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The Secret of The Growing Gold · Dracula's Guest & Other Weird Tales

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The Secret of the Growing Gold. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox
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recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please
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visit LibriVox dot org. Recording by Hailey Flagg, The Secret of the Growing
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Gold by Bram Stoker. When Margaret Delandre went to live at Brent's Rock,
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the whole neighborhood awoke to the pleasure of an entirely new scandal. Scandals in
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connection with either the Delandre family or the Brents of Brent's Rock were not few,
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and if the secret history of the county had been written in full,
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both names would have been found well represented. It is true that the status
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of each was so different that they might have belonged to different continents, or
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to different worlds. For the matter of that, for hitherto their orbits had
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never crossed. The Brents were accorded by the whole section of the county a
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unique social dominance, and had ever held themselves as high above the yoming class
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to which Margaret Delandre belonged, as blue blooded Spanish Hidalgo out tops his peasant
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tenantry. The Delaundres had an ancient record and were proud of it in their
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way, as the Brents were of theirs. But the family had never risen
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above yeomanry, and although they had been once well to do in the good
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old times of foreign wars and protection, their fortunes had withered under the scorching
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of the free trade sun and the piping times of peace. They had,
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as the elder members used to assert, stuck to the land, with the
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result that they had taken root in it, body and soul. In fact,
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they, having chosen the life of vegetables, had flourished as vegetation does,
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blossomed and thrived in the good season, and suffered in the bad.
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Their holding Dander's Croft seemed to have been worked out, and to be typical
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of the family which had lived in it. The latter had declined generation after
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generation, sending out now and again some abortive shoot of unsatisfied energy in the
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shape of a soldier or sailor who had worked his way to the minor grades
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of the services, and had there stopped cut short, either from unheeding gallantry
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action, or from that destroying cause. To men without breeding or youthful care,
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the recognition of a position above them which they feel unfitted to fill,
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so little by little the family dropped lower and lower, the men brooding and
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dissatisfied and drinking themselves into the grave, the women drudging at home or marrying
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beneath them, or worse. In process of time, all disappeared, leaving
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only two in the croft, Wickham Delandre and his sister Margaret. The man
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and women seemed to have inherited, in masculine and feminine form, respectively,
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the evil tendency of their race, sharing in common the principles, though manifesting
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them in different ways of sullen passion, voluptuousness, and recklessness. The history
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of the Brens had been something similar, but showing the causes of decadence in
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their aristocratic and not their plebeian forms. They too had sent their shoots to
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the wars, but their positions had been different, and they had often attained
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honor, for without flaw they were gallant, and brave deeds were done by
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them before the selfishness dissipation which marked them had sapped their vigor. The present
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head of the family, if family it could now be called, when one
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remained of the direct line, was Jeffrey Brent. He was almost a type
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of worn out race, manifesting in some ways its most brilliant qualities and in
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others its utter degradation. He might be fairly compared with some of those antique
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Italian nobles whom the painters have preserved to us, with their courage, their
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unscrupulousness, their refinement of lust and cruelty, the voluptuary actual with the fiendish
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potential. He was certainly handsome, with that dark, aquiline commanding beauty which
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women so generally recognize is dominant with men. He was distant and cold,
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but such a bearing never deters womankind. The unscrutable laws of sex are so
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arranged that even a timid woman is not afraid of a fierce and haughty man.
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And so it was that there was hardly a woman of any kind or
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degree who lived within view of Brent's Rock who did not cherish some form of
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secret admiration for the handsome wastrel category was a wide one, for Brent's Rock
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rose up steeply from the midst of a level region, and for a circuit
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of one hundred miles it lay on the horizon, with its high old towers
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and steep roofs cutting the level edge of wood a hamlet and far scattered mansions.
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So long as Jeffrey Brent confined his dissipations to London and Paris and Vienna,
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anywhere out of sight and sound of his home, opinion was silent.
