Fic: Haunted Summer
Written for prompt 155 on still_grrr, a free-for all of classic literature from any period before 1960. I ended up choosing a particular location in which a very famous story was begun, and two famous poets wrote. No prizes for guessing where and when!
Title: Haunted Summer
Rating: G
Word Count: 1,445
Prompt Classical literature from before 1960: Mary Shelley,
Frankenstein and Rambles in Germany and Italy; poems of Byron and Shelley; Polidori's The Vampyre.
Characters/Pairing (if any) Angelus, Darla
A/N: The setting is the shores of Lake Geneva, in the summer of 1816.
Haunted Summer
London, April 1844
My Dear Fanny,
I am sure that by now you will have heard the sad news of the death of Sir Timothy last week. My boy is now Sir Percy Florence Shelley - long may he live to do honour to the title his poor father did not live to inherit. More than twenty years since he drowned, yet those days seem more vivid to me than yesterday.
My
Rambles in Germany and Italy nears publication at long last. From respect for Sir Timothy, I shall keep to my intention to reveal little of detail about our time in Switzerland, yet as my health worsens I feel the need, dear friend, to confide to you something of the truth about what happened that long ago summer by the lake. My book tells of our journeys in Italy, Germany and Switzerland, and some of the memories, so sweet though so painful, they aroused, but it tells not of some of the strangest of memories locked within my bosom.
From Simplon I went to Vevey and thence took the steamer across Lac Leman; Lake Geneva to the prosaic Briton it may be, but to me it whispered of love long lost, and the old word “leman” speaks of that too. We passed the Chateau of which poems were written, where the famous Prisoner languished, and before long I saw on the banks that Villa Diodati of which I have said something to you in the past.
I disembarked and wandered along the shore, once the place of rambles now desolate to me indeed. Strange and indescribable emotions invaded me; recollections, long forgotten, arose fresh and strong by mere force of association, produced by those objects being presented to my eye, inspiring a mixture of pleasure and pain, almost amounting to agony. Close to the lake was our humble house, the Maison Chapuis, where my beloved husband and I had lived with or still more beloved child - ah! Little knew I then of the grief and loss which awaited me. Beyond, though, was that Villa, inhabited by Lord Byron and his guests, where so much happened, told and untold. There were the terraces, the vineyards, the upward path threading them, the little port where our boat lay moored; I could mark and recognise a thousand slight peculiarities, familiar objects then - forgotten since - now replete with recollections and associations.
I may have told before, of how bleak and dark was that “year without a summer” - indeed, so nearly was it “the summer without a sun”. The rain poured on us constantly, with never a healing ray of light to pierce the gloom, and we were, perforce, required to spend much time indoors together.
A strange group we were: Lord Byron and my husband, forever arguing politics or poetry, sharing their writing with us; Dr Polidori, that odd little man who followed my lord as his physician, or toady; Claire, with child by Byron and revelling in her condition despite his clear contempt for her; and last, but not least, that strange Irishman and his Lady. It is of that pair I wish to write now - no mention has heretofore escaped my pen, yet I feel it imperative to put to paper my confused, disturbing memories.
The Irishman claimed some acquaintance with Byron from times since, and he most certainly did not deny that claim. His lady was all ice; her skin was smooth, her hair elaborately coiffed, her garb in the latest mode, but there was a chill about her I could not explain. Her very touch was oddly cool, and she kept herself aloof, from all but her husband and Byron. With them she sparkled, like frozen water in the sun; her wit was sharp, her estimate of her companions often sharper and expressed in the most elegant tones but harshest of words.
