BOOK II: VISSARION

by Bram Stoker

　　Letter from Rupert Sent Leger, Castle of Vissarion, the Spear ofIvan, Land of the Blue Mountains, to Miss Janet MacKelpie, CroomCastle, Ross-shire, N.B.January 23, 1907.MY DEAREST AUNT JANET,As you see, I am here at last. Having got my formal duty done, asyou made me promise--my letters reporting arrival to Sir Colin andMr. Trent are lying sealed in front of me ready to post (for nothingshall go before yours)--I am free to speak to you.This is a most lovely place, and I hope you will like it. I am quitesure you will. We passed it in the steamer coming from Trieste toDurazzo. I knew the locality from the chart, and it was pointed outto me by one of the officers with whom I had become quite friendly,and who kindly showed me interesting places whenever we got withinsight of shore. The Spear of Ivan, on which the Castle stands, is aheadland running well out into the sea. It is quite a peculiarplace--a sort of headland on a headland, jutting out into a deep,wide bay, so that, though it is a promontory, it is as far away fromthe traffic of coast life as anything you can conceive. The mainpromontory is the end of a range of mountains, and looms up vast,towering over everything, a mass of sapphire blue. I can wellunderstand how the country came to be called the "Land of the BlueMountains," for it is all mountains, and they are all blue! Thecoast-line is magnificent--what is called "iron-bound"--being allrocky; sometimes great frowning precipices; sometimes jutting spursof rock; again little rocky islets, now and again clad with trees andverdure, at other places stark and bare. Elsewhere are little rockybays and indentations--always rock, and often with long, interestingcaves. Some of the shores of the bays are sandy, or else ridges ofbeautiful pebbles, where the waves make endless murmur.But of all the places I have seen--in this land or any other--themost absolutely beautiful is Vissarion. It stands at the ultimatepoint of the promontory--I mean the little, or, rather, lesserpromontory--that continues on the spur of the mountain range. Forthe lesser promontory or extension of the mountain is in realityvast; the lowest bit of cliff along the sea-front is not less than acouple of hundred feet high. That point of rock is really verypeculiar. I think Dame Nature must, in the early days of herhousekeeping--or, rather, house-building--have intended to give herlittle child, man, a rudimentary lesson in self-protection. It isjust a natural bastion such as a titanic Vauban might have designedin primeval times. So far as the Castle is concerned, it is alonevisible from the sea. Any enemy approaching could see only thatfrowning wall of black rock, of vast height and perpendicularsteepness. Even the old fortifications which crown it are not built,but cut in the solid rock. A long narrow creek of very deep water,walled in by high, steep cliffs, runs in behind the Castle, bendingnorth and west, making safe and secret anchorage. Into the creekfalls over a precipice a mountain-stream, which never fails in volumeof water. On the western shore of that creek is the Castle, a hugepile of buildings of every style of architecture, from the Twelfthcentury to where such things seemed to stop in this dear old-worldland--about the time of Queen Elizabeth. So it is prettypicturesque. I can tell you. When we got the first glimpse of theplace from the steamer the officer, with whom I was on the bridge,pointed towards it and said:"That is where we saw the dead woman floating in a coffin." That wasrather interesting, so I asked him all about it. He took from hispocket-book a cutting from an Italian paper, which he handed to me.As I can read and speak Italian fairly well, it was all right; but asyou, my dear Aunt Janet, are not skilled in languages, and as I doubtif there is any assistance of the kind to be had at Croom, I do notsend it. But as I have heard that the item has been produced in thelast number of The Journal of Occultism, you will be easily able toget it. As he handed me the cutting he said: "I am Destilia!" Hisstory was so strange that I asked him a good many questions about it.He answered me quite frankly on every point, but always adheringstoutly to the main point--namely, that it was no phantom or mirage,no dream or imperfect vision in a fog. "We were four in all who sawit," he said--"three from the bridge and the Englishman,Caulfield--from the bows--whose account exactly agreed with what wesaw. Captain Mirolani and Falamano and I were all awake and in goodtrim. We looked with our night-glasses, which are more than usuallypowerful. You know, we need good glasses for the east shore of theAdriatic and for among the islands to the south. There was a fullmoon and a brilliant light. Of course we were a little way off, forthough the Spear of Ivan is in deep water, one has to be careful ofcurrents, for it is in just such places that the dangerous currentsrun." The agent of Lloyd's told me only a few weeks ago that it wasonly after a prolonged investigation of the tidal and sea currentsthat the house decided to except from ordinary sea risks losses dueto a too close course by the Spear of Ivan. When I tried to get alittle more definite account of the coffin-boat and the dead ladythat is given in The Journal of Occultism he simply shrugged hisshoulders. "Signor, it is all," he said. "That Englishman wroteeverything after endless questioning."So you see, my dear, that our new home is not without superstitiousinterests of its own. It is rather a nice idea, is it not, to have adead woman cruising round our promontory in a coffin? I doubt ifeven at Croom you can beat that. "Makes the place kind of