Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 350, December 1844

"Not at all. She was very seldom spoken to upon any subject. She kept aloof from all who seemed disposed to be inquisitive; and if she ever came within range, as the sailors say, of a question, she never gave an intelligible, or at least satisfactory, answer. Besides, as she was never seen save in the track of him whom she lives but to pursue, her own sex have had no opportunity of conciliating her into an acquaintanceship, and their patience and curiosity have long consumed themselves away."

"Then, after all, it may be only the whim of an eccentric woman that leads her thus to persecute an inoffensive, industrious person?"

"I cannot think so. I am persuaded there is some peculiar occurrence in their past lives that has thus mysteriously associated them – some conscious secret that, by its influence, draws them forcibly into contact. What the nature of this strange sympathy may be, I cannot form the least idea."

"Has no one attempted to unriddle it before now?"

"Not with any prospect of success. Of course there have been a thousand conjectures. Among the lower orders of people, the prevalent opinion is, that the woman once possessed a large sum of money, out of which this Maunsell (for such is his name) contrived to cheat her; and that she has ever since haunted him, as they very appropriately term it. But this offence I am inclined to think infinitely too light a one to draw upon him the grievous punishment which has been so many years inflicted on him. One of our neighbours, Rochfort, a very matter-of-fact sort of man, not at all given to the marvellous, asserts, that he witnessed by accident what he is sure was the first meeting of the Pair after the man's arrival in this quarter. It was late in the evening; Rochfort was standing, he says, in the shadow of a gateway that breaks up the long blank wall of a large timber-yard that belongs to him, at some distance from this, and which skirts a lonely and unfrequented road leading to Kennington. He is positive there was not a human being but himself within sight or hearing, when he perceived the milkman coming along by the wall, his footsteps echoing loudly up the dusty path. Not choosing to encounter a stranger at the moment in such a spot, my friend withdrew further into the shadow of the gateway. The man, in passing it, happening to drop some pieces of money from his hand, stooped to recover then; and while so engaged, a female, who, Rochfort asserts, must have risen out of the earth on the instant, suddenly appeared standing at the searcher's side, perfectly motionless, and muffled in those dark funereal garments that have since been so familiar to our eyes. On lifting his head the man perceived her, started, but, my informant says, it was more the subdued start of one accustomed to face horror, than the overwhelming dismay of a person terrified for the first time: he folded his arms, as if endeavouring to collect himself, but his whole frame shook convulsively. He was about to speak, when a noise of workmen approaching up the archway stopped him, and, turning away, he hastened on – that dark spectral woman gliding noiselessly after him."

"Perhaps," I said, with a forced laugh – for, despite of myself, the story was exciting my imagination as well as curiosity – "she really is a visitant from another world."

"There are not wanting those who say so," replied my friend; "but however ghost-like her mission and appearance may be, I believe there is no doubt that as yet she is a denizen in the flesh."

"And this Pair – where and how do they reside?"

"The man lives at his dairies, a considerable way from here, and although he has, I am told, an extensive establishment, never goes out but on his daily business. He is of a serious, methodistical disposition, and, I understand, affects devotional reading a good deal; yet he is never seen at a place of worship. He is unmarried, nor does any relative or companion reside with him. The woman – it is hardly known where she lives; in some miserable lonely room far away, buried in the heart of one of those dismal courts that lurk in the outlets of London, her way of life and means of support equally unknown, the one object of her existence palpable to all – to come forth at the grey of daybreak in winter and summer, in storm or shine, and seat herself at a little distance from that man's abode, until he makes his appearance: when he was passed her, to rise, to follow, to track him through the livelong day with that unflagging constancy poets are fond of ascribing to unquenchable love, which the early Greeks attributed to their impersonations of immortal Hate."

"Surely the wild and doubtful surmises that those circumstances have raised in people's minds must have had an injurious effect on Maunsell's business?"

"Not at all; on the contrary, I think it has assisted it. Every neighbourhood loves to have a mystery of its own, and we, you must confess, have got a superlative one. The man has been found scrupulously honest, regular, and exact in his dealings; and were we to lose him now, and get a mere common-place person to succeed him, half the housewives of Walworth would perish of inanition. And now," said Sainsbury, rising, "That I have imparted to you all I know respecting the milkman and his familiar, let us to the drawing-room and seek some coffee."

