‘Ten o’clock! We should be away!’ he said.
But we were not, and the delays continued whilst he found fault with the seating arrangements in the chaise, giving the maid instructions to move some of the parcels, so that Miss Morland was only just able to prevent him from throwing her writing table out by mistake.
At last, however, the door was closed upon the three females, and they set off, with my father and myself following in my curricle. We stopped for lunch at Petty France, where my father berated the waiters, complained abut the postilion, and generally made us all uncomfortable, so that scarcely anything was said but by himself. However, he then had a happy thought, and said, ‘The day is fine, and I am anxious for you seeing as much of the country as possible, Miss Morland. Why do you not take my place in the curricle and I will travel with my daughter? You need not have any fear that Henry will overset you. He is a very good driver.’
Miss Morland blushed, but it was soon arranged, and she was sitting in the curricle beside me, beaming with delight.
‘I believe we could have been ready in half the time, had we all travelled by curricle,’ said Miss Morland, as we left the inn. ‘The chaise is very grand, to be sure, but it took a deal of time to ready for the onward journey. I do believe we could pass the chaise in half a minute, if your father was not disposed to travel in front.’
‘Then if you like travelling in it so well, I must take you out often,’ I said. ‘It is the least I can do to thank you for your kindness to Eleanor. It is a sign of real friendship, and I assure you that both Eleanor and I are grateful for it. Eleanor is uncomfortably circumstanced at the Abbey. She has no female companion, and in the frequent absences of my father, she is sometimes without any companion at all.’
‘But how can that be?’ she asked. ‘Are not you with her?’
I explained that Northanger was not more than half my home and that I had an establishment at my own house in Woodston.
‘How sorry you must be for that!’ she said.
‘I am always sorry to leave Eleanor.’
‘Yes; but besides your affection for her, you must be so fond of the abbey! After being used to such a home as the abbey, an ordinary parsonage house must be very disagreeable.’
I smiled and said that she had formed a very favourable idea of the abbey.
‘To be sure, I have. Is not it a fine old place, just like what one reads about?’
‘And are you prepared to encounter all the horrors that a building such as “what one reads about” may produce? Have you a stout heart? Nerves fit for sliding panels and tapestry?’ I asked.
‘Oh! yes,’ she said in breathless delight. ‘I do not think I should be easily frightened, because there would be so many people in the house, and besides, it has never been uninhabited and left deserted for years, and then the family come back to it unawares, without giving any notice, as generally happens.’
‘No, certainly. I came back myself last week to give the housekeeper notice of our return. We shall not have to explore our way into a hall dimly lighted by the expiring embers of a wood fire, nor be obliged to spread our beds on the floor of a room without windows, doors, or furniture. But you must be aware that when a young lady is (by whatever means) introduced into a dwelling of this kind, she is always lodged apart from the rest of the family. While they snugly repair to their own end of the house, she is formally conducted by Dorothy, the ancient housekeeper, up a different staircase, and along many gloomy passages, into an apartment never used since some cousin or kin died in it about twenty years before. Can you stand such a ceremony as this? Will not your mind misgive you when you find yourself in this gloomy chamber, too lofty and extensive for you, with only the feeble rays of a single lamp to take in its size, its walls hung with tapestry exhibiting figures as large as life, and the bed, of dark-green stuff or purple velvet, presenting even a funereal appearance? Will not your heart sink within you?’
‘Oh! But this will not happen to me, I am sure,’ she said.
‘How fearfully will you examine the furniture of your apartment! And what will you discern? Not tables, toilettes, wardrobes, or drawers, but on one side perhaps the remains of a broken lute, on the other a ponderous chest which no efforts can open, and over the fireplace the portrait of some handsome warrior, whose features will so incomprehensibly strike you, that you will not be able to withdraw your eyes from it. Dorothy, meanwhile, no less struck by your appearance, gazes on you in great agitation, and drops a few unintelligible hints. To raise your spirits, moreover, she gives you reason to suppose that the part of the abbey you inhabit is undoubtedly haunted, and informs you that you will not have a single domestic within call. With this parting cordial she curtsies off, you listen to the sound of her receding footsteps as long as the last echo can reach you. And when, with fainting spirits, you attempt to fasten your door, you discover, with increased alarm, that it has no lock.’
Her eyes were wide, and she gave a pleasurable shiver.
‘Oh! Mr Tilney, how frightful! This is just like a book! But it cannot really happen to me. I am sure your housekeeper is not really Dorothy. Well, what then?’
‘Nothing further to alarm perhaps may occur the first night. After surmounting your unconquerable horror of the bed, you will retire to rest, and get a few hours’ unquiet slumber. But on the second, or at farthest the third night after your arrival, you will probably have a violent storm. Peals of thunder so loud as to seem to shake the edifice to its foundation will roll round the neighbouring mountains, and during the frightful gusts of wind which accompany it, you will probably think you discern (for your lamp is not extinguished) one part of the hanging more violently agitated than the rest. Unable of course to repress your curiosity in so favourable a moment for indulging it, you will instantly arise, and throwing your dressing-gown around you, proceed to examine this mystery. After a very short search, you will discover a division in the tapestry so artfully constructed as to defy all but the minutest inspection, and on opening it, a door will immediately appear – which door, being only secured by massy bars and a padlock, you will, after a few efforts, succeed in opening and, with your lamp in your hand, will pass through it into a small vaulted room.’
‘No, indeed; I should be too much frightened to do any such thing.’
‘What! Not when Dorothy has given you to understand that there is a secret subterraneous communication between your apartment and the chapel of St Anthony, scarcely two miles off? Could you shrink from so simple an adventure? No, no, you will proceed into this small vaulted room, and through this into several others, without perceiving anything very remarkable in either. In one perhaps there may be a dagger, in another a few drops of blood, and in a third the remains of some instrument of torture; but there being nothing in all this out of the common way, and your lamp being nearly exhausted, you will return towards your own apartment. In re-passing through the small vaulted room, however, your eyes will be attracted towards a large, old-fashioned cabinet of ebony and gold, which, though narrowly examining the furniture before, you had passed unnoticed. Impelled by an irresistible presentiment, you will eagerly advance to it, unlock its folding doors, and search into every drawer, but for some time without discovering anything of importance – perhaps nothing but a considerable hoard of diamonds. At last, however, by touching a secret spring, an inner compartment will open – a roll of paper appears – you seize it – it contains many sheets of manuscript – you hasten with the precious treasure into your own chamber, but scarcely have you been able to decipher “O Thou! – whomsoever thou mayst be, into whose hands these memoirs of the wretched Matilda may fall—” when your lamp suddenly expires in the socket, and leaves you in total darkness.’