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It is easy to listen to far off echoes unmoved, and we can treat
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them with disbelief or scorn or disdain, or whatever attitude of coldness may suit
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our purpose. But when the scandal came close to home, it was another
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matter, and the feelings of independence and integrity, which is in people of
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every community which is not utterly spoiled, asserted itself and demanded that condemnation should
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be expressed. Still, there was a certain reticence in all, and no
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more notice was taken of the existing facts than was absolutely necessary. Margaret Delandre
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bore herself so fearlessly and so openly. She accepted her position as the justified
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con of Jeffrey Brent, so naturally that people came to believe that she was
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secretly married to him, and therefore thought it wiser to hold their tongues lest
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time should justify her and also make her an active enemy. The one person
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who by his interference could have settled all doubts, was debarred by circumstances from
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interfering in the matter. Wickham Delandre had quarreled with his sister, or perhaps
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it was that she had quarreled with him, and they were on terms not
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merely of armed neutrality, but of bitter hatred. The quarrel had been antecedent
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to Margaret going to Brent's rock. She and Wickham had almost come to blows.
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There had certainly been threats on one side and on the other, and
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in the end, Wickham, overcome with passion, had ordered his sister to
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leave his house. She had risen straight away, and without waiting to pack
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up even her own personal belongings, had walked out of the house. On
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the threshold. She had paused for a moment to hurl a bitter threat at
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Wickham that he would ruin shame and despair to the last hour of his life.
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His act of that day. Week had since passed, and it was
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understood in the neighborhood that Margaret had gone to London when she suddenly appeared driving
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out with Jeffrey Brent, and the entire neighborhood knew before nightfall that she had
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taken up her abode at the Rock. It was no subject of surprise that
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Brent had come back unexpectedly, for such was his usual custom. Even his
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own servants never knew when to expect him, for there was a private door
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of which he alone had the key, by which he sometimes entered without anyone
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in the house being aware of his coming. This was his usual method of
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appearing after a long absence. Wickham Delandre was furious at the news. He
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vowed vengeance, and to keep his mind level with his passion drank deeper than
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ever. He tried several times to see his sister, but she contemptuously refused
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to meet him. He tried to have an interview with Brent and was refused
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by him also. Then he tried to stop him in the road, but
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without avail, for Geoffrey was not a man to be stopped against his will.
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Several actual encounters took place between the two men, and many more were
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threatened, and at last Wickham Delandre settled down to a morose, vengeful acceptance
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of the situation. Neither Margaret nor Jeffrey was of a pacific temperament, and
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it was not long before there began to be quarrels between them. One thing
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would lead to another, and wine flowed freely at Brent's Rock. Now and
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again, the quarrels would assume a bitter aspect, and threats would be exchanged
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in uncompromising language that fairly awed the listening servants. But such quarrels generally ended
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where domestic altercations do, in reconciliation and in a mutual respect for the fighting
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qualities proportionate to their manifestation. Fighting for its own sake is found by a
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certain class of persons all the world over to be a matter of absorbing interest,
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and there is no reason to believe that domestic conditions minimize its potency.
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Jeffrey and Margaret made occasional absences from Brent's Rock, and on each of these
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occasions Wickham Delandre also absented himself, but as he generally heard of the absence
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too late to be of any service, he returned home each time in a
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more bitter and discontented frame of mind than before. At last, there came
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a time when the absence from Brent's Rock became longer than before. Only a
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few days earlier, there had been a quarrel exceeding in bitterness anything which had
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gone before. But this too had been made up, and a trip on
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the continent had been mentioned before the servants. After a few days, Wickham
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Delandre also went away, and it was some weeks before he returned. It
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was noticed that he was full of some new importance, satisfaction, exaltation,
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they hardly knew how to call it. He went straight away to Brent's Rock
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and demanded to see Jeffrey Brent, and, on being told that he had
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not yet returned, said with a grim decision, which the servants noted,
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I shall come again. My news is solid. It can wait, and
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turned away. Week after week went by, and month after month, and
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then there came a rumor certified later on, that an accident had occurred in
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the Zermatt Valley. Whilst crossing a dangerous pass. The carriage containing an English
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lady and the driver had fallen over a precipice. The gentlemen of the party,
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mister Jeffrey Brent, having been fortunately saved as he had been walking up
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the hill to ease the horses, He gave information and a search was made
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the broken rail, the excoriated roadway the marks where the horses had struggled on
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the decline before finally pitching over into the Torrent. All told the sad tale.