He seemed sunk in gloom much of the time, his brooding countenance veiled in coarse locks of hair which, in the fashion of some earlier era, tumbled across his shoulders. Whenever I turned, in those days, it seemed his gaze was upon me, lascivious and hungry. She, too, had something of a look of starvation at times; both gave an aura of a self-restraint terrible in its totality. I mentioned my troubled response to the pair to my dear husband, but he laughed at my girlish fears. “Mary, my Mary; it would indeed be very impertinent and inhuman in me to trouble them with any inquisitiveness of mine. Remember that I am a gentleman above all"
And so he left it and so, perforce, did I. Then, one evening, we crowded around a blazing wood fire, and amused ourselves with some German stories of ghosts, which happened to fall into our hands. These tales excited in us a playful desire of imitation. From that evening, as you know, my dear Fanny, came my little book which occasioned such interest in the world. Byron and Percy wrote in a desultory manner, but poetry was their gift, and that evening we used prose. Dr Polidori urged them in eager tones to write on some new topic, “My lord,” he began in his customary obsequious style, “you wrote of such terrors in your wonderful Giaour, mayhap you could now develop them into some prose fiction; from your pen it would be magnificent indeed. I can recall those lines; they are engraven on my very heart:
And fire unquench'd, unquenchable,
Around, within, thy heart shall dwell;
Nor ear can hear nor tongue can tell
The tortures of that inward hell !”
“Enough,” drawled his Lordship. “Think not to impress me by quoting my poems. I am not a silly wench to be seduced thus.”
“Sir,” responded Polidori, “I did but wish to recall to your mind those thrilling lines on the Vampire. Your Public would, I feel sure, be in ecstasies should you vouchsafe them more in that vein.”
The Irishman laughed, a mirthless laugh indeed, and glared at his fair companion, before turning to Byron. “What know you of such creatures, my Lord?” he asked in tones both soft and menacing.
“They are creations of legend, merely; the undead walk this earth, or so say simple peasants, seeking nourishment in the very life’s blood of the living.”
The lady laughed, a tinkling sound. “Is that all you know, my lord? What would you say were I to tell you more of these beings who walk amongst us?”
“I should be most intrigued” answered his always-gallant Lordship. “Though how a delicately-nurtured lady such as yourself could know of such things I cannot guess.”
She smiled mysteriously and turned to her companion. “My love, do tell them our story.”
Mr Angelus glared at her for a moment; a look perplexing in its mystery passed between them and he sighed.
“Lady Darla and I scarcely escaped with our lives but two months since, from an attack by these creatures of darkness. Hideous were their features, yet no more hideous than their natures. We came upon them feasting, bathed in gore from their victims. With yellow eyes and brows sharpened, fangs snarling at us, they turned, and we ran, filled with terror.”
“Come now, sir. There are no gullible peasants here. You truly expect us to credit this fantastic tale?”
Lady Darla leaned forward. “Call you my husband a liar, Dr Polidori?”, for he it was who had spoken.
The doctor blushed and stammered a feeble denial. She continued, “What must we do, think you, to prove these creatures of the night are real? Must we show you one?”
“Were that indeed possible I would be most impressed.”
The lady turned her laughing eyes to her lord. “What say you, my dear? Could we show such things to him?”
“As you will”, grunted the Irishman. He stood and jerked his head toward the door. “Coming?”
She nodded. “Come, doctor. In the morning we leave for Milan. Come with us, and we will show you things beyond your wildest imaginings.” She hooked a finger and beckoned to him. Stumbling, stunned of face, he followed.
We never saw the doctor again, or that strange couple. They went to Milan the next day. That is all. Some years later a book was published under Polidori’s name, “The Vampyre”. Lord Ruthven, its central character, was as like Byron as one hand is like another. He was reported to have died soon after the loss of my own dear husband.
And such is my story. Inconsequential, you think? True. Yet last month I will swear that I saw them. Three of them together, in Milan.
And not one of them had aged a day.
Author's note: Some of the words are Mary Shelley's own. The last book she published before her death in 1851 of a brain tumour at the age of 54 was "Rambles in Germany and Italy". She was much better known, though, for her first book, Frankenstein, started in Switzerland in the summer of 1816. Byron did write at length about vampires in several of his poems. Polidori's book inspired Bram Stoker some decades later, though he is often said to have stolen many of his ideas from Byron's unfinished fiction. Shelley died of drowning some five years after the setting of this fiction, in the same year as Polidori. Byron died only two years later. Mary lived on, writing to support herself and her son, Percy Florence.
