Count Karlstein

  I reached the top floor, the narrow little landing with the lancet window where I’d first heard the horrible plan, and paused. What next? Into the study. I shut the door quickly behind me and looked around with great curiosity, for I’d never been inside it before.

  It was a large room that took up the whole of that floor of the tower apart from the landing. In one corner there was a set of wooden steps that led to a trapdoor in the ceiling—obviously the way to the roof. Three of the walls were covered with bookshelves, rank upon rank of dusty leather tomes. In the center of the room there was a desk, littered with papers, and against one wall there was a great oak chest.

  A sudden draft swirled around me, and I looked up at the diamond-paned window. It wouldn’t be a bad idea to pull the curtains across, I thought. Then I sat in his chair and leaned back. It was a deep, comfortable one, with velvet cushions and wide arms; and I thought, how pleasant to be wealthy, with comfortable chairs and leisure to sit down in them. I began to daydream. And before I knew what was happening, I’d fallen asleep.

  I woke suddenly, with a horrible start. The candle had burnt down and gone out, leaving a smoky smell and a little lake of hot wax on the polished leather of the desk top; it must have been the sudden extinguishing of the light that had woken me.

  But what a lot of time had gone by! It wasn’t dark—quite—because the curtains didn’t meet and a crack of moonlight shone through. As I sat bolt upright in the chair, with a beating heart, I heard the castle clock give that sort of ticking whirr that told that it was about to strike. I held my breath. It struck one. How frustrating! Did that mean one o’clock, or half-past something else? I found myself growing rapidly very much more afraid than I’d been earlier.

  But I didn’t have time to think about that. Voices, from below…

  I stood up hastily. All my brave thoughts of vengeance, of confronting him with his own wickedness, had all crept away while I’d been asleep and unable to keep hold of them. Now I was terrified. Where could I hide? That chest beside the steps to the roof—was there any space behind it? There was. I scrambled over the dark oak and lay down flat on the floor—as the door opened and in came the count.

  I listened. He wasn’t alone; he was talking to someone, but I couldn’t hear what he was saying at first. Then he shut the door, and I heard them more clearly.

  “Oh, the poet Byron himself couldn’t have expressed it better, your grace,” said an oily voice—Snivelwurst, of course. “I’ve always held the opinion that if your grace had turned your talents to the drama, say—” (sneeze)—“or to verse, you would have become the foremost poet of the age. It is a great pleasure to me to hear you talk, your grace; believe me, it is.”

  I couldn’t see either of them, of course, but I could hear where their voices were coming from. Count Karlstein’s came directly toward me as he said, “You’re a fool, Snivelwurst.” Then something soft dropped over the chest, covering the gap behind it where I crouched and making it dark. It was his cloak. I heard him sniff.

  “Something burning? Can you smell that?” he said.

  “Alas! I can smell nothing, your grace.” (Sneeze.) “But bless my soul! Look here, upon your desk! Someone has been up here with a candle!”

  I thought that was the end, that they’d search the room, find me, and fling me in the dungeons, or else shoot me outright. But Count Karlstein merely laughed.

  “I expect Frau Muller has found a new parlormaid. About time, too. That slut who broke her foot’s just lying up in her room guzzling my food and doing nothing to earn it—and the other one, that girl from the inn, she was no damn good anyway. Clumsy, snooping wench. Give me some brandy, Snivelwurst.”

  Oh, yes, I thought. I heard the count settle into his armchair and a sound as if he was putting his feet up on the desk. There was the tinkle of glass, the delicate sound of liquid.

  “Have one yourself. And bring me a cigar from the humidor,” said the count.

  “You are very kind, your grace. I should esteem it an honor.”

  There was a pause then, following which the smell of cigar smoke came faintly to my narrow little hideout.

  “You know, Snivelwurst,” said the count in a ruminative tone, “I haven’t felt safe for—oh, ten years or more. Strange feeling. Don’t quite know how to describe it.”

  “I am fascinated, your grace.”

  “Mmm. If you take risks, though, you must be prepared for danger….I don’t think I’d do it again, mind you.”

