The Castle of Otranto
and fearing to renew his tears by the sight of his sole remaining child,
she hesitated whether she should break in upon his affliction; yet
solicitude for him, backed by the commands of her mother, encouraged her
to venture disobeying the orders he had given; a fault she had never been
guilty of before.
The gentle timidity of her nature made her pause for some minutes at his
door. She heard him traverse his chamber backwards, and forwards with
disordered steps; a mood which increased her apprehensions. She was,
however, just going to beg admittance, when Manfred suddenly opened the
door; and as it was now twilight, concurring with the disorder of his
mind, he did not distinguish the person, but asked angrily, who it was?
Matilda replied, trembling—
“My dearest father, it is I, your daughter.”
Manfred, stepping back hastily, cried, “Begone! I do not want a
daughter;” and flinging back abruptly, clapped the door against the
terrified Matilda.
She was too well acquainted with her father’s impetuosity to venture a
second intrusion. When she had a little recovered the shock of so bitter
a reception, she wiped away her tears to prevent the additional stab that
the knowledge of it would give to Hippolita, who questioned her in the
most anxious terms on the health of Manfred, and how he bore his loss.
Matilda assured her he was well, and supported his misfortune with manly
fortitude.
“But will he not let me see him?” said Hippolita mournfully; “will he not
permit me to blend my tears with his, and shed a mother’s sorrows in the
bosom of her Lord? Or do you deceive me, Matilda? I know how Manfred
doted on his son: is not the stroke too heavy for him? has he not sunk
under it? You do not answer me—alas! I dread the worst!—Raise me, my
maidens; I will, I will see my Lord. Bear me to him instantly: he is
dearer to me even than my children.”
Matilda made signs to Isabella to prevent Hippolita’s rising; and both
those lovely young women were using their gentle violence to stop and
calm the Princess, when a servant, on the part of Manfred, arrived and
told Isabella that his Lord demanded to speak with her.
“With me!” cried Isabella.
“Go,” said Hippolita, relieved by a message from her Lord: “Manfred
cannot support the sight of his own family. He thinks you less
disordered than we are, and dreads the shock of my grief. Console him,
dear Isabella, and tell him I will smother my own anguish rather than add
to his.”
As it was now evening the servant who conducted Isabella bore a torch
before her. When they came to Manfred, who was walking impatiently about
the gallery, he started, and said hastily—
“Take away that light, and begone.”
Then shutting the door impetuously, he flung himself upon a bench against
the wall, and bade Isabella sit by him. She obeyed trembling.
“I sent for you, Lady,” said he—and then stopped under great appearance
of confusion.
“My Lord!”
“Yes, I sent for you on a matter of great moment,” resumed he. “Dry your
tears, young Lady—you have lost your bridegroom. Yes, cruel fate! and I
have lost the hopes of my race! But Conrad was not worthy of your
beauty.”
“How, my Lord!” said Isabella; “sure you do not suspect me of not feeling
the concern I ought: my duty and affection would have always—”
“Think no more of him,” interrupted Manfred; “he was a sickly, puny
child, and Heaven has perhaps taken him away, that I might not trust the
honours of my house on so frail a foundation. The line of Manfred calls
for numerous supports. My foolish fondness for that boy blinded the eyes
of my prudence—but it is better as it is. I hope, in a few years, to
have reason to rejoice at the death of Conrad.”
Words cannot paint the astonishment of Isabella. At first she
apprehended that grief had disordered Manfred’s understanding. Her next
thought suggested that this strange discourse was designed to ensnare
her: she feared that Manfred had perceived her indifference for his son:
and in consequence of that idea she replied—
“Good my Lord, do not doubt my tenderness: my heart would have
accompanied my hand. Conrad would have engrossed all my care; and
wherever fate shall dispose of me, I shall always cherish his memory, and
regard your Highness and the virtuous Hippolita as my parents.”
“Curse on Hippolita!” cried Manfred. “Forget her from this moment, as I
do. In short, Lady, you have missed a husband undeserving of your
charms: they shall now be better disposed of. Instead of a sickly boy,
you shall have a husband in the prime of his age, who will know how to
value your beauties, and who may expect a numerous offspring.”
“Alas, my Lord!” said Isabella, “my mind is too sadly engrossed by the
recent catastrophe in your family to think of another marriage. If ever
my father returns, and it shall be his pleasure, I shall obey, as I did
when I consented to give my hand to your son: but until his return,
permit me to remain under your hospitable roof, and employ the melancholy
hours in assuaging yours, Hippolita’s, and the fair Matilda’s
affliction.”
“I desired you once before,” said Manfred angrily, “not to name that
woman: from this hour she must be a stranger to you, as she must be to
me. In short, Isabella, since I cannot give you my son, I offer you
myself.”
“Heavens!” cried Isabella, waking from her delusion, “what do I hear?
You! my Lord! You! My father-in-law! the father of Conrad! the husband
of the virtuous and tender Hippolita!”
“I tell you,” said Manfred imperiously, “Hippolita is no longer my wife;
I divorce her from this hour. Too long has she cursed me by her
unfruitfulness. My fate depends on having sons, and this night I trust
will give a new date to my hopes.”
