Carmilla

For my part, I was delighted. I was longing to see and talk to her; and

only waiting till the doctor should give me leave. You, who live in

towns, can have no idea how great an event the introduction of a new

friend is, in such a solitude as surrounded us.

The doctor did not arrive till nearly one o'clock; but I could no more

have gone to my bed and slept, than I could have overtaken, on foot, the

carriage in which the princess in black velvet had driven away.

When the physician came down to the drawing room, it was to report very

favorably upon his patient. She was now sitting up, her pulse quite

regular, apparently perfectly well. She had sustained no injury, and the

little shock to her nerves had passed away quite harmlessly. There could

be no harm certainly in my seeing her, if we both wished it; and, with

this permission I sent, forthwith, to know whether she would allow me to

visit her for a few minutes in her room.

The servant returned immediately to say that she desired nothing more.

You may be sure I was not long in availing myself of this permission.

Our visitor lay in one of the handsomest rooms in the schloss. It was,

perhaps, a little stately. There was a somber piece of tapestry opposite

the foot of the bed, representing Cleopatra with the asps to her bosom;

and other solemn classic scenes were displayed, a little faded, upon the

other walls. But there was gold carving, and rich and varied color

enough in the other decorations of the room, to more than redeem the

gloom of the old tapestry.

There were candles at the bedside. She was sitting up; her slender

pretty figure enveloped in the soft silk dressing gown, embroidered with

flowers, and lined with thick quilted silk, which her mother had thrown

over her feet as she lay upon the ground.

What was it that, as I reached the bedside and had just begun my little

greeting, struck me dumb in a moment, and made me recoil a step or two

from before her? I will tell you.

I saw the very face which had visited me in my childhood at night, which

remained so fixed in my memory, and on which I had for so many years so

often ruminated with horror, when no one suspected of what I

was thinking.

It was pretty, even beautiful; and when I first beheld it, wore the

same melancholy expression.

But this almost instantly lighted into a strange fixed smile of

recognition.

There was a silence of fully a minute, and then at length she spoke; I

could not.

"How wonderful!" she exclaimed. "Twelve years ago, I saw your face in a

dream, and it has haunted me ever since."