The Strange Story Book Part 32

'Why not write it yourself?' asked Mrs. Bargrave. 'Your brother may think it an impertinence in me.'

'No,' said Mrs. Veal; 'it may seem an impertinence in you now, but you will discover more reason for it hereafter;' so to satisfy her, Mrs.

Bargrave fetched pen and ink and was about to begin when Mrs. Veal stopped her.

'Not now,' she said; 'wait till I am gone; but you must be sure to do it,' and began to inquire for Mrs. Bargrave's little girl, Molly, who was not in the house.

'If you have a mind to see her, I will fetch her home,' answered the mother, and hastily ran over to the neighbour's where the child was.

When she returned, Mrs. Veal was standing outside the street door, opposite the market (which was crowded, the day being Sat.u.r.day and market day), waiting to say good-bye to her.

'Why are you in such a hurry?' inquired Mrs. Bargrave.

'It is time for me to go,' answered Mrs. Veal, 'though I may not start on my journey till Monday. Perhaps I may see you at my cousin Watson's before I depart whither I am hastening.' Then she once more spoke of the letter Mrs. Bargrave was to write, and bade her farewell, walking through the market-place, till a turning concealed her from view.

It was now nearly two o'clock.

The following day Mrs. Bargrave had a sore throat, and did not go out, but on Monday she sent a messenger to Captain Watson's to inquire if Mrs. Veal was there. This much astonished the Watsons, who returned an answer that Mrs. Veal had never been to the house, neither was she expected. Mrs. Bargrave felt sure that some mistake had been made, and, ill though she was, put on her hood and walked to the Watsons' (whom she did not know) to find out the truth of the matter.

Mrs. Watson, who was at home, declared herself unable to understand _why_ Mrs. Bargrave should imagine that Mrs. Veal should be in their house. She had never been in town, Mrs. Watson was persuaded, as if she had, she would certainly have called on them. It was to no purpose that Mrs. Bargrave a.s.sured the good lady that Mrs. Veal had spent two hours with her on the previous Sat.u.r.day; Mrs. Watson simply refused to believe it.

In the midst of the discussion Captain Watson came in and announced that on the previous Friday--September 7, 1705--at noon, Mrs. Veal had died of exhaustion, after one of her fits; and that even at that moment the big painted board with the family coat of arms--called by Captain Watson an 'escutcheon' and by us a 'hatchment'--was being painted in Canterbury. When finished, it would be taken to Dover and hung up in front of the Veals' house. Mrs. Bargrave found the Captain's story impossible to believe, and she went off immediately to the undertaker's shop, where the 'escutcheon' was shown her. Not knowing what to think, she next hastened back to the Watsons, and told the whole tale of Mrs.

Veal's visit, describing every particular of her appearance and silk habit, which Mrs. Veal had specially mentioned was scoured. On hearing this, Mrs. Watson cried out excitedly, 'Then you must indeed have seen her, as I helped her myself to make it up, and n.o.body but she and I knew that it was scoured.'

In this way the Watsons' doubts of the appearance of Mrs. Veal were set at rest, and the story was soon 'blazed' all about the town by the lady, while the Captain took two of his friends to Mrs. Bargrave in order that they might listen to her own account of the strange circ.u.mstance, which she gave in exactly the same words as before. Very soon her house was besieged by all sorts of people interested in the story, who saw that Mrs. Bargrave was a straightforward, cheerful person, not at all likely to have invented such a surprising tale.

Amongst those who visited Mrs. Bargrave was the lady whose account was published by Defoe in 1706. Their houses were near together, and they had known each other well for many years. It is she who tells us of various little facts which go far to prove the truth of Mrs. Veal's apparition: how it was discovered that the sister and brother-in-law to whom Mrs. Veal referred really _had_ travelled from London to Dover in order to pay their family a visit but only arrived just as Mrs. Veal was dying; how the servant next door, hanging out clothes in the garden, had heard Mrs. Bargrave talking to someone for above an hour at the very time Mrs. Veal was said to be with her; and how immediately after Mrs.