  “What is that, your grace?”

  “Make a bargain with…the Prince of Darkness.”

  “Ah, the—er—bargain…I know it’s not my place, Count Karlstein, sir, to ask, as it were, but I must confess to an awesome curiosity, your grace….”

  The count laughed harshly. “You want to know what it’s all about? Is that it?”

  “I should be very honored, your grace….”

  “Very well. It’s over now, so I may as well tell you. Ten years ago I was a poor man, Snivelwurst. No hope, no prospects—nothing. That was up by the Brocken, in the Harz mountains, up north….I’d been a soldier, you see. Younger son, no estate…my fool of an elder brother inherited everything. So I made a bargain with Zamiel. He was to have—well, you know what he was to have; and I was to have a great estate, an honorable name, and wealth. We signed a document. In blood, Snivelwurst.”

  I imagined the oily little man shuddering melodramatically; and then the count went on:

  “I didn’t know what it would mean until a month or so later. My father’s estate had been a modest one—little more than a farm. No good to anyone, except my pious brother and his fat wife. Well, Zamiel told me to kill them.”

  “What!”

  “So I did. Set fire to the place, burned them both to cinders. I was the next in line, you see—though what use a pile of ash was, I couldn’t see. But then came Zamiel’s cleverness. The very next day there came a letter from Geneva, naming the owner of our estate—me, now, you see—as the next in line to the much bigger estate of Karlstein! And here I am. But, as I say, I wouldn’t do it again. Not like that; not quite like that.”

  “I would never have had the courage, Count Karlstein. I take my hat off to you. I salute your daring. A dark and dangerous bargain indeed! Only nerves of steel, only a heart of ice could have carried it through!”

  “And there’s no risk of that other claimant to the title turning up—the lawyer was plain about that. The estate’s mine for good, Snivelwurst. For good! What d’you think of that?”

  “You do the title honor by bearing it, your grace.”

  “Oh, sit down, man, sit down and stop bowing at me,” snapped the count wearily.

  Another chair scraped across the floor. Count Karlstein continued:

  “I shall have to think about marrying next. Ha! Getting an heir! I should have done that years ago, perhaps—but with that bargain hanging over me, well, I don’t know….”

  “The title’s yours for good, your grace,” said Snivelwurst again, more quietly this time, trying—as he always did—to match his companion’s mood but not sure what that mood was. I shouldn’t have liked to guess, either; I’d never heard the count ruminative before. It was an ugly sound: the daydreams of a greedy bear.

  “For good,” he said slowly. “An odd phrase, isn’t it? For good. Well, why not, I wonder?”

  “Why not what, your grace?”

  “Why not spend the rest of my life—doing good?”

  “An extraordinary notion! Most strange!”

  “Why’s that?” said the count, more sharply—just flicking out his claws to keep Snivelwurst nervous and himself amused.

  “Oh! The originality, sir—the, er—unexpectedness,” said the secretary lamely.

  “Fool. Still, why not? I wonder what it feels like….”

  “To do good?” Snivelwurst attempted a light, sophisticated laugh.

  “There must be something in it. People don’t do anything without getting something from it, Sniv
elwurst. I admit it seems unlikely now, but there must be some kind of pleasure in it. After all, think of this: d’you like olives?”

  “Thank you, your grace—very much—”

  “I was asking, fool, not offering! And caviar? D’you like caviar?”

  “Delicious, your grace…”

  “And did you when you first tasted them?”

  “Not at all, sir.”

  “But you kept on, eh? You saw that others liked them and you thought there must be something in it—eh? And you found that you liked them after all?”

  “Exactly it, your grace! A masterly piece of analysis!”

  “Well, then, it’ll be just the same with doing good.”

  A little silence. I could imagine Snivelwurst digesting this argument and wondering to himself not about the truth of it but whether the count really believed it, and how it would affect him personally. As for me, I was horrified—more by this even than by the revelation that the count had murdered his own brother. I thought then, and I think still, and I’ll go to my grave still thinking, that good should be done for its own sake and for nothing else. The idea that anyone could do good merely as a source of curious pleasure made me feel cold and fearful; because if that pleasure palled, might they not turn just as casually to cruelty instead?