At those words he seized the cold hand of Isabella, who was half dead
with fright and horror. She shrieked, and started from him, Manfred rose
to pursue her, when the moon, which was now up, and gleamed in at the
opposite casement, presented to his sight the plumes of the fatal helmet,
which rose to the height of the windows, waving backwards and forwards in
a tempestuous manner, and accompanied with a hollow and rustling sound.
Isabella, who gathered courage from her situation, and who dreaded
nothing so much as Manfred’s pursuit of his declaration, cried—
“Look, my Lord! see, Heaven itself declares against your impious
intentions!”
“Heaven nor Hell shall impede my designs,” said Manfred, advancing again
to seize the Princess.
At that instant the portrait of his grandfather, which hung over the
bench where they had been sitting, uttered a deep sigh, and heaved its
breast.
Isabella, whose back was turned to the picture, saw not the motion, nor
knew whence the sound came, but started, and said—
“Hark, my Lord! What sound was that?” and at the same time made towards
the door.
Manfred, distracted between the flight of Isabella, who had now reached
the stairs, and yet unable to keep his eyes from the picture, which began
to move, had, however, advanced some steps after her, still looking
backwards on the portrait, when he saw it quit its panel, and descend on
the floor with a grave and melancholy air.
“Do I dream?” cried Manfred, returning; “or are the devils themselves in
league against me? Speak, infernal spectre! Or, if thou art my
grandsire, why dost thou too conspire against thy wretched descendant,
who too dearly pays for—” Ere he could finish the sentence, the vision
sighed again, and made a sign to Manfred to follow him.
“Lead on!” cried Manfred; “I will follow thee to the gulf of perdition.”
The spectre marched sedately, but dejected, to the end of the gallery,
and turned into a chamber on the right hand. Manfred accompanied him at
a little distance, full of anxiety and horror, but resolved. As he would
have entered the chamber, the door was clapped to with violence by an
invisible hand. The Prince, collecting courage from this delay, would
have forcibly burst open the door with his foot, but found that it
resisted his utmost efforts.
“Since Hell will not satisfy my curiosity,” said Manfred, “I will use the
human means in my power for preserving my race; Isabella shall not escape
me.”
The lady, whose resolution had given way to terror the moment she had
quitted Manfred, continued her flight to the bottom of the principal
staircase. There she stopped, not knowing whither to direct her steps,
nor how to escape from the impetuosity of the Prince. The gates of the
castle, she knew, were locked, and guards placed in the court. Should
she, as her heart prompted her, go and prepare Hippolita for the cruel
destiny that awaited her, she did not doubt but Manfred would seek her
there, and that his violence would incite him to double the injury he
meditated, without leaving room for them to avoid the impetuosity of his
passions. Delay might give him time to reflect on the horrid measures he
had conceived, or produce some circumstance in her favour, if she
could—for that night, at least—avoid his odious purpose. Yet where
conceal herself? How avoid the pursuit he would infallibly make
throughout the castle?
As these thoughts passed rapidly through her mind, she recollected a
subterraneous passage which led from the vaults of the castle to the
church of St. Nicholas. Could she reach the altar before she was
overtaken, she knew even Manfred’s violence would not dare to profane the
sacredness of the place; and she determined, if no other means of
deliverance offered, to shut herself up for ever among the holy virgins
whose convent was contiguous to the cathedral. In this resolution, she
seized a lamp that burned at the foot of the staircase, and hurried
towards the secret passage.
The lower part of the castle was hollowed into several intricate
cloisters; and it was not easy for one under so much anxiety to find the
door that opened into the cavern. An awful silence reigned throughout
those subterraneous regions, except now and then some blasts of wind that
shook the doors she had passed, and which, grating on the rusty hinges,
were re-echoed through that long labyrinth of darkness. Every murmur
struck her with new terror; yet more she dreaded to hear the wrathful
voice of Manfred urging his domestics to pursue her.
She trod as softly as impatience would give her leave, yet frequently
stopped and listened to hear if she was followed. In one of those
moments she thought she heard a sigh. She shuddered, and recoiled a few
paces. In a moment she thought she heard the step of some person. Her
blood curdled; she concluded it was Manfred. Every suggestion that
horror could inspire rushed into her mind. She condemned her rash
flight, which had thus exposed her to his rage in a place where her cries
were not likely to draw anybody to her assistance. Yet the sound seemed
not to come from behind. If Manfred knew where she was, he must have
followed her. She was still in one of the cloisters, and the steps she
had heard were too distinct to proceed from the way she had come.
Cheered with this reflection, and hoping to find a friend in whoever was
not the Prince, she was going to advance, when a door that stood ajar, at
some distance to the left, was opened gently: but ere her lamp, which she
held up, could discover who opened it, the person retreated precipitately
on seeing the light.
Isabella, whom every incident was sufficient to dismay, hesitated whether
she should proceed. Her dread of Manfred soon outweighed every other
terror. The very circumstance of the person avoiding her gave her a sort
of courage. It could only be, she thought, some domestic belonging to
the castle. Her gentleness had never raised her an enemy, and conscious
innocence made her hope that, unless sent by the Prince’s order to seek
her, his servants would rather assist than prevent her flight.