The Secret of Willow Castle - A Historical Gothic Romance Novel by Nathaniel Burns

had a reputation for being a gambler, but there’s nothing on record to say what Lady Angela thought of that. He was quite a successful gambler, by all accounts, so perhaps she didn’t mind. However, it was his gambling habit that gave rise to the best of the Castle’s legends – he is said to have grown so tired of his easy victories and so obsessed with playing for higher and higher stakes that he challenged the Devil himself to cards.”
    “ Really?” I found myself sitting forward, rapt as a little girl. Mervyn leaned closer, obviously enjoying his role as the teller of ghostly tales by the library fire.
    “ Why, yes. They say that on Midsummer Eve, the shortest night of the year, he locked himself in the Withy Chamber. Alone and in perfect silence, he set up the gaming table, just as a young girl might prepare a dumb supper to learn the identity of her future husband. On the first stroke of midnight he took his place at the table, poured the wine, picked up the pack of cards and began to shuffle. On the last stroke, he looked up and saw the Devil appear in the seat opposite him. They bowed to each other and the challenge began.
    For the first game the stakes were long life against Carvell’s soul. Carvell won, but it was too easy and at once he felt disappointed by an anticlimactic victory. The Devil, seeing an opportunity, offered to play again. This time Carvell bet the family jewels – a handful of finely wrought rings and bracelets encrusted with jewels, a few medallions and a spectacular gold pendant containing an emerald the size of a goose egg – against the promise of equally long life for Angela. This time, for the first time in years, he lost. As he pushed the velvet bag containing the jewels across the table and saw the Devil’s clawed hand close around it, he suddenly lost his nerve. Faced with the prospect of explaining to his wife and children that he had gambled away the gems that were his sons’ birthright, he knew he had to win them back.
    At first the Devil seemed reluctant, claiming that he had answered Carvell’s summons and won the jewels fair and square. But Carvell persisted, and eventually the Devil suggested that since Lady Angela and her good opinion meant so much to Sir Carvell, they should play for her. Carvell refused, so the Devil amended his offer – he would stake the newly-won jewels against a single night with Angela. This made Carvell nervous, but he was a confident man and believed himself a good enough card player that it was worth the risk.
    They played their final round. They were well-matched, and for a long time they were locked in stalemate, taking and losing hands at an equal rate. The wine was drunk, the night was coming to an end and they both knew that the game must end with the first rays of the dawn. Here the various versions of the story differ. Some say that Carvell uttered a prayer in his wife’s name, begging for her to be spared and not shamed as a result of his folly, and that’s what gave him the moment’s luck he needed to win the game. Others say that in his desperation he cheated his way to victory, but the Devil could not tell how. Either way, Carvell won at last.
    The Devil was enraged. Bound by their agreement to return the jewels, he swore that he would not place them in Carvell’s hand but would conceal them somewhere within the Castle. That way he would not have taken them, but nor would Carvell simply have them back. He also vowed that since he had not won Lady Angela, he would wait until she came to Hell of her own accord.
    Carvell laughed and told him that would never happen, for Angela was the most virtuous woman he knew. Yet within six months, Lady Angela had gone mad and one stormy night, she threw herself from the ramparts to her death. Carvell was left to live out a very long life, blaming himself for his wife’s death.”
    His story concluded, we sat in silence for a long moment. I traced a finger over the image of poor Lady