Yet he was a brave man!”

“Listen,” said I, taking hold of her arm, the better to arrest her full
attention: “if what I suspect holds true, that man stole Bridget’s only
child—the very Mary Fitzgerald who was Lucy’s mother; if so, Bridget
cursed him in ignorance of the deeper wrong he had done her. To this
hour she yearns after her lost child, and questions the saints whether
she be living or not. The roots of that curse lie deeper than she knows:
she unwittingly banned him for a deeper guilt than that of killing a dumb
beast. The sins of the fathers are indeed visited upon the children.”

“But,” said Mistress Clarke, eagerly, “she would never let evil rest on
her own grandchild? Surely, sir, if what you say be true, there are
hopes for Lucy. Let us go—go at once, and tell this fearful woman all
that you suspect, and beseech her to take off the spell she has put upon
her innocent grandchild.”

It seemed to me, indeed, that something like this was the best course we
could pursue. But first it was necessary to ascertain more than what
mere rumour or careless hearsay could tell. My thoughts turned to my
uncle—he could advise me wisely—he ought to know all. I resolved to go
to him without delay; but I did not choose to tell Mistress Clarke of all
the visionary plans that flitted through my mind. I simply declared my
intention of proceeding straight to London on Lucy’s affairs. I bade her
believe that my interest on the young lady’s behalf was greater than
ever, and that my whole time should be given up to her cause. I saw that
Mistress Clarke distrusted me, because my mind was too full of thoughts
for my words to flow freely. She sighed and shook her head, and said,
“Well, it is all right!” in such a tone that it was an implied reproach. But I was firm and constant in my heart, and I took confidence from that. I rode to London. I rode long days drawn out into the lovely summer
nights: I could not rest. I reached London. I told my uncle all, though
in the stir of the great city the horror had faded away, and I could
hardly imagine that he would believe the account I gave him of the
fearful double of Lucy which I had seen on the lonely moor-side. But my
uncle had lived many years, and learnt many things; and, in the deep
secrets of family history that had been confided to him, he had heard of
cases of innocent people bewitched and taken possession of by evil
spirits yet more fearful than Lucy’s. For, as he said, to judge from all
I told him, that resemblance had no power over her—she was too pure and
good to be tainted by its evil, haunting presence. It had, in all
probability, so my uncle conceived, tried to suggest wicked thoughts and
to tempt to wicked actions but she, in her saintly maidenhood, had passed
on undefiled by evil thought or deed. It could not touch her soul: but
true, it set her apart from all sweet love or common human intercourse. My uncle threw himself with an energy more like six-and-twenty than sixty
into the consideration of the whole case. He undertook the proving
Lucy’s descent, and volunteered to go and find out Mr. Gisborne, and
obtain, firstly, the legal proofs of her descent from the Fitzgeralds of
Kildoon, and, secondly, to try and hear all that he could respecting the
working of the curse, and whether any and what means had been taken to
exorcise that terrible appearance. For he told me of instances where, by
prayers and long fasting, the evil possessor had been driven forth with
howling and many cries from the body which it had come to inhabit; he
spoke of those strange New England cases which had happened not so long
before; of Mr. Defoe, who had written a book, wherein he had named many
modes of subduing apparitions, and sending them back whence they came;
and, lastly, he spoke low of dreadful ways of compelling witches to undo
their witchcraft. But I could not endure to hear of those tortures and
burnings. I said that Bridget was rather a wild and savage woman than a
malignant witch; and, above all, that Lucy was of her kith and kin; and
that, in putting her to the trial, by water or by fire, we should be
torturing—it might be to the death—the ancestress of her we sought to
redeem. My uncle thought awhile, and then said, that in this last matter I was
right—at any rate, it should not be tried, with his consent, till all
other modes of remedy had failed; and he assented to my proposal that I
should go myself and see Bridget, and tell her all. In accordance with this, I went down once more to the wayside inn near
Coldholme. It was late at night when I arrived there; and, while I
supped, I inquired of the landlord more particulars as to Bridget’s ways. Solitary and savage had been her life for many years. Wild and despotic
were her words and manner to those few people who came across her path. The country-folk did her imperious bidding, because they feared to
disobey. If they pleased her, they prospered; if, on the contrary, they
neglected or traversed her behests, misfortune, small or great, fell on
them and theirs. It was not detestation so much as an indefinable terror
that she excited. In the morning I went to see her. She was standing on the green outside
her cottage, and received me with the sullen grandeur of a throneless
queen. I read in her face that she recognized me, and that I was not
unwelcome; but she stood silent till I had opened my errand. “I have news of your daughter,” said I, resolved to speak straight to all
that I knew she felt of love, and not to spare her. “She is dead!”

The stern figure scarcely trembled, but her hand sought the support of
the door-post. “I knew that she was dead,” said she, deep and low, and then was silent
for an instant. “My tears that should have flowed for her were burnt up
long years ago. Young man, tell me about her.”

“Not yet,” said I, having a strange power given me of confronting one,
whom, nevertheless, in my secret soul I dreaded. “You had once a little dog,” I continued. The words called out in her
more show of emotion than the intelligence of her daughter’s death. She
broke in upon my speech:—

“I had! It was hers—the last thing I had of hers—and it was shot for
wantonness! It died in my arms. The man who killed that dog rues it to
this day. For that dumb beast’s blood, his best-beloved stands
accursed.”

Her eyes distended, as if she were in a trance and saw the working of her
curse. Again I spoke:—

“O, woman!” I said, “that best-beloved, standing accursed before men, is
your dead daughter’s child.”

The life, the energy, the passion, came back to the eyes with which she
pierced through me, to see if I spoke truth; then, without another
question or word, she threw herself on the ground with fearful vehemence,
and clutched at the innocent daisies with convulsed hands. “Bone of my bone! flesh of my flesh! have I cursed thee—and art thou
accursed?”

So she moaned, as she lay prostrate in her great agony. I stood aghast
at my own work.