Chapter II

The night that followed this conversation was to me a most uncomfortable one. The episode in the day's occurrences had made so deep an impression on me, that it excluded all other thoughts from my mind, which it occupied so intently, that, upon retiring to my chamber, several hours elapsed before I sought repose. I did so at last, but in vain. Between the fever attendant upon my indisposition, and the irksomeness of frame caused by mental inquietude, sleep was completely banished from my eyelids, or visited them only in short and broken slumbers, peopled by the distorted images of my waking thoughts. The mysterious Pair were again before me. I saw them gliding through the long street, the man hastening on in that attitude, so strikingly described by Coleridge, like one

"Who walks in fear and dread;
And having once turn'd round, walks on,
And turns no more his head,
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread" —

the woman keeping on his track with the constancy of Doom. Or I was standing a witness to their first meeting in the grim Dark on that lonely road, their eyes of hate and fear staring wildly into each other. Sometimes I found myself spellbound between the two, the centre upon which their fearful sympathies revolved, the object upon which their long pent-up passions were about to burst. Starting from those visions, my waking fancies were hardly less tormenting. I was just at that season of youth, before the calmer and nobler faculties have acquired maturity and tone; when incidents that vary but little from the ordinary economy of life, seen through the medium of the imagination, assume a magnitude of distinctness not properly their own. On the present occasion, however, my friend's recital was well calculated to arouse the speculations of a romantic fancy; and mine was now fully employed in forming a thousand conjectures in elucidation of the curious circumstances he had repeated to me. What could be the relation between those strange parties? Was it attachment in the one and aversion in the other? Or had one, as was commonly supposed, been the plundered victim – the other the Despoiler? Neither of these cases could be so. A petty office of police would have relieved the persecuted – a court of law would have redressed the robbery. Monomania had been known to instigate persons to a line of conduct as perseveringly painful as this woman pursued; but then there could be no motive why the object of her attention should, for years, resign himself to a system of annoyance that drew upon him so much of remark and obloquy. Or could the female be the hired instrument of persecution in the hands of others? The poverty, the utter joylessness of her solitary life, precluded the supposition. No! crime, I felt convinced —crime was at the bottom of it all! and crime, too, of no ordinary quality. Was the man intent upon committing some deadly offence against society? and was it to prevent its commission that he was so assiduously watched by his companion? Perhaps he meditated breaking that instinctive canon which the Most High has so wisely fixed against "self-slaughter." Or had some hideous deed already been perpetrated? Was it by one, or both? or was one a soul black with guilt – the other a spirit of innocence? The more I indulged in those heated fancies, the wilder they became. Was the woman, after all, a Being endowed with vitality? The suddenness of her first appearance before the man watching at the gate – the fearful hour – the lonely spot – her noiseless tread – her silent demeanour – her sepulchral dress – almost warranted the contrary opinion. Had she fallen by the hand of this Maunsell? and was the apparition, which we are told ever lives by the side of the murderer, thus permitted to haunt him, embodied before the eyes of men? Such were the troubled thoughts that disturbed me throughout the night. Long before sunrise I was up, endeavouring to calm the fever into which I had wrought myself, by pacing my apartment in the cool of morning. A brilliant sunshine ushered in the day, and under its enlivening influence my perturbed spirits gradually subsided to their usual tone. At breakfast, I confess, I was disposed again to enter on the topic, if an opportunity occurred; but Sainsbury, occupied in some letters of importance that had arrived, talked but little, and did not recur to the subject of the previous evening. This did not assist to allay the interest which had been so powerfully excited in my bosom. The continuance of my cold once more served me as a plea for remaining within doors; and, upon our parting for the day, I did not hesitate to retire to the dining-parlour, whose windows looked directly on the street, and there, shutting myself up, I awaited the arrival of the hour at which the extraordinary pair generally appeared, determined to satisfy myself by a closer observation than I had hitherto made.