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It was a wet season and there had been much snow in the winter,
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so that the river was swollen beyond its usual volume, and the eddies
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of the stream were packed with ice. All search was made, and finally
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the wreck of the carriage and the body of one horse were found in an
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eddy of the river. Later, the body of the driver was found on
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the sandy Torrent swept waste near Tash, but the body of the lady,
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like that of the other horse, had quite disappeared, and was what was
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left of it by that time, whirling amongst the eddies of the Rhone on
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its way down to the Lake of Geneva. Wickham Delandre made all the inquiries
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possible, but could not find any trace of the missing woman. He found,
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however, in the books of the various hotels the name of mister and
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missus Jeffrey Brent, and he had a stone erected at Zermatt to his sister's
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memory under her married name, and a tablet put up in the church at
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Breton, the parish in which both Brent's Rock and Danderscroft were situated. There
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was a lapse of nearly a year after the excitement of the matter had worn
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away, and the whole neighborhood had gone on in its accustomed way. Brent
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was still absent, and de Laundre more drunken, more morose, and more
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revengeful than before. Then there was a new excitement. Brent's Rock was being
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made ready for a new mistress. It was officially announced by Jeffrey himself in
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a letter to the Vicar that he had been married some months before to an
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Italian lady, and that they were then on their way home. Then a
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small army of workmen invaded the house, and hammer and planes sounded, and
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a general air of size and paint pervaded the atmosphere. One wing of the
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old house, the south, was entirely redone, and then the great body
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of the workmen departed, leaving only materials for the doing of the old hall.
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When Jeffrey Brynch should have returned, for he had directed that the decoration
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was only to be done under his own eyes, he had brought with him
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accurate drawings of a hall in the house of his bride's father, for he
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wished to reproduce for her the place to which he had been accustomed, As
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the molding had all to be redone, some scaffolding poles and boards were brought
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in and laid on one side of the Great Hall, and also a great
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wooden tank or box for mixing the lime, which was laid in bags beside
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it. When the new mistress of Brent's Rock arrived, the bells of the
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church rang out, and there was a general jubilation. She was a beautiful
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creature, full of the poetry and fire and passion of the South, and
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the few English words which she had learned were spoken in such a sweet and
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pretty broken way that she won the hearts of the people, almost as much
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by the music of her voice as by the melting beauty of her dark eyes.
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Jeffrey Brent seemed more happy than he had ever before appeared, but there
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was a dark, anxious look on his face that was new to those who
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knew him of old, and he started at times as though at some noise
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that was on heard by others. And so months passed, and the whisper
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grew that at last Brent's Rock was to have an air Jeoffrey was very tender
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to his wife, and the new bond between them seemed to soften him.
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He took more interest in his tenants and their needs than he had ever done,
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and works of charity on his part, as well as on his sweet
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young wife's, were not lacking. He seemed to have set all his hopes
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on the child that was coming, and as he looked deeper into the future,
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the dark shadow that had come over his face seemed to die gradually away.
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All the time Wickham delandre nursed his revenge. Deep in his heart had
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grown up a purpose of vengeance which only waited an opportunity to crystallize and take
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a definite shape. His vague idea was somehow centered in the wife of Brent,
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for he knew that he could strike him best through those he loved,
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and the coming time seemed to hold in its womb the opportunity for which he
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longed. One night, he sat alone in the living room of his house.