  He went on: “There’s plenty to be done in the village here. The people are poor, the houses are falling to pieces, there are old men without work, old women without warm clothes—I could change all that. Change it at once!”

  “I suppose you could, your grace,” replied Snivelwurst cautiously.

  “I could start tomorrow at the shooting contest! An extra prize, eh? A bag of gold, donated by Count Karlstein! Or better still—a banquet for all the villagers! How would they like that? And I’ll make a speech and tell them all my plans.”

  “Plans, your grace? Already?”

  “Give me some more brandy, man—yes, plans. Easy. I’ll build a hospital! How’s that?”

  “Very generous! Magnificent!”

  “New roofs on all the village houses—”

  “Capital, capital!”

  “New shoes for all the children—”

  “Sublime! Incomparable!”

  “A new bell for the church—almshouses for the aged—a drinking-trough for horses—”

  “Peerless! Unparalleled!”

  “Ah, Snivelwurst! This is a novel experience! Being good…I can see that it could last a lifetime, this business. I could do so much! I wonder….” His voice trailed away as he considered his future saintliness, and in the wide silence I could hear, far below, as it seemed, the great mechanism of the castle clock beginning to stir itself once again. It had struck once last time: what would it strike now?

  One…two…

  “When I die,” said the count—

  …three…four…five…

  —“all the little children will shed tears—”

  …six…seven…

  —“and they’ll shut the village school for a day—”

  …eight…nine…

  —“and all the children will come to the castle—”

  …ten…eleven…

  —“each carrying a posy of flowers—for good Count Karlstein!”

  …twelve….

  Midnight!

  Far away in the forest—what was happening? Oh, what was happening? This was the hour that Zamiel had named! And—

  Very soft, very faint—as soft and faint as the dream of a memory of a dream—there came into the silence the note of a hunting horn.

  “What was that?” Count Karlstein’s voice—tense, all at once.

  And the horn sounded again. Not a bright, cheerful note with sunshine and fresh air and the dappled leaves of the forest in it; something wilder, colder, far more terrible. The horn of Zamiel!

  I heard the secretary scuttle across the floor and draw the curtain.

  “Leave it, fool!” snarled the count.

  “But I heard—”

  “Hush!” said Count Karlstein.

  And again—but closer now, only a league or two distant, perhaps, and so high up it could only have come from the bare chilly wilderness of the sky itself—again, the horn. And a rumble, like the first mutter of thunder: hoofbeats?

  “Zamiel,” said the count, and there was horror in his voice. “Surely not…It’s my heart, how it’s racing! Come here, Snivelwurst, put your hand on my chest, feel my heart—can you feel it? Can you feel it racing?”

  “Oh, indeed, beating like a drum, your grace. That’s what it is—not a shadow of doubt. Best lie down, Count Karlstein—a glass of brandy—”

  “What’s the matter with me?” said the count, and now there was an angry puzzlement in his voice. “Calm down! Stop panicking—control yourself…there’s nothing wrong….”

  I’d twisted round, so that by lifting up the count’s cloak just a little I could see from beneath it. Snivelwurst was helping him to the chair, looking white in the face himself. But the count looked dreadful; his face was suffused with darkness, his eyes stared wildly, his hands clutched convulsively at the arms of the chair—and I swear I could see his hair bristling on the top of his head. I’ve never seen such a picture of mortal fear; it made my skin crawl.

  And outside…

  The count flung Snivelwurst aside, and the little rat-like man fell to the floor, twisting as he fell, and wriggled out of reach. Count Karlstein rose from the chair and rushed to the window, shielding his face, and then turned aside swiftly and stood with his back pressed against the wall.

