
The fire was in the other wing to that which had been converted into a smithy, and when the villagers arrived they found it so enveloped in flames, that any attempt to save it seemed perfectly in vain.
“Blood—blood is spilling,” cried Mad Maud, rushing close to the flaming building. “I heard it. A deed of blood! Hark!—hark!”
The villagers were horror-stricken by hearing piercing shrieks coming from the interior of the burning house.
“There!” cried the maniac exultingly; “that’s a death cry. Ha! Ha! Ha! Brave work—brave work. Andrew Britton, where are you?”
“Here,” cried the smith. “Look at me, all of you, and swear hereafter you saw me here while—while—”
“While the murder was doing!” cried Maud.
“Murder?” said the villagers, as if with one voice.
“Drivelling idiot!” roared Britton. “By—”
Before the oath could escape his lips, there dashed from among the burning ruins a figure which might well strike terror into every heart. It was that of a man, but so blackened and scorched was he by the fire that he scarcely looked human.
“Help! Help!” he screamed. “Murder! Murder!”
Every heart was paralysed as he dashed into the centre of the throng, screaming with pain.
“The child! The child!” he screamed. “The child of the dead—save her! Save her!”
Many hands were immediately stretched forward to take from his arms an infant that the villagers now perceived he carried.
He resigned his charge, and then flinging his arms above his head, he cried—
“Save me—save me from myself—from the glance of the dead man’s eye—from blood save me. Oh, save me from conscience. The hell has begun.”
His last words rung faintly on the ears of the horrified crowd, for having given up the child, he then bounded onwards, and was soon lost to sight and hearing in the darkness of a plantation which grew on the border of the stream that watered the valley.
Britton, the smith, glared with eyes of fury after the shrieking fugitive, then clenching his hand, he shook it wildly in the air, and breathing a bitter curse, turned from the burning portion of the house, and dashed into the wing in which was the Smithy.
CHAPTER II.
The Lull of the Tempest.—Morning is Coming.—The Child of Mystery.—The Necklace.—A Surprise and a Disappearance.—The Inscription.—The Lord of Learmont.
The startling and singular events at the Old Smithy had the effect of distracting in some measure the attention of the affrighted inhabitants of Learmont from the fury of the tempest, which was still raging, although with diminished rage, around their humble dwellings.
The forked lightning was not so frequent in its flashes, and the thunder seemed to be passing away in the direction of the wind.
Still it was a night of terror, and it was not until the wind had sensibly abated, and a few heavy drops of rain fell splashing upon the ground, that the peasants ventured to