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It had once been a handsome room in its way, but time and
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neglect had done their work, and it was now little better than a ruin
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without dignity or picturesqueness of any kind. He had been drinking heavily for some
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time, and was more than half stupefied. He thought he heard a noise
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as of someone at the door, and looked up. Then he called half
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savagely to come in, but there was no response. With a muttered blasphemy,
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he renewed his potations. Presently, he forgot all around him, sank
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into a daze, but suddenly awoke to see standing before him someone or some
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thing like a battered ghostly addition of his sister. For a few moments there
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came upon him a sort of fear. The woman before him, with distorted
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features and burning eyes, seemed hardly human, and the only thing that seemed
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a reality of his sister as she had been was her wealth of golden hair,
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and this was now streaked with gray. She eyed her brother with a
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long, cold stare, and he, too, as he looked and began
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to realize the actuality of her presence, found the hatred of her which he
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had had once again surging up in his heart. All the brooding passion of
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the past year seemed to find a voice at once as he asked her,
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why are you here? You're dead and buried. I am here. Wickham
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Delandre for no love of you, but because I hate another even more than
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I do you. A great passion blazed in her eyes him, he asked,
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in so fierce a whisper that even the woman was for an instant startled
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till she regained her calm. Yes, him, she answered, But make
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no mistake. My revenge is my own, and I merely use you to
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help me to it. Wickham asked, suddenly, did he marry you?
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The woman's distorted face broadened out, and a ghastly attempt at a smile.
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It was a hideous mockery, for the broken features and seamed scars took strange
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shapes, and strange colors, and queer lines of white showed out as the
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straining muscles pressed on the old Cicatrice's. So you would like to know it
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would please your pride to feel that your sister was truly married. Well,
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you shall not know. That was my revenge on you, and I do
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not mean to change it by a hair's breadth. I have come here to
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night simply to let you know that I am alive, so that if any
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violence be done me where I am going there may be a witness. Where
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are you going, demanded her brother. That is my affair, and I
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have not the least intention of letting you know. Wickham stood up, but
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the drink was on him, and he reeled and fell. As he lay
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on the floor, he announced his intention of following his sister, and with
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an outburst of splenetic humor, told her that he would follow her through the
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darkness by the light of her hair and of her beauty. At this she
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turned on him and said that there were others beside him that would rue her
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hair and her beauty too, as he will. She hissed, for the
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hair remains, though the beauty be gone. When he withdrew the lynch pin
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and sent us over the precipice into the torrent, he had little thought of
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my beauty. Perhaps his beauty would be scarred like mine where he whirled as
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I was among the rocks of the visp and frozen on the ice pack in
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the drift of the river. But let him beware his time is coming,
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And with a fierce gesture, she flung open the door and passed out into
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the night. Later on that night, missus Brent, who was but half
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asleep, became suddenly awake and spoke to her husband, Geoffrey, was not
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that the click of a lock somewhere below our window. But Geoffrey, though
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she thought that he too had started at the noise, seemed sound asleep and
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breathed heavily. Again. Missus Brent dozed, but this time awoke to the
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fact that her husband had arisen and was partially dressed. He was deadly pale,
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and when the light of the lamp, which he had in his hand,
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fell on his face, she was frightened at the look in his eyes.
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What is it, Geoffrey, What dost thou, she asked, Hush,
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little one, He answered, in a strange, hoarse voice, go
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to sleep. I am restless and wished to finish some work I left undone.
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Bring it here, my husband, she said, I am lonely and
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I feel when thou art away. For a reply, he merely kissed her
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and went out, closing the door behind him. She lay awake for a
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while, and then nature asserted itself and she slept. Suddenly she started broad
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awake with the memory in her ears of a smothered cry from somewhere not far
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off. She jumped up and ran to the door and listened, but there
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was no sound, she grew alarmed for her husband and called out Jeffrey,
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Jeffrey. After a few moments, the door of the Great Hall opened,
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and Geoffrey appeared at it, but without his lamp. Hush, he said,
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in a sort of whisper, and his voice was harsh and stern.
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Hush, Get to bed. I am working and must not be disturbed.
