“Through all eternity!” she repeated in a terrified whisper.
“Hark ye, Lucy Pelryhn, I bring you news of your son.”
“My son! Where is he? Why does he not come?”
“But you have news of him. I thank you. Alas! and can you bring me pleasure?”
“They are pleasant tidings indeed that I bring you,” said the man in hollow tones; “for you are a weak woman, and I wonder that you could bring forth such a son. Rejoice and be glad. You feared that your son would follow in my footsteps; fear no longer.”
“What!” cried the enraptured mother, “has my son, my beloved Gill, changed?”
The hermit watched her raptures with an ominous sneer.
“And why did he not fly to my arms? Where did you see him? What was he doing?”
In the excess of her joy, the widow did not notice the little man’s ominous look, nor his horrible and scoffing manner.
“Why did you not wake him? Why did not you say to him, ‘Gill, come to your mother?’”
“Oh, when will he come? Tell me, I implore, if I shall see him soon.”
The mock monk drew from beneath his gown a sort of cup of singular shape.
“There, widow,” said he, “drink to your son’s speedy return!”
The widow uttered a shriek of horror. It was a human skull. She waved it away in terror, and could not utter a word.
“No, no!” abruptly exclaimed the man, in an awful voice, “do not turn away your eyes, woman; look. You asked to see your son. Look, I say! for this is all that is left of him.”
And by the red light of the lamp, he offered the dry and fleshless skull of her son to the mother’s pale lips.
Too many waves of misfortune had passed over her soul for one misery the more to crush her. She gazed at the cruel monk with a fixed and meaningless stare.
“Dead!” she whispered; “dead! Then let me die.”
“Die, if you choose! But remember, Lucy Pelryhn, Thoctree woods; remember the day when the demon, taking possession of your body, gave your soul to hell! I am that demon, Lucy, and you are my wife forever! Now, die if you will.”
It is the belief in those superstitious regions that infernal spirits sometimes appear among men to lead lives of crime and calamity. In common with other noted criminals, Hans of Iceland enjoyed this fearful renown. It was also believed that a woman, who by seduction or by violence, became the prey of one of these monsters in human form, by that misfortune was doomed to be his companion in hell.