Veal had departed, Mrs. Bargrave had hurried in to the lady next door, and told her that an old friend she feared she had lost sight of had been to see her, and related their conversation.

But Mrs. Veal's brother in Dover was very angry when he heard what was being said in Canterbury, and declared he should go and call on Mrs.

Bargrave, who seemed to be making a great deal out of nothing. As to the little legacies which Mrs. Bargrave had mentioned in her letter that Mrs. Veal wished him to give to her friends, why, he had asked his sister on her death-bed--for she was conscious for the last four hours of her life--whether there was anything she desired to dispose of, and she had answered no. But, in spite of Mr. Veal's wrath, everyone believed in Mrs. Bargrave's tale, for they believed in Mrs. Bargrave herself. She had nothing to gain by inventing such a story, and was ready to answer all questions put to her in a plain, straightforward way.

'I asked her,' said the lady from whom Defoe obtained his account, 'if she was sure she felt the gown; she answered, "If my senses are to be relied on, I am sure of it."'

'I asked her if she had heard a sound when Mrs. Veal clapped her hand upon her knee; she said she did not remember that she did, but added: "She appeared to be as much a substance as I did, who talked with her; and I may be as soon persuaded that your apparition is talking to me now as that I did not really see her, for I was under no manner of fear; I received her as a friend and parted with her as such. I would not," she concluded "give one farthing to make anyone believe it, for I have no interest in it."'

From Defoe's day to this many people have read the tale, and several have held it to be a pure invention of the novelist. But some have taken the trouble to search out the history of the persons mentioned in it, and have found that they at any rate were real, and living in Dover and in Canterbury at the very dates required by the story. In the reign of Charles I. a Bargrave had been Dean of Canterbury, and a Richard Bargrave married a widow in the church of St. Alphege in 1700. There had been also Veals connected with Canterbury, which is curious, and we find that a son of William Veal was baptised in St. Mary's, Dover, in August 1707. Now, as Mrs. Veal kept her brother's house when they moved into Dover, he must have married after his sister's death on September 7, 1705. And if we turn over the Parish Register of that very year, we shall see the burial of a 'Mrs. Veal' on September 10.

The Watsons are also to be found in Canterbury, and an 'old Mr. Breton'

in Dover, who was known to have given Mrs. Veal 10 a year.

Of course it does not follow from this that, because the characters of the tale published by Defoe only ten months after Mrs. Veal's death were actually alive in the very places where he said we should find them, Mrs. Veal's ghost did really appear to Mrs. Bargrave. But if not, why drag in all these people to no purpose? They could all have contradicted him, but the only person who did so was Mr. Veal himself, and he alone had a motive in disbelieving the appearance of his sister, as he may not have wished to hand over the rings which she had bequeathed to her friends, or to diminish the contents of the purse of gold he was driven to admit that she possessed.

Once more, it is perfectly certain that Mrs. Bargrave told and stood by her story, for in May 1714 a gentleman went to see her and cross-examine her. Mrs. Bargrave said that she did not know the editor of her story, but that it was quite correct except in three or four small points; for instance, that she and Mrs. Veal had talked about the persecution of Dissenters in the time of Charles II. was omitted in the printed version. The gentleman then made the corrections by his copy of the book, and added a long note in Latin about his visit to Mrs. Bargrave on May 21, 1714.

This copy of the book Mr. Aitken found in the British Museum; so, whether we believe Mrs. Bargrave's story or not, she undoubtedly told it, and it was not invented by Defoe.

The facts were discovered by Mr. G. A. Aitken, who published them in his edition of Defoe's tales. He does not seem to have known that in an old book, Dr. Welby's 'Signs before Death,' there is another version, with curious information about Mistress Veal's broken engagement with Major-General Sibourg, killed in the battle of Mons; and about the kinship of the mother of Mrs. Veal with the family of the Earl of Clarendon, which induced Queen Anne, moved by Archbishop Tillotson, to give Mr. Veal his place in the Customs. We also learn that Mrs.