homey," asan American would say. When you come, Aunt Janet, you will not feellonesome, at any rate, and it will save us the trouble of importingsome of your Highland ghosts to make you feel at home in the newland. I don't know, but we might ask the stiff to come to tea withus. Of course, it would be a late tea. Somewhere between midnightand cock-crow would be about the etiquette of the thing, I fancy!But I must tell you all the realities of the Castle and around it.So I will write again within a day or two, and try to let you knowenough to prepare you for coming here. Till then adieu, my dear.Your lovingRUPERT.From Rupert Sent Leger, Vissarion, to Janet MacKelpie, Croom.January 25, 1907.I hope I did not frighten you, dear Aunt Janet, by the yarn of thelady in the coffin. But I know you are not afraid; you have told metoo many weird stories for me to dread that. Besides, you haveSecond Sight--latent, at all events. However, there won't be anymore ghosts, or about ghosts, in this letter. I want to tell you allabout our new home. I am so glad you are coming out so soon; I ambeginning to feel so lonesome--I walk about sometimes aimlessly, andfind my thoughts drifting in such an odd way. If I didn't knowbetter, I might begin to think I was in love! There is no one hereto be in love with; so make your mind easy, Aunt Janet. Not that youwould be unhappy, I know, dear, if I did fall in love. I suppose Imust marry some day. It is a duty now, I know, when there is such anestate as Uncle Roger has left me. And I know this: I shall nevermarry any woman unless I love her. And I am right sure that if I dolove her you will love her, too, Aunt Janet! Won't you, dear? Itwouldn't be half a delight if you didn't. It won't if you don't.There, now!But before I begin to describe Vissarion I shall throw a sop to youas a chatelaine; that may give you patience to read the rest. TheCastle needs a lot of things to make it comfortable--as you wouldconsider it. In fact, it is absolutely destitute of everything of adomestic nature. Uncle Roger had it vetted on the defence side, andso far it could stand a siege. But it couldn't cook a dinner or gothrough a spring-cleaning! As you know, I am not much up in domesticmatters, and so I cannot give you details; but you may take it thatit wants everything. I don't mean furniture, or silver, or evengold-plate, or works of art, for it is full of the most magnificentold things that you can imagine. I think Uncle Roger must have beena collector, and gathered a lot of good things in all sorts ofplaces, stored them for years, and then sent them here. But as toglass, china, delft, all sorts of crockery, linen, householdappliances and machinery, cooking utensils--except of thesimplest--there are none. I don't think Uncle Roger could have livedhere more than on a temporary picnic. So far as I only am concerned,I am all right; a gridiron and a saucepan are all I want--and I canuse them myself. But, dear Aunt Janet, I don't want you to pig it.I would like you to have everything you can imagine, and all of thevery best. Cost doesn't count now for us, thanks to Uncle Roger; andso I want you to order all. I know you, dear--being a woman--won'tobject to shopping. But it will have to be wholesale. This is anenormous place, and will swallow up all you can buy--like aquicksand. Do as you like about choosing, but get all the help youcan. Don't be afraid of getting too much. You can't, or of beingidle when you are here. I assure you that when you come there willbe so much to do and so many things to think of that you will want toget away from it all. And, besides, Aunt Janet, I hope you won't betoo long. Indeed, I don't wish to be selfish, but your boy islonely, and wants you. And when you get here you will be an EMPRESS.I don't altogether like doing so, lest I should offend amillionairess like you; but it may facilitate matters, and the way'sof commerce are strict, though devious. So I send you a cheque for1,000 pounds for the little things: and a letter to the bank tohonour your own cheques for any amount I have got.I think, by the way, I should, if I were you, take or send out a fewservants--not too many at first, only just enough to attend on ourtwo selves. You can arrange to send for any more you may want later.Engage them, and arrange for their being paid--when they are in ourservice we must treat them well--and then they can be at our call asyou find that we want them. I think you should secure, say, fifty ora hundred--'tis an awfu' big place, Aunt Janet! And in the same waywill you secure--and, of course, arrange for pay similarly--a hundredmen, exclusive of any servants you think it well to have. I shouldlike the General, if he can give the time, to choose or pass them. Iwant clansmen that I can depend on, if need be. We are going to livein a country which is at present strange to us, and it is well tolook things in the face. I know Sir Colin will only have men who area credit to Scotland and to Ross and to Croom--men who will impressthe Blue Mountaineers. I know they will take them to theirhearts--certainly if any of them are bachelors the girls will!Forgive me! But if we are to settle here, our followers willprobably want to settle also. Moreover, the Blue Mountaineers maywant followers also! And will want them to settle, too, and havesuccessors!Now for the description of the place. Well, I simply can't just now.It is all so wonderful and so beautiful. The Castle--I have writtenso much already about other things that I really must keep the Castlefor another letter! Love to Sir Colin if he is at Croom. And oh,dear Aunt Janet, how I wish that my dear mother was coming out! Itall seems so dark and empty without