Exactly as noon sounded, I saw him stop at an opposite door, and – did I see rightly? Yes – alone. No; I had not approached sufficiently close to the window; when I did, she, too, was there, at the same slight distance behind, in the same silent, patient, motionless attitude. He went on, and, steady as his shadow, she pursued. I now resolved to see them still closer, and for that purpose proceeded to the hall-door, where I remained carelessly standing until the man approached it. I could observe that he walked at an even deliberate pace; and as he carried none of the cumbrous machinery distinctive of his craft, his step was steady and unimpeded. He was a low-sized, well-made man, probably somewhat more than forty years of age. He was neatly dressed; his attire being a suit of some of those grave colours and primitive patterns which find so much favour in the eyes of staid Dissenters, and persons of that class. Indeed, I could see by his whole deportment, that the occupation he pursued was one of choice, not of necessity. His features were regular, nor was there in his countenance any thing remarkable, except that it was pale and subdued, with a look of endurance which peculiar circumstances perhaps imparted to it. What I chiefly noticed, was an evident consciousness about the man that some disagreeable object lurked behind him; and when I caught his eye, which I did once or twice, I could see in its glance that he quite understood why my attention was directed to him. He did not utter a word in my hearing, and there was altogether in his appearance an air of depression and reserve which still further aided the impression Sainsbury's story had made on my imagination. When he next paused, his short progress brought his attendant close to me – in every way a more striking and interesting person. She was a woman tall in stature, of an erect figure, finely proportioned, as well as the coarse mourning garments and large dark cloak in which she was muffled allowed me to judge. She must have been, in youth, very handsome; but on her thin ashen cheek premature age had already made unusual ravage. She could not, from the unbroken and graceful outline of her form, be much more than thirty; but her face was marked with the passionate traces of nearly double that period. Nothing of life I ever beheld exhibited the paleness – the monumental paleness of that face. On the brow, on the cheek, all was the aspect of the grave. Yet life – intenser life than thrills the soul of Beauty in her bridal bower, dwelt in the working of those thin compressed lips – lurked beneath those heavy downcast lids, burned in those dark wild eyes, whose flashes I more than once arrested ere she passed from before me. Writing at the interval of time I now do, and disposed as I am to deal severely with the fantastic imaginations of my youth, I have not in any way exaggerated the appearance this singular female exhibited. Should the reader suspect me of such an error, a moment's reflection will convince him that she who could – from whatever motive it might be – adopt the strange purpose to which she had devoted her solitary life, must have been characterized by energies of mind that would of necessity have filled and informed her frame, and imparted to her an air that altogether distinguished her from ordinary persons. I observed that she seemed wholly regardless of what was passing around her, appearing to be entirely absorbed in one great duty – the business of her existence – that of attending on the individual whose steps she so closely followed. He made no movement that, I thought, escaped her. Insensible, apparently, to every thing else, her glance showed that never for a moment did she cease to watch him, eager, my fancy suggested, to catch the slightest indication of his turning round and encountering her gaze. If so, her vigilance, as long as I beheld the Pair, was in vain. The man never ventured to look behind him. In half an hour they had vanished from the street.

They re-appeared in the evening again as usual, and then, and for several subsequent days, (for I did not feel well enough to undergo some twenty or thirty hours' sea-sickness in the packet that offered the Saturday after my arrival,) I took a morbid and eager pleasure in awaiting the visits and observing the motions of those inscrutable beings. Sainsbury and his son were amused, but not surprised, at the anxiety I evinced to obtain a nearer insight into Maunsell's history. My curiosity and vigilance were, however, fruitless. The Pair performed their revolutions with a cold uniformity, a silent perseverance, that I found sufficiently monotonous; and at length, after one or two baffled attempts to engage the man in conversation, and which never proceeded beyond a few common-place words, (about his companion there was a something indefinable that prevented me from ever addressing her,) I relinquished any further hope of penetrating the mystery. Towards the close of my stay, and as my indisposition wore away, the Sainsburys complimented me by giving one or two dinner-parties, and these, with some morning visits and rambles with the men I met at the house, served to draw my attention from the matter; so that by the time I had fairly embarked on board the Blitzen, bound for Helvoetsluys, the circumstances which had occupied me so intently for the last fortnight were beginning to take their place among the remembrances of the past.

