“Ye’re crazy, Jonas,” assured the neighbor. “There weren’t no cabin here las’ night, an’ no Matildy an’ no children, neither. They wuz all burnt up, along with the rest o’ the countery hereabouts. We heerd yer wife an’ babies a-screamin’, but the fire wuz all aroun’ before ye could say Jack Robinson, an’ the trees fell across yer road, an’ no one could git in, an’ no one could git out… I alluz told ye, Jonas, t’ cut them yeller pines down.”
“My folks wuz all burnt up?” faltered Jonas.
“Wal, yer little boy died a year ago, so they wuz jus’ Matildy an’ the two gals.”
A NIGHT IN MALNÉANT
My brief sojourn in the city of Malnéant occurred during a period of my life that is dim and dubious even as that city itself and the misty regions lying thereabouts. I have no precise recollection of its locality, nor can I remember exactly when and how I came to visit it. But I had heard vaguely that such a place was situated along my route; and when I came to the fog-enfolded river that flows beside its walls, and heard beyond the river the mortuary tolling of many bells, I surmised that I was approaching Malnéant. On reaching the grey, colossal bridge that crosses the river at that point, I could have continued at will on other roads leading to remoter cities: but it seemed to me that I might as well enter Malnéant as any other place. And so it was that I set foot on the bridge of shadowy arches, under which the black waters flowed in stealthy division and were joined again in a silence as of Styx and Acheron.
That period of my life, I have said, was dim and dubious—mainly so, perhaps, on account of my need for forgetfulness, my persistent and at times partially rewarded search for oblivion. And that which I needed to forget above all was the death of the lady Mariel, and the fact that I myself had slain her as surely as if I had done the deed with my own hand. For she had loved me with an affection that was deeper and purer and more stable than mine; and my changeable temper, my fits of cruel indifference or ferocious irritability, had broken her gentle heart. So it was that she had sought the anodyne of a lethal poison; and after she was laid to rest in the somber vaults of her ancestors, I had become a wanderer, followed and forever tortured by a belated remorse. For months, or years, I am uncertain which, I roamed from old-world city to city, heeding little where I went, if only wine and the other agents of oblivion were available… And thus it was that I came, somewhile in my indefinite journeying, to the dim environs of Malnéant.
The sun (if ever there was a sun above this region) had been lost for I knew not how long in a sky of leaden vapors; the day was drear and sullen at best. But now, by the thickening of the shadows and the mist, I felt that evening must be near; and the bells I had heard in Malnéant, however heavy and sepulchral their tolling, gave at least the assurance of prospective shelter from the night. So I crossed the long bridge, and entered the grimly yawning gate with a quickening of my footsteps even if with no alacrity of spirit.
The dusk had gathered behind the grey walls, but there were few lights in the city. Also, few people were abroad, and these went upon their way with a sort of solemn haste, as if on some funereal errand that would admit of no delay. The streets were narrow, the houses high, with overhanging balconies and heavily curtained or shuttered windows. All was very silent, except for the bells, which tolled recurrently, sometimes faint and far off, and sometimes with a loud and startling clangor that seemed to come almost from overhead.
As I plunged among the shadowy mansions, along the streets from which a visible twilight issued to envelop me, it seemed that I was going farther and farther away from my memories at every step. For this reason I did not at once inquire my way to a tavern but was content to lose myself more and more in the grey labyrinth of buildings, which grew vaguer and vaguer amid the ever-mounting darkness and fog, as if they were about to dissolve in oblivion.
I think that my soul would have been almost at peace with itself during that first hour in Malnéant, if it had not been for the reiterant ringing of the bells, which were like all bells that toll for the repose of the dead, and therefore set me to remembering those that had rung for Mariel. But whenever they ceased, my thoughts would soon drift back with an indolent ease, a recovered security, to the all-surrounding vagueness, and I would walk the length of many dark alleys, past many of the shrouded and mysterious mansions, in whose interior I could somehow imagine nothing but cobwebs and silence and slumber, before the hateful pealing began once more. Also, I deemed that the sound of the bells receded and became fainter with each repetition; and I hoped that I would presently lose it altogether, along with my troublous memories.
I had no idea how far I had gone in Malnéant, nor how long I had roamed among those houses that hardly seemed as if they could be peopled by any but the sleeping or the dead. At last, however, I became aware that I was very tired, and bethought me of food and wine and a lodging for the night. But nowhere in my wanderings had I noticed the sign-board of an inn; so I resolved to ask the next passer-by for the desired direction.
As I have said before, there were few people abroad—how few, I had apparently not realized. For when I made up my mind to address one of them, it appeared that there was no one at all; and I walked onward through street after street in my futile search for a living face.
At length I met two women, clothed in grey that was cold and dim as the folds of the fog, and veiled withal, who were hurrying along the street with the same funereal intentness I had perceived in all other denizens of that city. I made bold to accost them, asking if they could direct me to an inn.
Scarcely pausing or even turning their heads, they answered: “We cannot tell you. We are shroud-weavers, and we have been busy making a shroud for the lady Mariel.”
Now, at that name, which of all names in the world was the one I should least have expected or cared to hear, an unspeakable chill invaded my heart, and I felt a dreadful surprise, a dismay like the breath of the tomb. It was indeed strange that in this dim city, so far in time and space from all I had fled to escape, a woman should have recently died who was also named Mariel. The coincidence appeared so sinister, that an odd fear of the streets through which I had wandered was born suddenly in my soul; for the name had evoked, with a more irrevocable fatality than the tolling of the bells, all that I had vainly wished to forget; and the dying coals of my remorse were fanned to a ravening flame.
As I went onward, with paces that had become more hurried, more feverish than those of the people of Malnéant, I met two men, who were likewise dressed from head to foot in grey; and I asked of them the same question I had asked of the shroud-weavers.
“We cannot tell you,” they replied. “We are coffin-makers, and we have been busy making a coffin for the lady Mariel.”
As they spoke, and hastened on, the bells rang out again, this time very near at hand, with a more leaden and sepulchral menace in their dismal tolling. And everything about me, the tall and misty houses, the dark, indefinite streets, the rare and wraith-like figures, became as if part of the obscure confusion and fear and bafflement of a nightmare. Moment by moment, the coincidence on which I had stumbled appeared all too bizarre for belief, and I was troubled now by the monstrous and absurd idea that the Mariel I knew had only just died, and that this fantastic city was in some unsurmisable manner connected with her death. But this, of course, my reason rejected summarily, and I kept repeating to myself: “The Mariel of whom they speak is another Mariel.” And it irritated me beyond all measure that a doubt so enormous and ludicrous should return when my logic had dismissed it.