her. How she would have enjoyedit! How proud she would have been! And, my dear, if she could bewith us again, how grateful she would have been to you for all youhave done for her boy! As I am, believe me, most truly and sincerelyand affectionately grateful.Your lovingRUPERT.Rupert Sent Leger, Vissarion, to Janet MacKelpie, Croom.January 26, 1907.MY DEAR AUNT JANET,Please read this as if it was a part of the letter I wrote yesterday.The Castle itself is so vast that I really can't describe it indetail. So I am waiting till you come; and then you and I will goover it together and learn all that we can about it. We shall takeRooke with us, and, as he is supposed to know every part of it, fromthe keep to the torture-chamber, we can spend a few days over it. Ofcourse, I have been over most of it, since I came--that, is, I wentat various times to see different portions--the battlements, thebastions, the old guard-room, the hall, the chapel, the walls, theroof. And I have been through some of the network of rock passages.Uncle Roger must have spent a mint of money on it, so far as I cansee; and though I am not a soldier, I have been in so many placesfortified in different ways that I am not entirely ignorant of thesubject. He has restored it in such an up-to-date way that it ispractically impregnable to anything under big guns or a siege-train.He has gone so far as to have certain outworks and the keep coveredwith armoured plating of what looks like harveyized steel. You willwonder when you see it. But as yet I really know only a few rooms,and am familiar with only one--my own room. The drawing-room--notthe great hall, which is a vast place; the library--a magnificentone, but in sad disorder--we must get a librarian some day to put itin trim; and the drawing-room and boudoir and bedroom suite which Ihave selected for you, are all fine. But my own room is what suitsme best, though I do not think you would care for it for yourself.If you do, you shall have it. It was Uncle Roger's own room when hestayed here; living in it for a few days served to give me moreinsight to his character--or rather to his mind--than I could haveotherwise had. It is just the kind of place I like myself; so,naturally, I understand the other chap who liked it too. It is afine big room, not quite within the Castle, but an outlying part ofit. It is not detached, or anything of that sort, but is a sort ofgarden-room built on to it. There seems to have been always somesort of place where it is, for the passages and openings inside seemto accept or recognize it. It can be shut off if necessary--it wouldbe in case of attack--by a great slab of steel, just like the door ofa safe, which slides from inside the wall, and can be operated fromeither inside or outside--if you know how. That is from my room orfrom within the keep. The mechanism is a secret, and no one butRooke and I know it. The room opens out through a great Frenchwindow--the French window is modern, I take it, and was arranged byor for Uncle Roger; I think there must have been always a largeopening there, for centuries at least--which opens on a wide terraceor balcony of white marble, extending right and left. From this awhite marble stair lies straight in front of the window, and leadsdown to the garden. The balcony and staircase are quite ancient--ofold Italian work, beautifully carved, and, of course, weather-wornthrough centuries. There is just that little tinging of green hereand there which makes all outdoor marble so charming. It is hard tobelieve at times that it is a part of a fortified castle, it is soelegant and free and open. The first glance of it would make aburglar's heart glad. He would say to himself: "Here is the sort ofcrib I like when I'm on the job. You can just walk in and out as youchoose." But, Aunt Janet, old Roger was cuter than any burglar. Hehad the place so guarded that the burglar would have been a baffledburglar. There are two steel shields which can slide out from thewall and lock into the other side right across the whole big window.One is a grille of steel bands that open out into diamond-shapedlozenges. Nothing bigger than a kitten could get through; and yetyou can see the garden and the mountains and the whole view--much thesame as you ladies can see through your veils. The other is a greatsheet of steel, which slides out in a similar way in differentgrooves. It is not, of course, so heavy and strong as the safe-doorwhich covers the little opening in the main wall, but Rooke tells meit is proof against the heaviest rifle-hall.Having told you this, I must tell you, too, Aunt Janet, lest youshould be made anxious by the arriere-pensee of all these warlikemeasures of defence, that I always sleep at night with one of theseiron screens across the window. Of course, when I am awake I leaveit open. As yet I have tried only, but not used, the grille; and Idon't think I shall ever use anything else, for it is a perfectguard. If it should be tampered with from outside it would sound analarm at the head of the bed, and the pressing of a button would rollout the solid steel screen in front of it. As a matter of fact, Ihave been so used to the open that I don't feel comfortable shut in.I only close windows against cold or rain. The weather here isdelightful--as yet, at all events--but they tell me that the rainyseason will be on us before very long.I think you will like my den, aunty dear, though it will doubtless bea worry to you to see it so untidy. But that can't be helped. Imust be untidy somewhere; and it is best in my own den!Again I find my letter so long that I must cut it off now and go onagain to-night. So this must go as it stands. I shall not cause