Chapter III

The passage to the Dutch coast, and my journey onward to Heidelberg, were performed without interruption, and were unenlivened by any incident that deserves relating. As it is not my intention to dwell upon the vicissitudes of my career at the high school and university, I shall merely say that, attending very little to the conventional and arbitrary distinctions by which the students of Germany choose to classify themselves – caring still less for chores, brand-foxes, and Burschenschafft, and nothing at all for noisy suppers and their drunken refrain—

"Toujours fidèle et sans souci
C'est l'ordre du Crambambuli!" —

I very earnestly bent myself to second the intentions of my father. For three years, diligently and indefatigably, I pursued a course of severe application to long-neglected studies, which enabled me fairly to redeem the time I had squandered in early youth. Nor is it unworthy of remark, that, as is often the case with imaginative people, the temptations which had appeared so inviting when beheld from a distance, failed in their powers of allurement on a nearer approach. The Spirit of the Brocken and I made no advances in intimacy, and I rode through the Black Forest without a desire to enroll myself amongst its freebooters.

The fourth year of my stay at Heidelberg was drawing to a close, when, in pursuance of arrangements entered into with my father, I returned to England. Upon reaching London, I drove to my kind friends at Walworth, where I experienced the same ready welcome as before, accompanied by many congratulations upon my academical success, of which they had heard from time to time from my family. It was the middle of winter – the second or third week in December – when London exhibits all that joyous bustle of plenteousness and good cheer, amidst which its citizens celebrate the festival of Christmas. As Mrs Sainsbury and her daughters were now at home, I was easily prevailed on to prolong my visit for a few days before I departed for Lincolnshire. The moment I entered the house, the rooms and their associations recalled to me forcibly the mysterious Pair, whose proceedings had filled my mind with so much of curiosity and interest when I was last a sojourner in the abode. During my residence in Germany I had not forgotten them; and although the austerity of my pursuits in that country had schooled my fancy to a soberer pace, I could not forbear from enquiring, in one or two letters which I had occasion to write to the younger Sainsbury, whether the milkman of Walworth and his Shadow still pursued their rounds uninterrupted, or if any thing had transpired that could enlighten our conjectures on their history. My correspondent always neglected, or forgot, to satisfy me in this particular; and it was therefore with something, I am ashamed to say, nearly approaching to anxiety, that on the morning after my arrival – for the gay variety of the social circle had monopolized my attention until then – I once more, after so long an interval, seated myself in the library window, under pretence of seeking a passage in Herder, which I had quoted for Julia Sainsbury the preceding evening, and awaited the hour of noon.

And there, before the clock of the neighbouring church had ceased striking, with the selfsame step, in the same subdued attire in which I saw him four years ago, came gliding up the street the dark, sullen milkman; and there, too, close behind him as ever, followed his shadowy companion! It is in vain to deny it. I could feel my heart beating audibly when I beheld them, as if they were unsubstantial visitants, whose appearance I expected the grave would have interdicted from my eyes for ever. It was a dim, bitter, wintry day, and showers of sleet were drifting heavily on the fierce and angry wind, soaking the man's garments through and through, and sweeping aside the thin habiliments of the female, as though they would tear them from her slender form, and leave it a prey to the keen wrath of the elements. Yet the Pair passed upon their way, seemingly regardless of weather that had banished all other creatures from the streets. As they stopped beneath the window where I sat, I scrutinized them eagerly, to see whether time, or toil, or the terrors of such winters as that now raging, had wrought the work of ruin I would have expected in their frames. In that of the woman there was but little alteration. She was thinner and paler perhaps, and the poorness of her dress betokened no doubt an increase in her sufferings and privations; but her glance, when I could catch it, had more of fiery blackness: her mouth more of compressed determination than when I formerly beheld her. But in Maunsell there was a striking change: his figure was stooped, his cheek hollow, his eye sunk; in a word, his aspect now bore the signs of that mental misery which, on an earlier occasion, I had looked for in one subjected like him to such long, and steady, and undying persecution. Mournful beings! I internally exclaimed, as they proceeded from my sight, whatever sinful sorrow thus serves to link together your discordant existences, it must indeed be of a damning nature, if such a career as yours does not go far to expiate it!

That day, on the re-assembling of the family, I did not fail to allude to the subject of the milkman, and to express my surprise at his tenacity to life, as well as at the fixedness of purpose that enabled him to pursue his occupation through a long series of years, under such remarkable circumstances. I found, however, that the ladies only smiled at the interest which my manner exhibited; some of them assuring me, at the same time, that the neighbourhood was now so accustomed to the matter, that, although calculated to arrest the attention of a stranger, to them it had ceased to be either a source of curiosity or enquiry. I believe they added, that of late the man's health had begun to fail, and that once or twice, when he happened to be confined from indisposition, his companion's visits were interrupted by the occurrence, although she still kept her vigilance in exercise by watching unremittingly for his re-appearance.

