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Thus, with this vague bond of sympathy with a man whom he had never seen, never known, so long ago, so cruelly dead, this intuitive divination of his paternal sentiment, Varney's fatherly attitude grew more definite daily and became accustomed, and he was jealous of the influence of Colannah, who in turn was jealous of his influence.
Beck pulled his forelock, and retreated back, not in the direction of the principal staircase, but towards that used by the servants, and which his researches into the topography of the mansion had now made known to him. To gain these back stairs he had to pass Lucretia's room; the door stood ajar; Varney's face was turned from him.
"But I tell you what, mates," said the first speaker; "that if it isn't Sir Francis Varney's, it is somebody else's as bad. I dare say, now, he's a wictim." "A what!" "A wictim to the wampyre; and, if he sees the blessed moonlight, he will be a wampyre hisself, and so shall we be, too, if he puts his teeth into us."
Thus was it that Sir Francis Varney's position, although he knew it not, became momentarily one of extreme peril, and the danger he was about to run, was certainly greater than any he had as yet experienced.
"So you attended Mr. Varney's uncle in his last illness. Did he suffer much?" "He was a poor creature at best," answered Martha; "but he gave me a deal of trouble afore he went. He was a scranny corpse when I strecked him out." Madame Dalibard shrank from the hands at that moment employed upon herself, and said, "It was not, then, the first corpse you have laid out for the grave?" "Not by many."
"Ah," he said, as he came up, "I see you have been to Sir Francis Varney's, if I may judge from the direction whence you're coming, and your proximity." "Yes, we have," said Mr. Chillingworth. "I thought you had left these parts?" "I had intended to do so," replied Marchdale; "but second thoughts are sometimes best, you know." "Certainly."
"The devil!" thought the landlord; "this is another of them, I'll bet a guinea. Sir Francis Varney, sir, did you say? Why, sir, there was a Sir Francis Varney, but folks seem to think as how he's no better than he should be a sort of vampyre, sir, if you know what that is." "I have, certainly, heard of such things; but can you not tell me Varney's address? I wish to see him."
Indeed, saving the sound of the footsteps, nothing could be heard of them at all; and that regular tramp, tramp, would have puzzled any one listening to it from any distance to know in which direction it was proceeding. In this way they went on until Sir Francis Varney's house was reached, and then a whispered word to halt was given, and all eyes were bent upon the building.
That was when Varney's hands let go of the handle-bars. The next instant they fell upon Hammerton's withdrawing figure and brought it up with a sharp jerk. Peter heard the ensuing struggle, but saw nothing. He paid Varney the tribute of sitting still in his seat and saying not a word. The contest was bitter, but brief.
It was only his strong sense of the duty he owed to his family, that took him to the new church at all, and it was to be feared that had it not been for his personal interest in Mr Maxwell, and his real love for the word of truth as presented by him to the people, he would, during the winter which saw the work at Varney's farm commenced and carried on at Jacob Holt's bidding, have absented himself from the house of God altogether.
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