youto wait to hear all I can tell you about our new home.Your lovingRUPERT.From Rupert Sent Leger, Vissarion, to Janet MacKelpie, Croom.January 29, 1907.MY DEAR AUNT JANET,My den looks out, as I told you in my last letter, on the garden, or,to speak more accurately, on one of the gardens, for there areacres of them. This is the old one, which must be almost as old asthe Castle itself, for it was within the defences in the old days ofbows. The wall that surrounds the inner portion of it has long agobeen levelled, but sufficient remains at either end where it joinedthe outer defences to show the long casemates for the bowmen to shootthrough and the raised stone gallery where they stood. It is justthe same kind of building as the stone-work of the sentry's walk onthe roof and of the great old guard-room under it.But whatever the garden may have been, and no matter how it wasguarded, it is a most lovely place. There are whole sections ofgarden here of various styles--Greek, Italian, French, German, Dutch,British, Spanish, African, Moorish--all the older nationalities. Iam going to have a new one laid out for you--a Japanese garden. Ihave sent to the great gardener of Japan, Minaro, to make the plansfor it, and to come over with workmen to carry it out. He is tobring trees and shrubs and flowers and stone-work, and everythingthat can be required; and you shall superintend the finishing, if notthe doing, of it yourself. We have such a fine head of water here,and the climate is, they tell me, usually so lovely that we can doanything in the gardening way. If it should ever turn out that theclimate does not suit, we shall put a great high glass roof over it,and make a suitable climate.This garden in front of my room is the old Italian garden. It musthave been done with extraordinary taste and care, for there is not abit of it which is not rarely beautiful. Sir Thomas Browne himself,for all his Quincunx, would have been delighted with it, and havefound material for another "Garden of Cyrus." It is so big thatthere are endless "episodes" of garden beauty I think all Italy musthave been ransacked in old times for garden stone-work of exceptionalbeauty; and these treasures have been put together by somemaster-hand. Even the formal borders of the walks are of old porousstone, which takes the weather-staining so beautifully, and arecarved in endless variety. Now that the gardens have been so longneglected or left in abeyance, the green staining has become perfect.Though the stone-work is itself intact, it has all the picturesqueeffect of the wear and ruin wrought by many centuries. I am havingit kept for you just as it is, except that I have had the weeds andundergrowth cleared away so that its beauties might be visible.But it is not merely the architect work of the garden that is sobeautiful, nor is the assembling there of the manifold wealth offloral beauty--there is the beauty that Nature creates by the hand ofher servant, Time. You see, Aunt Janet, how the beautiful gardeninspires a danger-hardened old tramp like me to high-grade sentimentsof poetic fancy! Not only have limestone and sandstone, and evenmarble, grown green in time, but even the shrubs planted and thenneglected have developed new kinds of beauty of their own. In somefar-distant time some master-gardener of the Vissarions has tried torealize an idea--that of tiny plants that would grow just a littlehigher than the flowers, so that the effect of an uneven floralsurface would be achieved without any hiding of anything in thegarden seen from anywhere. This is only my reading of what has beenfrom the effect of what is! In the long period of neglect the shrubshave outlived the flowers. Nature has been doing her own work allthe time in enforcing the survival of the fittest. The shrubs havegrown and grown, and have overtopped flower and weed, according totheir inherent varieties of stature; to the effect that now you seeirregularly scattered through the garden quite a number--for it is abig place--of vegetable products which from a landscape standpointhave something of the general effect of statues without the crampingfeeling of detail. Whoever it was that laid out that part of thegarden or made the choice of items, must have taken pains to getstrange specimens, for all those taller shrubs are in specialcolours, mostly yellow or white--white cypress, white holly, yellowyew, grey-golden box, silver juniper, variegated maple, spiraea, andnumbers of dwarf shrubs whose names I don't know. I only know thatwhen the moon shines--and this, my dear Aunt Janet, is the very landof moonlight itself!--they all look ghastly pale. The effect isweird to the last degree, and I am sure that you will enjoy it. Formyself, as you know, uncanny things hold no fear. I suppose it isthat I have been up against so many different kinds of fears, or,rather, of things which for most people have terrors of their own,that I have come to have a contempt--not an active contempt, youknow, but a tolerative contempt--for the whole family of them. Andyou, too, will enjoy yourself here famously, I know. You'll have tocollect all the stories of such matters in our new world and make anew book of facts for the Psychical Research Society. It will benice to see your own name on a title-page, won't it, Aunt Janet?From Rupert Sent Leger, Vissarion, to Janet MacKelpie, Croom.January 30, 1907.MY DEAR AUNT JANET,I stopped writing last night--do you know why? Because I wanted towrite more! This sounds a paradox, but it is true. The fact isthat, as I go on telling you of this delightful place, I keep findingout new beauties myself. Broadly speaking, it is all beautiful.In the long view or the little view--as