After a few pleasant days passed in London, I proceeded to Lincolnshire, and had the happiness of finding my family well when I arrived at home. My father was quite satisfied with the letters I conveyed from Professor Von Slammerbogen; my mother delighted to receive me in any character, whether that of pedant or prodigal. Nicholas, my elder brother, I found as much attached, as when I left him, to practising "Dull Care", upon the violin. In Tom, however, there was a considerable modification, he having left his sinister arm at Hougomont, in exchange for a three months' campaign in country quarters and a Waterloo medal. In the following term I entered at Cambridge, as my father had originally planned; and in due time, upon obtaining my degree, was admitted into holy orders. My first curacy, it is singular enough, was obtained through the influence of our friend the Walworth banker, and was that of St – 's, in his neighbourhood, but nearer to town, and the centre of a poor but densely peopled district. The scene of life I now entered upon was truly laborious and painful. Resolved to perform its duties diligently to the best of my ability, I found every moment I could spare from refreshment and sleep hardly sufficient for the claims which the Comfortless, whom I had to console, the Sick, whom I had to succour, the Profligate, to reclaim, the Sceptic, to convince, made upon my time. Wholesome and profitable to my spirit, I trust, was this discipline! It seems to me a thing inexplicable, how a man can advocate the interests, the benefits of religion – can impress upon others the divine precepts of Christianity, and be himself not a partaker in the blessings he imparts. Such a one, I hope, I have long ceased to be; and although I do not profess to have attained that degree of zealous fervour and devotion, which sees, in the light and graceful relaxations of life nothing but the darkness and allurements of sin, I humbly believe I have endeavoured to make my course, as much as in me was possible, conformable to the doctrines I have taught.

Upon settling in London, I gladly renewed my acquaintance with the Sainsburys; yet so arduous were the duties of my profession, that, for the first two years in which I resided in St – 's parish, I saw but little of this amiable family. Towards the close of that period, the aid of an additional curate, appointed to assist in the district, afforded me a little more leisure time, and I was enabled occasionally to spend an evening at Walworth. In passing to and from my friend's house, I now and then met, and ever with renewed interest and surprise, the dark Pair still plodding their melancholy, interminable rounds. The last time I beheld them, I remember calculating, as they passed me, the number of years they had been thus incomprehensibly associated, and speculating on how many more should elapse before age and death terminated that melancholy partnership. In about two months after, I dined at the banker's, and the first intelligence with which John Sainsbury greeted me, was the news that the milkman of Walworth and his companion had at length disappeared. Maunsell, he said, had died some weeks before, after a couple of days' illness. No one seemed to know of what disorder – general debility, it was thought; no doctor had been called in; and not having left a will, his property went to some distant relative. With respect to the woman, she was last noticed, the evening of his death, sitting in the usual spot – within sight of the gateway leading to his house – where she generally awaited his appearance. She was not there the following morning; nor was she seen again. As the deceased had made no disclosure respecting her, nor left any papers that could tend to explain their connexion, all chance, it was concluded, of clearing up the mystery was at an end for ever. I confess this disappointed me not a little. I found I had, whenever the strange Pair occurred to my recollection, unconsciously entertained a conviction that I should, at some period or other, learn their history; and now that all opportunity of so doing had vanished, the fancies of my early youth again returned, and occupied me with their wild suggestions for a longer time than was either pleasing or justifiable. The coincidence, however, which had brought me so often into contact with those singular persons, was not fated as yet to discontinue.

Chapter IV

It was, I think, about half a year from this period, that, in returning late one evening from the neighbourhood of Russell Square, where my father, during a short visit he was compelled to make to town, had taken lodgings, I missed my way, and got entangled in the intricacies of the numerous narrow streets and alleys that lie between that quarter of London and the eastern end of Holborn. Intending to avail myself of some of the public conveyances homewards, I had attempted to shorten my passage to the great thoroughfares, and in doing so had thus gone astray. As it was past ten o'clock I was necessarily hurried, and yet the heat and heaviness of the night – it was July – prevented me freeing myself as rapidly as I should otherwise have done from the squalid and disagreeable avenues in which I had got entangled. I was just pausing to enquire my way of a slatternly-looking woman, who stood considerably in front of the door of a dirty-looking house in one of the dirtiest lanes I had yet explored, and who, with an apron thrown round her shoulders, to supply, it seemed to me, the absence of their appropriate garments, appeared, from the direction of her looks, to be awaiting some one's arrival, when a lad hastened up the opposite side of the alley, and breathlessly announced to her, that "the docther wouldn't come 'thout he first got his fee."

