Carmilla: A Critical Edition

VIII

55 VIII Search At sight of the room, perfectly undisturbed except for our violent entrance, we began to cool a little, and soon recovered our senses sufficiently to dismiss the men. It had struck Mademoiselle that possibly Carmilla had been wakened by the uproar at her door, and in her first panic had jumped from her bed, and hid herself in a press,1 or behind a curtain, from which she could not, of course, emerge until the majordomo and his myrmidons2 had withdrawn. We now recommenced our search, and began to call her by name again. It was all to no purpose. Our perplexity and agitation increased. We examined the windows, but they were secured. I implored of Carmilla , if she had concealed herself, to play this cruel trick no longer— to come out, and to end our anxieties. It was all useless. I was by this time convinced that she was not in the room, nor in the dressingroom , the door of which was still locked on this side. She could not have passed it. I was utterly puzzled. Had Carmilla discovered one of those secret passages which the old housekeeper said were known to exist in the schloss, although the tradition of their exact situation had been lost. A little time would, no doubt, explain all—utterly perplexed as, for the present, we were. 1. A large shuttered cabinet able to store clothes and large enough for a person. 2. “In translations of Homer (Iliad 2. 684) or with reference to the Homeric story: a member of a warlike people inhabiting ancient Thessaly, whom Achilles led to the siege of Troy” (OED). 56 J O S E P H S H E R I D A N L E F A N U It was past four o’clock, and I preferred passing the remaining hours of darkness in Madame’s room. Daylight brought no solution of the difficulty. The whole household, with my father at its head, was in a state of agitation next morning. Every part of the chateau was searched. The grounds were explored. Not a trace of the missing lady could be discovered . The stream was about to be dragged; my father was in distraction; what a tale to have to tell the poor girl’s mother on her return. I, too, was almost beside myself, though my grief was quite of a different kind. The morning was passed in alarm and excitement. It was now one o’clock, and still no tidings. I ran up to Carmilla’s room, and found her standing at her dressing-table. I was astounded. I could not believe my eyes. She beckoned me to her with her pretty finger, in silence. Her face expressed extreme fear. I ran to her in ecstasy of joy; I kissed and embraced her again and again. I ran to the bell and rang it vehemently, to bring others to the spot, who might at once relieve my father’s anxiety. “Dear Carmilla, what has become of you all this time? We have been in agonies of anxiety about you,” I exclaimed. “Where have you been? How did you come back?” “Last night has been a night of wonders,” she said. “For mercy’s sake, explain all you can.” “It was past two last night,” she said, “when I went to sleep as usual in my bed, with my doors locked, that of the dressing-room, and that opening upon the gallery.3 My sleep was uninterrupted, and, so far as I know, dreamless; but I awoke just now on the sofa in the dressing-room there, and I found the door between the rooms open, and the other door forced. How could all this have happened without my being wakened? It must have been accompanied with a great deal of noise and I am particularly easily wakened; and how could I have been carried out of my bed without my sleep having been interrupted, I whom the slightest stir startles?” 3. Comma added after “night” in In a Glass Darkly. Carmilla 57 By this time, Madame, Mademoiselle, my father, and a number of the servants were in the room. Carmilla was, of course, overwhelmed with enquiries, congratulations, and welcomes. She had but one story to tell, and seemed the least able of all the party to suggest any way of accounting for what had happened. My father took...