the telescope or themicroscope directs--it is all the same. Your eye can turn on nothingthat does not entrance you. I was yesterday roaming about the upperpart of time Castle, and came across some delightful nooks, which atonce I became fond of, and already like them as if I had known themall my life. I felt at first a sense of greediness when I hadappropriated to myself several rooms in different places--I who havenever in my life had more than one room which I could call myown--and that only for a time! But when I slept on it the feelingchanged, and its aspect is now not half bad. It is now under anotherclassification--under a much more important label--proprietorship.If I were writing philosophy, I should here put in a cynical remark:"Selfishness is an appanage of poverty. It might appear in thestud-book as by 'Morals' out of 'Wants.'"I have now three bedrooms arranged as my own particular dens. One ofthe other two was also a choice of Uncle Roger's. It is at the topof one of the towers to the extreme east, and from it I can catch thefirst ray of light over the mountains. I slept in it last night, andwhen I woke, as in my travelling I was accustomed to do, at dawn, Isaw from my bed through an open window--a small window, for it is ina fortress tower--the whole great expanse to the east. Not far off,and springing from the summit of a great ruin, where long ago a seedhad fallen, rose a great silver-birch, and the half-transparent,drooping branches and hanging clusters of leaf broke the outline ofthe grey hills beyond, for the hills were, for a wonder, grey insteadof blue. There was a mackerel sky, with the clouds dropping on themountain-tops till you could hardly say which was which. It was amackerel sky of a very bold and extraordinary kind--not a dish ofmackerel, but a world of mackerel! The mountains are certainly mostlovely. In this clear air they usually seem close at hand. It wasonly this morning, with the faint glimpse of the dawn whilst thenight clouds were still unpierced by the sunlight, that I seemed torealize their greatness. I have seen the same enlightening effect ofaerial perspective a few times before--in Colorado, in Upper India,in Thibet, and in the uplands amongst the Andes.There is certainly something in looking at things from above whichtends to raise one's own self-esteem. From the height, inequalitiessimply disappear. This I have often felt on a big scale whenballooning, or, better still, from an aeroplane. Even here from thetower the outlook is somehow quite different from below. Onerealizes the place and all around it, not in detail, but as a whole.I shall certainly sleep up here occasionally, when you have come andwe have settled down to our life as it is to be. I shall live in myown room downstairs, where I can have the intimacy of the garden.But I shall appreciate it all the more from now and again losing thesense of intimacy for a while, and surveying it without the sense ofone's own self-importance.I hope you have started on that matter of the servants. For myself,I don't care a button whether or not there are any servants at all;but I know well that you won't come till you have made yourarrangements regarding them! Another thing, Aunt Janet. You mustnot be killed with work here, and it is all so vast . . . Why can'tyou get some sort of secretary who will write your letters and do allthat sort of thing for you? I know you won't have a man secretary;but there are lots of women now who can write shorthand andtypewrite. You could doubtless get one in the clan--someone with adesire to better herself. I know you would make her happy here. Ifshe is not too young, all the better; she will have learned to holdher tongue and mind her own business, and not be too inquisitive.That would be a nuisance when we are finding our way about in a newcountry and trying to reconcile all sorts of opposites in a whole newcountry with new people, whom at first we shan't understand, and whocertainly won't understand us; where every man carries a gun with aslittle thought of it as he has of buttons! Good-bye for a while.Your lovingRUPERT.From Rupert Sent Leger, Vissarion, to Janet MacKelpie, Croom.February 3, 1907.I am back in my own room again. Already it seems to me that to gethere again is like coming home. I have been going about for the lastfew days amongst the mountaineers and trying to make theiracquaintance. It is a tough job; and I can see that there will benothing but to stick to it. They are in reality the most primitivepeople I ever met--the most fixed to their own ideas, which belong tocenturies back. I can understand now what people were like inEngland--not in Queen Elizabeth's time, for that was civilized time,but in the time of Coeur-de-Lion, or even earlier--and all the timewith the most absolute mastery of weapons of precision. Every mancarries a rifle--and knows how to use it, too. I do believe theywould rather go without their clothes than their guns if they had tochoose between them. They also carry a handjar, which used to betheir national weapon. It is a sort of heavy, straight cutlass, andthey are so expert with it as well as so strong that it is as facilein the hands of a Blue Mountaineer as is a foil in the hands of aPersian maitre d'armes. They are so proud and reserved that theymake one feel quite small, and an "outsider" as well. I can seequite well that they rather resent my being here at all. It is notpersonal, for when alone with me they are genial, almost brotherly;but the moment a few of them get together they are like a sort ofjury, with me as the criminal before them. It is an odd situation,and quite new to me. I am pretty well accustomed to all sorts ofpeople, from