“Has he such an opinion?”

“He has.”

“’Tis very strange.”

“Yes, Flora; he seems to gather from all the circumstances, nothing but an overwhelming desire on the part of Sir Francis Varney to become the tenant of Bannerworth Hall.”

“He certainly wishes to possess it.”

“Yes; but can you, sister, in the exercise of any possible amount of fancy, imagine any motive for such an anxiety beyond what he alleges?”

“Which is merely that he is fond of old houses.”

“Precisely so.  That is the reason, and the only one, that can be got from him.  Heaven only knows if it be the true one.”

“It may be, brother.”

“As you say, it may; but there’s a doubt, nevertheless, Flora.  I much rejoice that you have had an interview with this mysterious being, for you have certainty, since that time, been happier and more composed than I ever hoped to see you again.”

“I have indeed.”

“It is sufficiently perceivable.”

“Somehow, brother, since that interview, I have not had the same sort of dread of Sir Francis Varney which before made the very sound of his name a note of terror to me.  His words, and all he said to me during that interview which took place so strangely between us, indeed how I know not, tended altogether rather to make him, to a certain extent, an object of my sympathies rather than my abhorrence.”

“That is very strange.”

“I own that it is strange, Henry; but when we come for but a brief moment to reflect upon the circumstances which have occurred, we shall, I think, be able to find some cause even to pity Varney the vampyre.”

“How?”

“Thus, brother.  It is said—­and well may I who have been subject to an attack of such a nature, tremble to repeat the saying—­that those who have been once subject to the visitations of a vampyre, are themselves in a way to become one of the dreadful and maddening fraternity.”

“I have heard so much, sister,” replied Henry.

“Yes; and therefore who knows but that Sir Francis Varney may, at one time, have been as innocent as we are ourselves of the terrible and fiendish propensity which now makes him a terror and a reproach to all who know him, or are in any way obnoxious to his attacks.”

“That is true.”

“There may have been a time—­who shall say there was not?—­when he, like me, would have shrunk, with a dread as great as any one could have experienced, from the contamination of the touch even of a vampyre.”

“I cannot, sister, deny the soundness of your reasoning,” said Henry, with a sigh; “but I still no not see anything, even from a full conviction that Varney is unfortunate, which should induce us to tolerate him.”

“Nay, brother, I said not tolerate.  What I mean is, that even with the horror and dread we must naturally feel at such a being, we may afford to mingle some amount of pity, which shall make us rather seek to shun him, than to cross his path with a resolution of doing him an injury.”