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Go to sleep, and do not wait the house. With a chill in
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her heart, for the harshness in her husband's voice was new to her,
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she crept back to bed and lay there, trembling, too frightened to cry,
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and listened to every sound. There was a long pause of silence,
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and then the sound of some iron implements striking muffled blows. Then there came
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a clang of heavy stone, followed by a muffled curse, then a dragging
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sound, and then more noise of stone on stone. She lay all the
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while in an agony of fear, and her heart beat dreadfully. She heard
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a curious sort of scraping sound, and then there was silence. Presently,
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the door opened gently and Jeffrey appeared. His wife pretended to be asleep,
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but through her eyelashes she saw him wash from his hands, something white that
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looked like lime. In the morning, he made no allusion to the previous
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night, and she was afraid to ask any question. From that day there
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seemed some shadow over Geoffrey Brent. He neither ate nor slept as he had
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been accustomed, and his former habit of turning suddenly as though some one were
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speaking from behind him revived. The old Hall seemed to have some kind of
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fascination for him. He used to go there many times in the day,
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but grew impatient if anyone, even his wife, entered it. When the
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builder's foreman came to inquire about continuing his work, Jeoffrey was out driving.
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The man went into the hall, and when Jeffrey returned, the servant told
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him of his arrival and where he was. With a frightful oath, he
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pushed the servant aside and hurried up to the old hall. The workman met
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him almost at the door, and as Jeffrey burst into the room, he
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ran against him. The man apologized, beg pardon, sir, but I
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was just going out to make some inquiries. I directed twelve sacks of lamb
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to be sent here, but I see there are only ten curse the ten
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sacks and the twelve too, was the ungracious and incomprehensible rejoinder. The workman
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looked surprised and tried to turn the conversation. I see, sir, there's
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a little matter which our people must have done, but the governor will of
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course see it set right at his own cost. What do you mean that
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ea a stone, sir. So idiot must have put a scaffold pole on
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it and cracked it right down the middle, and it's stick enough, you'd
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think to stand anything. Jeffrey was silent for quite a minute, and then
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said, in a constrained voice, and with much gentler manner, tell your
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people that I am not going on with the work in the hall at present.
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I want to leave it as it is for a while longer, all
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right, sir, I'll send up a few of our chaps to take away
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these poles and line bags and tied it the place up a bit. No,
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no, said Geoffrey. Leave them where they are. I shall send
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and tell you when you ought to get home with the work. So the
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foreman went away, and his comment to his master was, I'd send in
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the bilsurf for the work already done. Appears to me that money's a little
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shaky in that quarter. Once or twice Delaundre tried to stop Brent on the
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road, and at last, finding that he could not attain his object,
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rode after the carriage, calling out, what has become of my sister your
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wife? Jeffrey lashed his horses into a gallop, and the other, seeing
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from his white face and from his wife's collapse, almost into a faint,
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that his object was attained, rode away with a scowl and a laugh.
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That night, when Jeffrey went into the hall, he passed over to the
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great fireplace, and all at once started back with a smothered cry. Then
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with an effort, he pulled himself together and went away, Returning with a
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light. He bent down over the broken hearthstone to see if the moonlight falling
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through the storied window had in any way deceived him. Then, with a
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groan of anguish sank to his knees. There, sure enough, through the
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crack and the broken stone were protruding a multitude of threads of golden hair,
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just hinged with gray. He was disturbed by a noise at the door,
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and looking round, saw his wife standing in the doorway. In the desperation
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of the moment, he took action to prevent discovery, and, lighting a
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match at the table, stooped down and burned away the hair that rose through
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the broken stone. Then, rising as nonchalantly as he could, he pretended
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surprise at seeing his wife beside him. For the next week he lived in
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an agony, for, whether by accident or design, he could not find
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himself alone in the hall for any length of time. At each visit,
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the hare had grown afresh through the crack, and he had to watch it
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carefully lest his terrible secret should be discovered. He tried to find a receptacle
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for the body of the murdered woman outside the house, but someone always interrupted
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him, and once when he was coming out of the private doorway, he
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was met by his wife, who began to question him about it, and
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manifested surprise that she should not have before noticed the key, which he now
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reluctantly showed her. Jeffrey dearly and passionately loved his wife, so that any
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possibility of her discovering his dread secrets, or even of doubting him, filled
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him with anguish, and after a couple of days had passed, he could
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not help coming to the conclusion that at least she suspected something. That very
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evening, she came into the hall after her drive and found him there,
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sitting moodily by the deserted fireplace. She spoke to him directly, Geoffrey,
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I have been spoken to by that fellow Delandre, and he says horrible things.