cannibals to Mahatmas, but I'm blessed if I ever strucksuch a type as this--so proud, so haughty, so reserved, so distant,so absolutely fearless, so honourable, so hospitable. Uncle Roger'shead was level when he chose them out as a people to live amongst.Do you know, Aunt Janet, I can't help feeling that they are very muchlike your own Highlanders--only more so. I'm sure of one thing: thatin the end we shall get on capitally together. But it will be a slowjob, and will need a lot of patience. I have a feeling in my bonesthat when they know me better they will be very loyal and very true;and I am not a hair's-breadth afraid of them or anything they shallor might do. That is, of course, if I live long enough for them tohave time to know me. Anything may happen with such an indomitable,proud people to whom pride is more than victuals. After all, it onlyneeds one man out of a crowd to have a wrong idea or to make amistake as to one's motive--and there you are. But it will be allright that way, I am sure. I am come here to stay, as Uncle Rogerwished. And stay I shall even if it has to be in a little bed of myown beyond the garden--seven feet odd long, and not too narrow--orelse a stone-box of equal proportions in the vaults of St. Sava'sChurch across the Creek--the old burial-place of the Vissarions andother noble people for a good many centuries back . . .I have been reading over this letter, dear Aunt Janet, and I amafraid the record is rather an alarming one. But don't you gobuilding up superstitious horrors or fears on it. Honestly, I amonly joking about death--a thing to which I have been rather pronefor a good many years back. Not in very good taste, I suppose, butcertainly very useful when the old man with the black wings goesflying about you day and night in strange places, sometimes visibleand at others invisible. But you can always hear wings, especiallyin the dark, when you cannot see them. You know that, Aunt Janet,who come of a race of warriors, and who have special sight behind orthrough the black curtain.Honestly, I am in no whit afraid of the Blue Mountaineers, nor have Ia doubt of them. I love them already for their splendid qualities,and I am prepared to love them for themselves. I feel, too, thatthey will love me (and incidentally they are sure to love you). Ihave a sort of undercurrent of thought that there is something intheir minds concerning me--something not painful, but disturbing;something that has a base in the past; something that has hope in itand possible pride, and not a little respect. As yet they can havehad no opportunity of forming such impression from seeing me or fromany thing I have done. Of course, it may be that, although they arefine, tall, stalwart men, I am still a head and shoulders over thetallest of them that I have yet seen. I catch their eyes looking upat me as though they were measuring me, even when they are keepingaway from me, or, rather, keeping me from them at arm's length. Isuppose I shall understand what it all means some day. In themeantime there is nothing to do but to go on my own way--which isUncle Roger's--and wait and be patient and just. I have learned thevalue of that, any way, in my life amongst strange peoples.Good-night.Your lovingRUPERT.From Rupert Sent Leger, Vissarion, to Janet MacKelpie, Croom.February 24, 1907.MY DEAR AUNT JANET,I am more than rejoiced to hear that you are coming here so soon.This isolation is, I think, getting on my nerves. I thought for awhile last night that I was getting on, but the reaction came all toosoon. I was in my room in the east turret, the room on thecorbeille, and saw here and there men passing silently and swiftlybetween the trees as though in secret. By-and-by I located theirmeeting-place, which was in a hollow in the midst of the wood justoutside the "natural" garden, as the map or plan of the castle callsit. I stalked that place for all I was worth, and suddenly walkedstraight into the midst of them. There were perhaps two or threehundred gathered, about the very finest lot of men I ever saw in mylife. It was in its way quite an experience, and one not likely tobe repeated, for, as I told you, in this country every man carries arifle, and knows how to use it. I do not think I have seen a singleman (or married man either) without his rifle since I came here. Iwonder if they take them with them to bed! Well, the instant after Istood amongst them every rifle in the place was aimed straight at me.Don't be alarmed, Aunt Janet; they did not fire at me. If they had Ishould not be writing to you now. I should be in that little bit ofreal estate or the stone box, and about as full of lead as I couldhold. Ordinarily, I take it, they would have fired on the instant;that is the etiquette here. But this time they--all separately butall together--made a new rule. No one said a word or, so far as Icould see, made a movement. Here came in my own experience. I hadbeen more than once in a tight place of something of the same kind,so I simply behaved in the most natural way I could. I feltconscious--it was all in a flash, remember--that if I showed fear orcause for fear, or even acknowledged danger by so much as evenholding up my hands, I should have drawn all the fire. They allremained stock-still, as though they had been turned into stone, forseveral seconds. Then a queer kind of look flashed round them likewind over corn--something like the surprise one shows unconsciouslyon waking in a strange place. A second after they each dropped therifle to the hollow of his arm and stood ready for anything. It wasall as regular and quick and simultaneous as a salute at St. James'sPalace.Happily I had no arms of any kind with me, so that there could be nocomplication. I am rather a quick hand myself when there is anyshooting to be done. However, there was no trouble here, but thecontrary; the Blue Mountaineers--it sounds like a new sort of BondStreet band, doesn't it?