  “After all, he’s bound to make some sort of noise…” he said, quickly and almost under his breath, as if he was trying to reassure himself. “He wouldn’t hunt silently, would he…? But why come this way? Surely he should go back to the Brocken, when he’s hunted? He must have found them now—it’s after midnight—”

  A thin, wild howling, like that of some creature composed only of ferocious greed, came through the tense air like a needle. The hounds! He heard it, and seemed to crumple suddenly, as if a huge invisible hand had reached inside his breast and crushed his heart. He sank back against the tapestry and put up one hand. His face was the color of a thundercloud—like a bruise, purple and angry black; and I thought: Is he going to have a stroke? And one eye (I saw with horror) had suddenly become so shot with blood that it looked as if blood was going to spill out like a cascade of scarlet tears.

  “No, no—I’m imagining it! It’s not Zamiel now—it’s after midnight—He hasn’t come for me? Not for me! I’ve given him his victims, haven’t I? No, no!”

  There was a bubbling, whining sound from the table, and I tore my eyes away from the dreadful spectacle of the count to see Snivelwurst, his knees knocking together, attempting to pull the tablecloth over himself in the last extremity of terror.

  The hounds—again, and much, much closer! And cries from no human throat—and hoofbeats more thunderous than any that trod the good earth—and the crack of a whip that sounded as long and as vicious as a tongue of lightning. The air outside the tower was full of it now: the Wild Hunt itself, careering closer—the hounds in full cry, the air and the stone echoing, trembling, shaking with the awesome force of it. I said a prayer. The count clung to the tapestry and cried:

  “No, no! Not me! I’m good! I’ve just decided to be good! I’ve repented!”

  And then a voice as deep as the roots of the mountains, as majestic as the thunder that plays between them, said:

  “Too late!”

  The glass in the window shook; the flame of the candle flared and streamed, and the tapestries lifted themselves off the walls as if a mighty wind had blown straight through the stone. Count Karlstein staggered.

  “No, no”—he cried—“it’s never too late!”

  “Too late! Midnight has come and gone. Where is my prey?”

  “At the hunting lodge. I locked them in—I swear I did!”

  And again the voice cried: “Too late! Too late!”

  ?
??No—no—”

  “For ten years I have waited for this night. Where is my prey?”

  “I took them there myself! I locked the door!”

  “The hunting lodge was empty, Heinrich Karlstein.”

  “I don’t believe it! No—it isn’t possible!”

  A gust of wind more powerful, I swear, than any that had beaten against the stone of the tower for a thousand years or more seized it and shook it from side to side as a young tree can be shaken by a man’s fist. Count Karlstein fell to his knees, and his eyes—one full of blood, the other so wide with fear that I thought it would burst from his head—rolled this way and that, seeking safety.

  But there was none. For once again the great voice of the Demon Hunter—sonorous as a mighty organ, yet with depths of jagged harshness, discordant tones of mockery in it—filled the small room, washing through it as a wave on the stormy sea would sweep through the length of a smashed and drifting boat.

  “It is after midnight now, Count Karlstein.”

  “No, no! I beg you!”

  “Ten years ago we made a bargain. Now I have come to collect what is due to me….”

  “No—no—”

  And the glass of the window burst, and the heavy curtains rose up and drew together like gigantic hands—and then they were not curtains anymore, nor hands, but a billowing cloak, fastened at the neck with a clasp of blazing fire. And the great Being who wore the cloak had no face, nor body, nor arms, nor legs, but was composed all of impenetrable Darkness. And the Darkness laughed, and the room was filled with the baying of hounds; and the sounds and the Darkness flung themselves at Count Karlstein, and took him up and crushed him like a piece of paper and dropped him to the floor—dead.

  As for what happened then, I have no knowledge at all, because I fainted clean away. But when I woke up—and it can’t have been more than a minute or two later—the candle had blown out and only the moonlight illuminated the room, in a wide swathe of cool silver from the broken window (the curtains hanging, tom and ragged, on either side) to the overturned table. Count Karlstein lay, face down—thank Heaven!—in the center, and the secretary had fled. Some distant swirl of sound that might well have been my imagination diminished in the distant sky. Otherwise, everything was silent.