"Holy Mary, mother of – ! Oh, wisha, what am I to do!" exclaimed the woman in a strong Irish accent, with that elision of apostrophe into complaint peculiar to her country.

"If she goes on this way till mornin', two men wouldn't hould her, let alone one colleen.[1 - Little girl – or girl, merely.] Run, Micky, to the 'seer, an' let him get her to the hospiddle, or my heart 'll be broke from her."

"How dove I know where the 'seer lives at this hour o' the night?" expostulated the boy.

"There's a wake in Tim Reilly's second floor – can't you go there, and they'll tell you – can't you?"

The messenger disappeared, and I now, before putting the question for which I had stopped, asked the woman soothingly the cause of her perturbation.

"Is it what's the matther, sir? Matther enough thin – a poor crethur of a woman lodgin' with me is took very bad with the fever. She wasn't to say so bad entirely till this evenin', when she begin to rave, and 'sist upon gettin' up; an' goin' on with terrible talk, that it would frighten the heart o' you to hear her."

"How long," I said, "has she been ill?"

"Wisha, sir, she was never well since the day she darkened my dure; but I think 'tis the heat o' the weather, an' her never stirrin' out, an' the weakness entirely, an' the impression on her heart, that is killin' her now."

"And has she had no advice?"

"Sorrow the 'vice – you'd think she'd go into fits when I mentioned a docther to her; and as to a priest or a ministher – my dear life, I might as well mention a blunderbush."

Well accustomed to hear of, and witness, such suffering as the woman described, I was about to proceed in quest of a physician myself, if she had paused in the first part of the sentence just finished. The concluding remarks arrested me.

"I am a clergyman," I said; "will you let me see this poor person?"

"An' a thousand welcomes, sir. I know you're not the Revern' Misthur Falvey, that I goes to a' Christmas an' Easther – nor the ministher convenient here. Maybe you're" —

"I'm quite unknown here; but by allowing me to see your patient, I shall be able to judge if she is in a fit state to be removed to an hospital; or, if instantly necessary, I shall myself procure medical advice for her."

The woman entered the house and I followed her, waiting, as she requested me, in the dark entry, until she procured from the sick chamber the only light that I presume was burning in the dwelling. She then re-appeared at the head of the stairs, and requested me to ascend.

Lighting me up four ruinous flights of steps, leading to rooms that appeared to be tenanted by beings as miserable as herself, she ushered me into an apartment of such large dimensions that the weak rushlight she carried left its extremity in absolute darkness. It was wretchedly furnished. At the farthest end from the door was a bed, by the side of which stood a coarse-looking girl about fifteen, engaged in preventing – now by soothing, now by forcible restraint – the invalid who occupied it from attempting to rise.

"Not another moment – not one moment longer! I must get up – he is waiting for me! See! I am late already, for 'tis daybreak – though you cannot see the dawn through that dismal rain. Let me go – wretch, wretch! – let me go; he shall not stir one step that I won't be near him to remind him of" —

Leaving the candle near the door, my guide approached the bed, and beckoned me to follow. I advanced, and even through the misty shadows that enveloped the place, I recognised, in the emaciated Form struggling on the couch, her wild flashing eyes now wilder with fever and insanity, the well-remembered wanderer who had so often excited my interest in Walworth.

"Ha!" she continued, after stopping suddenly, as lunatics will do when a stranger unexpectedly appears, and intently observing me for some minutes. "Ha! I knew I was late – see there. He has come to seek me, for the first time, too, for seventeen – eighteen-oh! so many long years. Ha, ha! all in black, too – Barnard – and you've brought your wealthy bride" – and she glanced at the woman, who stood beside me; "but, faugh, how her limbs rattle – not a whole bone," she said, with a hysterical laugh, "in her beautiful body!"