--treated me in quite a different way thanthey did when I first met them. They were amazingly civil, almostdeferential. But, all time same, they were more distant than ever,and all the time I was there I could get not a whit closer to them.They seemed in a sort of way to be afraid or in awe of me. No doubtthat will soon pass away, and when we know one another better weshall become close friends. They are too fine fellows not to beworth a little waiting for. (That sentence, by the way, is a prettybad sentence! In old days you would have slippered me for it!) Yourjourney is all arranged, and I hope you will be comfortable. Rookewill meet you at Liverpool Street and look after everything.I shan't write again, but when we meet at Fiume I shall begin to tellyou all the rest. Till then, good-bye. A good journey to you, and ahappy meeting to us both.RUPERT.Letter from Janet MacKelpie, Vissarion, to Sir Colin MacKelpie,United Service Club, London.February 28, 1907.DEAREST UNCLE,I had a very comfortable journey all across Europe. Rupert wrote tome some time ago to say that when I got to Vissarion I should be anEmpress, and he certainly took care that on the way here I should betreated like one. Rooke, who seems a wonderful old man, was in thenext compartment to that reserved for me. At Harwich he hadeverything arranged perfectly, and so right on to Fiume. Everywherethere were attentive officials waiting. I had a carriage all tomyself, which I joined at Antwerp--a whole carriage with a suite ofrooms, dining-room, drawing-room, bedroom, even bath-room. There wasa cook with a kitchen of his own on board, a real chef like a Frenchnobleman in disguise. There were also a waiter and a servant-maid.My own maid Maggie was quite awed at first. We were as far asCologne before she summoned up courage to order them about. Wheneverwe stopped Rooke was on the platform with local officials, and keptthe door of my carriage like a sentry on duty.At Fiume, when the train slowed down, I saw Rupert waiting on theplatform. He looked magnificent, towering over everybody there likea giant. He is in perfect health, and seemed glad to see me. Hetook me off at once on an automobile to a quay where an electriclaunch was waiting. This took us on board a beautiful bigsteam-yacht, which was waiting with full steam up and--how he gotthere I don't know--Rooke waiting at the gangway.I had another suite all to myself. Rupert and I had dinnertogether--I think the finest dinner I ever sat down to. This wasvery nice of Rupert, for it was all for me. He himself only ate apiece of steak and drank a glass of water. I went to bed early, for,despite the luxury of the journey, I was very tired.I awoke in the grey of the morning, and came on deck. We were closeto the coast. Rupert was on the bridge with the Captain, and Rookewas acting as pilot. When Rupert saw me, he ran down the ladder andtook me up on the bridge. He left me there while he ran down againand brought me up a lovely fur cloak which I had never seen. He putit on me and kissed me. He is the tenderest-hearted boy in theworld, as well as the best and bravest! He made me take his armwhilst he pointed out Vissarion, towards which we were steering. Itis the most lovely place I ever saw. I won't stop to describe itnow, for it will be better that you see it for yourself and enjoy itall fresh as I did.The Castle is an immense place. You had better ship off, as soon asall is ready here and you can arrange it, the servants whom Iengaged; and I am not sure that we shall not want as many more.There has hardly been a mop or broom on the place for centuries, andI doubt if it ever had a thorough good cleaning all over since it wasbuilt. And, do you know, Uncle, that it might be well to double thatlittle army of yours that you are arranging for Rupert? Indeed, theboy told me himself that he was going to write to you about it. Ithink old Lachlan and his wife, Sandy's Mary, had better be in chargeof the maids when they come over. A lot of lassies like yon will beiller to keep together than a flock of sheep. So it will be wise tohave authority over them, especially as none of them speaks a word offoreign tongues. Rooke--you saw him at the station at LiverpoolStreet--will, if he be available, go over to bring the whole bodyhere. He has offered to do it if I should wish. And, by the way, Ithink it will be well, when the time comes for their departure, ifnot only the lassies, but Lachlan and Sandy's Mary, too, will callhim Mister Rooke. He is a very important person indeed here. Heis, in fact, a sort of Master of the Castle, and though he is veryself-suppressing, is a man of rarely fine qualities. Also it will bewell to keep authority. When your clansmen come over, he will havecharge of them, too. Dear me! I find I have written such a longletter, I must stop and get to work. I shall write again.Your very affectionateJANET.From the Same to the Same.March 3, 1907.DEAREST UNCLE,All goes well here, and as there is no news, I only write because youare a dear, and I want to thank you for all the trouble you havetaken for me--and for Rupert. I think we had better wait awhilebefore bringing out the servants. Rooke is away on some business forRupert, and will not be back for some time; Rupert thinks it may be acouple of months. There is no one else that he could send to takecharge of the party from home, and I don't like the idea of all thoselassies coming out without an escort. Even