Title: Haunted Summer
Rating: G
Word Count: 1,445
Prompt Classical literature from before 1960: Mary Shelley,
Frankenstein and Rambles in Germany and Italy; poems of Byron and Shelley; Polidori's The Vampyre.
Characters/Pairing (if any) Angelus, Darla
A/N: The setting is the shores of Lake Geneva, in the summer of 1816.
Haunted Summer
London, April 1844
My Dear Fanny,
I am sure that by now you will have heard the sad news of the death of Sir Timothy last week. My boy is now Sir Percy Florence Shelley - long may he live to do honour to the title his poor father did not live to inherit. More than twenty years since he drowned, yet those days seem more vivid to me than yesterday.
My
Rambles in Germany and Italy nears publication at long last. From respect for Sir Timothy, I shall keep to my intention to reveal little of detail about our time in Switzerland, yet as my health worsens I feel the need, dear friend, to confide to you something of the truth about what happened that long ago summer by the lake. My book tells of our journeys in Italy, Germany and Switzerland, and some of the memories, so sweet though so painful, they aroused, but it tells not of some of the strangest of memories locked within my bosom.
From Simplon I went to Vevey and thence took the steamer across Lac Leman; Lake Geneva to the prosaic Briton it may be, but to me it whispered of love long lost, and the old word “leman” speaks of that too. We passed the Chateau of which poems were written, where the famous Prisoner languished, and before long I saw on the banks that Villa Diodati of which I have said something to you in the past.
I disembarked and wandered along the shore, once the place of rambles now desolate to me indeed. Strange and indescribable emotions invaded me; recollections, long forgotten, arose fresh and strong by mere force of association, produced by those objects being presented to my eye, inspiring a mixture of pleasure and pain, almost amounting to agony. Close to the lake was our humble house, the Maison Chapuis, where my beloved husband and I had lived with or still more beloved child - ah! Little knew I then of the grief and loss which awaited me. Beyond, though, was that Villa, inhabited by Lord Byron and his guests, where so much happened, told and untold. There were the terraces, the vineyards, the upward path threading them, the little port where our boat lay moored; I could mark and recognise a thousand slight peculiarities, familiar objects then - forgotten since - now replete with recollections and associations.
I may have told before, of how bleak and dark was that “year without a summer” - indeed, so nearly was it “the summer without a sun”. The rain poured on us constantly, with never a healing ray of light to pierce the gloom, and we were, perforce, required to spend much time indoors together.
A strange group we were: Lord Byron and my husband, forever arguing politics or poetry, sharing their writing with us; Dr Polidori, that odd little man who followed my lord as his physician, or toady; Claire, with child by Byron and revelling in her condition despite his clear contempt for her; and last, but not least, that strange Irishman and his Lady. It is of that pair I wish to write now - no mention has heretofore escaped my pen, yet I feel it imperative to put to paper my confused, disturbing memories.
The Irishman claimed some acquaintance with Byron from times since, and he most certainly did not deny that claim. His lady was all ice; her skin was smooth, her hair elaborately coiffed, her garb in the latest mode, but there was a chill about her I could not explain. Her very touch was oddly cool, and she kept herself aloof, from all but her husband and Byron. With them she sparkled, like frozen water in the sun; her wit was sharp, her estimate of her companions often sharper and expressed in the most elegant tones but harshest of words.
