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Sir Walter Scott, The Bride of Lammermoor,
1818
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Death of Lucy
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 Chapter XXXIV, Death of Lucy
Who comes from the bridal chamber? It is Azrael, the
angel of death.
Thalaba
After the dreadful scene that had taken place at the
castle, Lucy was transported to her own chamber, where she remained
for some time in a state of absolute stupor. Yet afterwards, in the
course of the ensuing day, she seemed to have recovered, not merely
her spirits and resolution, but a sort of flighty levity, that was
foreign to her character and situation, and which was at times
chequered by fits of deep silence and melancholy and of capricious
pettishness. Lady Ashton became much alarmed and consulted the
family physicians. But as her pulse indicated no change, they could
say that the disease was on the spirits, and recommended gentle
exercise and amusement. Miss Ashton never alluded to what had passed
in the state-room. It seemed doubtful even if she was conscious of
it, for she was often observed to raise her hands to her neck, as if
in search of the ribbon that had been taken from it, and mutter, in
surprise and discontent, when she could not find it, "It was the
link that bound me to life."
Notwithstanding all these remarkable symptoms, Lady
Ashton was too deeply pledged to delay her daughter’s marriage even
in her present state of health.
The Marriage takes place, the party goes on, and
bride and groom retire to the bridal chamber.
The instruments now played their loudest strains,
when a cry was heard so shrill and piercing as at once to arrest the
dance and the music. All stood motionless; but when it was again
repeated, Colonel Ashton snatched a torch form the sconce, and
demanding the key to the bridal-chamber from Henry, to whom, as
bride’man, it had been entrusted, rushed thither, followed by Sir
William and Lady Ashton, and one or two others, near relations of
the family. The bridal guests waited their return in stupefied
amazement.
Arrived at the door of the apartment, Colonel Ashton
knocked and called,
 but received no answer except stifled groans. He
hesitated no longer to open the door of the apartment, in which he
found opposition from something which lay against it. When he had
succeeded in opening it, the body of the bridegroom was found lying
on the threshold of the bridal chamber, and all around was flooded
with blood. A cry of surprise and horror was raised by all present;
and the company, excited by this new alarm, began to rush
tumultuously towards the sleeping apartment.
Colonel Ashton, first whispered to his mother,
"Search for her; she has murdered him!" drew his sword, planted
himself in the passage, and declared he would suffer no man to pass
excepting the clergyman and a medical person present. By their
assistance, Bucklaw, who still breathed, was raised from the ground,
and transported to another apartment, where his friends, full of
suspicion and murmuring, assembled round him to learn the opinion of
the surgeon.
In the meanwhile, Lady Ashton, her husband, and
their assistants in vain sought Lucy in the bridal bed and in the
chamber. There was no private passage from the room, and they began
to think that she must have thrown herself from the window, when one
of the company, holding his torch lower than the rest, discovered
something white in the corner of the great old-fashioned chimney of
the apartment. Here they found the unfortunate girl seated, or
rather crouched like a hare upon its form — her head-gear
disheveled, her night-clothes torn and dabbled with blood, her eyes
glazed, and her features convulsed into wilt paroxysm of insanity.
When she saw herself discovered, she gibbered, made mouths, and
pointed at them with bloody fingers, with the frantic gestures of an
exulting demoniac.
Female assistance was now hastily summoned; the
unhappy bride was overpowered, not without the use of some force. As
they carried her over the threshold, she looked down, and uttered
the only articulate words that she had yet spoken, saying, with a
sort of grinning exultation, "So you have ta’en up your bonny
bridegroom?" She was, by the shuddering assistants, conveyed to
another and more retired apartment, where she was secured as her
situation required, and closely watched. The unutterable agony of
the parents, the horror and confusion of all who were in the castle,
the fury of contending passions between friends of the different
parties — passions augmented by previous intemperance — surpass
description.
The surgeon was the first to obtained something like
a patient hearing; he pronounced that the wounds of Bucklaw, though
severe and dangerous, was by no means fatal, but might readily be
rende red so by disturbance and hasty removal. This silenced the
numerous party of Bucklaw’s friends, who had previously insisted
that he should, at all rated, be transported from the castle to one
of houses. They still demanded, however, that in consideration of
what had happened, four of their number should remain to watch over
the sick-bed of their friend, and that a suitable number of their
domestic, well armed, should also remain in the castle. This
condition being acceded to on the part of Colonel Ashton and his
father, the rest of the bridegroom’s friends left the castle,
notwithstanding the hour and the darkness of the night. The care of
the medical man were next employed in behalf of Miss Ashton, whom he
pronounced to be in a very dangerous state. Farther medical
assistance was immediately summoned. All night she remained
delirious.
On the morning, she fell into a state of absolute insensibility.
The next evening, the physicians said, would be the crisis of her
malady. It proved so; for although she awoke from her trance with
some appearance of calmness, and suffered her night-clothes to be
changed, or put in order, yet as soon as she put her hand to her
neck, as it to search for the fatal blue ribbon, a tide of
recollections seemed to rush upon her, which her mind and body alike
incapable of bearing. Convulsion followed convulsion, till they
closed in death, without her being able to utter a word explanatory
of the fatal scene.
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