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He tells me that a week ago his sister returned to his house the
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reckoned ruin of her former self, with only her golden hair as of old,
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and denounced some fell intention. He asked me where she is? And
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oh, Geoffrey, she is dead. She is dead. So how did
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she have returned? I am in dread and I know not where to turn
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for answer. Jeffrey burst into a torrent of blasphemy, which made her shudder.
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He cursed Alandra and his sister and all their kind, and in his
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special he hurled curse after curse on her golden hair. Oh, hush,
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hush, she said, and was then silent, for she feared her husband
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when she saw the evil effect of his humor. Jeffrey, in the torrent
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of his anger, stood up and moved away from the hearth, but suddenly
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stopped as he saw a new look of terror in his wife's eyes. He
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followed their glance, and then he too shuddered, for there on the broken
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hearthstone lay a golden streak as the point of the hair rose through the crack.
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Look. Look, she shrieked, it is some ghost of the dead.
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Come away, Come away, And seizing her husband by the wrist with
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a frenzy of madness, she pulled him from the room. That night,
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she was in a raging fever. The doctor of the district attended her at
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once, and special aid was telegraphed for to London. Jeoffrey was in despair,
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and in his anguish at the danger of his young wife, almost forgot
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his own crime and its consequences. In the evening, the doctor had to
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leave to attend to others, but he left Jeffrey in charge of his wife.
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His last words were, remember you must humor her till I come the
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morning, or till some other doctor hass her case in hand. What you
24:19
have to dread is another attack of emotion. See that she is kept warm.
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Nothing more can be done. Late in the evening, when the rest
24:26
of the household had retired, Jeoffrey's wife got up from her bed and called
24:30
to her husband. Come. She said, come to the old hall.
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I know where the gold comes from. I want to see it grow.
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Jeffrey would fain have stopped her, but he feared for her life or reason
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on the one hand, and lest in a paroxysm she should shriek out her
24:45
terrible suspicion, and, seeing that it was useless to try and prevent her,
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wrapped a warm rug about her and went with her to the old hall.
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When they entered, she turned and shut the door and locked it.
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We want no strangers amongst us. Three to night, she he whispered,
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with a wand smile. We three, nayves. We are two, said
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Geoffrey with a shudder. He feared to say more. Sit here, said
25:07
his wife, as she put out the light. Sit here by the hearth
25:11
and watch the gold growing. The silver moonlight is jealous. See it steals
25:15
along the floor towards the gold, our gold. Jeffrey looked with growing horror
25:22
and saw that during the hours that had passed, the golden hair had protruded
25:25
further through the broken hearth stone. He tried to hide it by placing his
25:29
feet over the broken place, and his wife, drawing her chair beside him,
25:33
leant over and laid her head on his shoulder. Now do not stir,
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dear, she said, let us sit still and watch. We shall
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find the secrets of the growing gold. He passed his arm round her and
25:45
sat silent, And as the moonlight stole along the floor, she sank to
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sleep. He feared to wake her, and so sat silent and miserable.
25:55
As the hours stole away. Before his horror struck eyes. The golden hair
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from the broken stone grew and grew, and as it increased, so his
26:03
heart got colder and colder, till at last he had not power to stir,
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and sat with his eyes full of terror, watching his doom. In
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the morning, when the London doctor came, neither Jeffrey nor his wife could
26:18
be found. Search was made in all the rooms, but without avail as
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a last resource. The great door of the old hall was broken open,
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and those who entered saw a grim and sorry sight. There By the deserted
26:33
hearth. Jeoffrey Brent and his young wife sat cold and white and dead.
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Her face was peaceful and her eyes were closed in sleep, But his face
26:44
was a sight that made all who saw it shudder, for there was on
26:48
it a look of unutterable horror. The eyes were open and stared glassily at
26:52
his feet, which were twined with tresses of golden hair streaked with gray,
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which came through the Broken heart Stone. End of the Secret of the Growing
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Gold recording by Haley, Flag of Texas,