Lachlan and Sandy's Maryare ignorant of foreign languages and foreign ways. But as soon asRooke returns we can have them all out. I dare say you will havesome of your clansmen ready by then, and I think the poor girls, whomay feel a bit strange in a new country like this, where the ways areso different from ours, will feel easier when they know that thereare some of their own mankind near them. Perhaps it might be wellthat those of them who are engaged to each other--I know there aresome--should marry before they come out here. It will be moreconvenient in many ways, and will save lodgment, and, besides, theseBlue Mountaineers are very handsome men. Good-night.JANET.Sir Colin MacKelpie, Croom, to Janet MacKelpie, Vissarion.March 9, 1907.MY DEAR JANET,I have duly received both your letters, and am delighted to find youare so well pleased with your new home. It must certainly be a verylovely and unique place, and I am myself longing to see it. I cameup here three days ago, and am, as usual, feeling all the better fora breath of my native air. Time goes on, my dear, and I am beginningto feel not so young as I was. Tell Rupert that the men are all fit,and longing to get out to him. They are certainly a fine lot of men.I don't think I ever saw a finer. I have had them drilled andtrained as soldiers, and, in addition, have had them taught a lot oftrades just as they selected themselves. So he shall have nigh himmen who can turn their hands to anything--not, of course, that theyall know every trade, but amongst them there is someone who can dowhatever may be required. There are blacksmiths, carpenters,farriers, saddle-makers, gardeners, plumbers, cutlers, gunsmiths, so,as they all are farmers by origin and sportsmen by practice, theywill make a rare household body of men. They are nearly allfirst-class shots, and I am having them practise with revolvers.They are being taught fencing and broadsword and ju-jitsu; I haveorganized them in military form, with their own sergeants andcorporals. This morning I had an inspection, and I assure you, mydear, they could give points to the Household troop in matters ofdrill. I tell you I am proud of my clansmen!I think you are quite wise about waiting to bring out the lassies,and wiser still about the marrying. I dare say there will be moremarrying when they all get settled in a foreign country. I shall beglad of it, for as Rupert is going to settle there, it will be goodfor him to have round him a little colony of his own people. And itwill be good for them, too, for I know he will be good to them--asyou will, my dear. The hills are barren here, and life is hard, andeach year there is more and more demand for crofts, and sooner orlater our people must thin out. And mayhap our little settlement ofMacKelpie clan away beyond the frontiers of the Empire may be someservice to the nation and the King. But this is a dream! I see thathere I am beginning to realise in myself one part of Isaiah'sprophecy:"Your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dreamdreams."By the way, my dear, talking about dreams, I am sending you out someboxes of books which were in your rooms. They are nearly all on oddsubjects that we understand--Second Sight, Ghosts, Dreams (that waswhat brought the matter to my mind just now), superstitions,Vampires, Wehr-Wolves, and all such uncanny folk and things. Ilooked over some of these books, and found your marks and underliningand comments, so I fancy you will miss them in your new home. Youwill, I am sure, feel more at ease with such old friends close toyou. I have taken the names and sent the list to London, so thatwhen you pay me a visit again you will be at home in all ways. Ifyou come to me altogether, you will be more welcome still--ifpossible. But I am sure that Rupert, who I know loves you very much,will try to make you so happy that you will not want to leave him.So I will have to come out often to see you both, even at the cost ofleaving Croom for so long. Strange, is it not? that now, when,through Roger Melton's more than kind remembrance of me, I am able togo where I will and do what I will, I want more and more to remain athome by my own ingle. I don't think that anyone but you or Rupertcould get me away from it. I am working very hard at my littleregiment, as I call it. They are simply fine, and will, I am sure,do us credit. The uniforms are all made, and well made, too. Thereis not a man of them that does not look like an officer. I tell you,Janet, that when we turn out the Vissarion Guard we shall feel proudof them. I dare say that a couple of months will do all that can bedone here. I shall come out with them myself. Rupert writes me thathe thinks it will be more comfortable to come out direct in a ship ofour own. So when I go up to London in a few weeks' time I shall seeabout chartering a suitable vessel. It will certainly save a lot oftrouble to us and anxiety to our people. Would it not be well when Iam getting the ship, if I charter one big enough to take out all yourlassies, too? It is not as if they were strangers. After all, mydear, soldiers are soldiers and lassies are lassies. But these areall kinsfolk, as well as clansmen and clanswomen, and I, their Chief,shall be there. Let me know your views and wishes in this respect.Mr. Trent, whom I saw before leaving London, asked me to "convey toyou his most respectful remembrances"--these were his very words, andhere they are. Trent is a nice fellow, and I like him. He haspromised to pay me a visit here before the month is up, and I lookforward to our both enjoying ourselves.Good-bye, my dear, and the Lord watch over you and our dear boy.Your affectionate Uncle,COLIN ALEXANDER MACKELPIE.