Carmilla

"Before then I had no idea of her danger. I have lost her, and now learn

all, too late. She died in the peace of innocence, and in the glorious

hope of a blessed futurity. The fiend who betrayed our infatuated

hospitality has done it all. I thought I was receiving into my house

innocence, gaiety, a charming companion for my lost Bertha. Heavens!

what a fool have I been!

"I thank God my child died without a suspicion of the cause of her

sufferings. She is gone without so much as conjecturing the nature of

her illness, and the accursed passion of the agent of all this misery. I

devote my remaining days to tracking and extinguishing a monster. I am

told I may hope to accomplish my righteous and merciful purpose. At

present there is scarcely a gleam of light to guide me. I curse my

conceited incredulity, my despicable affectation of superiority, my

blindness, my obstinacy--all--too late. I cannot write or talk

collectedly now. I am distracted. So soon as I shall have a little

recovered, I mean to devote myself for a time to enquiry, which may

possibly lead me as far as Vienna. Some time in the autumn, two months

hence, or earlier if I live, I will see you--that is, if you permit me;

I will then tell you all that I scarce dare put upon paper now.

Farewell. Pray for me, dear friend."

In these terms ended this strange letter. Though I had never seen Bertha

Rheinfeldt my eyes filled with tears at the sudden intelligence; I was

startled, as well as profoundly disappointed.

The sun had now set, and it was twilight by the time I had returned the

General's letter to my father.

It was a soft clear evening, and we loitered, speculating upon the

possible meanings of the violent and incoherent sentences which I had

just been reading. We had nearly a mile to walk before reaching the road

that passes the schloss in front, and by that time the moon was shining

brilliantly. At the drawbridge we met Madame Perrodon and Mademoiselle

De Lafontaine, who had come out, without their bonnets, to enjoy the

exquisite moonlight.

We heard their voices gabbling in animated dialogue as we approached. We

joined them at the drawbridge, and turned about to admire with them the

beautiful scene.

The glade through which we had just walked lay before us. At our left

the narrow road wound away under clumps of lordly trees, and was lost to

sight amid the thickening forest. At the right the same road crosses the

steep and picturesque bridge, near which stands a ruined tower which

once guarded that pass; and beyond the bridge an abrupt eminence rises,

covered with trees, and showing in the shadows some grey

ivy-clustered rocks.