Bargrave's cold on the Sunday was caused by the conduct of her husband, who came home intoxicated, found her excited by her interview with Mrs.

Veal, and saying, 'Molly, you are hot, you want to be cooled,' led her into the garden, where she pa.s.sed the night.

_THE CHIEF'S DAUGHTER_

Raven's wife had died, and as he felt very lonely he soon determined to marry a second, but it was not very easy to find a girl to suit him, for she was obliged to be of n.o.ble birth as the other had been. And to add to the difficulties, a mischief-maker called Tsagwan was also seeking a wife of the same kind, and wherever Raven went Tsagwan flew after him, and told untrue stories about Raven, so that fathers refused to give him their daughters. At last Raven discovered this and went straight to the chief of the town.

'I know what has happened,' said he. 'And you will suffer for it. If I had married your daughter, you would have had a great name in the world, but now your daughter will marry someone whom no one ever heard of, and if they speak of you among men it will be as The-Chief-with-no-name.'

When he heard this the chief trembled, for he knew it would be shameful.

So Raven left him and continued his journey till he reached the house of an old man who lived alone.

'Do you know the young daughter of the chief who lives not far from here?' he asked.

'Yes, I know her.'

'Well, why don't you marry her?'

'Oh, it is quite impossible that I should marry her, so I don't see the good of trying.'

'Don't be so faint-hearted,' said Raven, 'I will give you a medicine which will cause her to fall in love with you.'

'But I have no slaves, and she will expect slaves,' said the old man.

'Oh no, she won't,' answered Raven, 'she will take a liking to you and no one will be able to help it. She will marry you, and her father will lose half his property.'

And Raven kept his word and his medicine made the old man look young again, and Raven bestowed feathers on him to put in his hair, and a robe of marten skin to throw over his shoulders. When he was dressed the man looked very handsome and was greatly pleased with himself. But his face fell when Raven said to him:

'Remember you are not going to be like this always; it is only for a day or two.'

Then the man got into his skin canoe and paddled over to where the girl lived, and he did not go to ask her father's consent but sought her out when she was alone, and she fell in love with him although she had refused to listen to many other men besides Raven, and this was Raven's revenge.

'Yes, I will marry you,' she said, 'and I will go with you, even if my father kills me for it.'

So she married him, and after that her father and mother were told of it. But the chief, instead of being unkind to his daughter, gave her rich fur robes; 'for,' said he, 'if she is already married there is no use in my being angry; and besides, her husband is a handsome fellow and is plainly of high birth.' And he and the husband talked together of his daughter's suitors and especially of the man who had been cruel to his first wife, but the husband did not know that the chief meant Raven.

The new husband was anxious to get back to his own home, as he was afraid that his fine clothes might drop off him on the way. Therefore he lost no time in saying, 'My father told me I was to return at once in my canoe; let us hasten, but do not you, my wife, take any furs with you except those you want to keep you warm on the journey, for I have more than enough in my house.' The wife obeyed him, and only took with her a marten skin and a fox robe.

Now the girl lay in the canoe with her eyes shut, and she lay there for a long while till she thought that they must be near home. Then she sat up and looked out, and caught sight of her husband's face, which looked quite different from when she had seen it before. For now it was full of wrinkles, and the hair was thin and grey. And at the sight her heart beat so fast it seemed as if it would jump out of her body, and she cried very bitterly, because she was frightened and angry.

As soon as the canoe ran upon the beach she sat upon the rocks weeping while the old man went from house to house throughout the village, begging them to take her in, as she was a high-born girl and he had no place that was fit for her. But they would not, and at last his sister, who was still older than he, came down to the beach and took the girl back to her house, which was dirty and shabby. The girl went, but she was very miserable, and every day the people stopped as they were pa.s.sing, and mocked at her and her husband.