He seemed sunk in gloom much of the time, his brooding countenance veiled in coarse locks of hair which, in the fashion of some earlier era, tumbled across his shoulders. Whenever I turned, in those days, it seemed his gaze was upon me, lascivious and hungry. She, too, had something of a look of starvation at times; both gave an aura of a self-restraint terrible in its totality. I mentioned my troubled response to the pair to my dear husband, but he laughed at my girlish fears. “Mary, my Mary; it would indeed be very impertinent and inhuman in me to trouble them with any inquisitiveness of mine. Remember that I am a gentleman above all"
And so he left it and so, perforce, did I. Then, one evening, we crowded around a blazing wood fire, and amused ourselves with some German stories of ghosts, which happened to fall into our hands. These tales excited in us a playful desire of imitation. From that evening, as you know, my dear Fanny, came my little book which occasioned such interest in the world. Byron and Percy wrote in a desultory manner, but poetry was their gift, and that evening we used prose. Dr Polidori urged them in eager tones to write on some new topic, “My lord,” he began in his customary obsequious style, “you wrote of such terrors in your wonderful Giaour, mayhap you could now develop them into some prose fiction; from your pen it would be magnificent indeed. I can recall those lines; they are engraven on my very heart:
And fire unquench'd, unquenchable,
Around, within, thy heart shall dwell;
Nor ear can hear nor tongue can tell
The tortures of that inward hell !”
“Enough,” drawled his Lordship. “Think not to impress me by quoting my poems. I am not a silly wench to be seduced thus.”
“Sir,” responded Polidori, “I did but wish to recall to your mind those thrilling lines on the Vampire. Your Public would, I feel sure, be in ecstasies should you vouchsafe them more in that vein.”
The Irishman laughed, a mirthless laugh indeed, and glared at his fair companion, before turning to Byron. “What know you of such creatures, my Lord?” he asked in tones both soft and menacing.
“They are creations of legend, merely; the undead walk this earth, or so say simple peasants, seeking nourishment in the very life’s blood of the living.”
The lady laughed, a tinkling sound. “Is that all you know, my lord? What would you say were I to tell you more of these beings who walk amongst us?”
“I should be most intrigued” answered his always-gallant Lordship. “Though how a delicately-nurtured lady such as yourself could know of such things I cannot guess.”
She smiled mysteriously and turned to her companion. “My love, do tell them our story.”
Mr Angelus glared at her for a moment; a look perplexing in its mystery passed between them and he sighed.
“Lady Darla and I scarcely escaped with our lives but two months since, from an attack by these creatures of darkness. Hideous were their features, yet no more hideous than their natures. We came upon them feasting, bathed in gore from their victims. With yellow eyes and brows sharpened, fangs snarling at us, they turned, and we ran, filled with terror.”
“Come now, sir. There are no gullible peasants here. You truly expect us to credit this fantastic tale?”
Lady Darla leaned forward. “Call you my husband a liar, Dr Polidori?”, for he it was who had spoken.
The doctor blushed and stammered a feeble denial. She continued, “What must we do, think you, to prove these creatures of the night are real? Must we show you one?”
“Were that indeed possible I would be most impressed.”
The lady turned her laughing eyes to her lord. “What say you, my dear? Could we show such things to him?”
“As you will”, grunted the Irishman. He stood and jerked his head toward the door. “Coming?”
She nodded. “Come, doctor. In the morning we leave for Milan. Come with us, and we will show you things beyond your wildest imaginings.” She hooked a finger and beckoned to him. Stumbling, stunned of face, he followed.
We never saw the doctor again, or that strange couple. They went to Milan the next day. That is all. Some years later a book was published under Polidori’s name, “The Vampyre”. Lord Ruthven, its central character, was as like Byron as one hand is like another. He was reported to have died soon after the loss of my own dear husband.
And such is my story. Inconsequential, you think? True. Yet last month I will swear that I saw them. Three of them together, in Milan.
And not one of them had aged a day.
Author's note: Some of the words are Mary Shelley's own. The last book she published before her death in 1851 of a brain tumour at the age of 54 was "Rambles in Germany and Italy". She was much better known, though, for her first book, Frankenstein, started in Switzerland in the summer of 1816. Byron did write at length about vampires in several of his poems. Polidori's book inspired Bram Stoker some decades later, though he is often said to have stolen many of his ideas from Byron's unfinished fiction. Shelley died of drowning some five years after the setting of this fiction, in the same year as Polidori. Byron died only two years later. Mary lived on, writing to support herself and her son, Percy Florence.