Redclyffe smiled to himself, as he thus gave expression to what he really half fancied were Lord Braithwaite's feelings and purposes towards him, and he felt them in the kindness and sweetness of his demeanor, and his evident wish to make him happy, combined with his own subtile suspicion of some design with which he had been invited here, or which had grown up since he came.

Whoever has read Italian history must have seen such instances of this poisoning without malice or personal ill-feeling.

His own pleasant, companionable, perhaps noble traits and qualities, may have made a favorable impression on Lord Braithwaite, and perhaps he regretted the necessity of acting as he was about to do, but could not therefore weakly relinquish his deliberately formed design. And, on his part, Redclyffe bore no malice towards Lord Braithwaite, but felt really a kindly interest in him, and could he have made him happy at any less cost than his own life, or dearest interests, would perhaps have been glad to do so. He sometimes felt inclined to remonstrate with him in a friendly way; to tell him that his intended course was not likely to lead to a good result; that they had better try to arrange the matter on some other basis, and perhaps he would not find the American so unreasonable as he supposed.

All this, it will be understood, were the mere dreamy suppositions of Redclyffe, in the idleness and languor of the old mansion, letting his mind run at will, and following it into dim caves, whither it tended. He did not actually believe anything of all this; unless it be a lawyer, or a policeman, or some very vulgar natural order of mind, no man really suspects another of crime. It is the hardest thing in the world for a noble nature—the hardest and the most shocking—to be convinced that a fellow-being is going to do a wrong thing, and the consciousness of one's own inviolability renders it still more difficult to believe that one's self is to be the object of the wrong. What he had been fancying looked to him like a romance. The strange part of the matter was, what suggested such a romance in regard to his kind and hospitable host, who seemed to exercise the hospitality of England with a kind of refinement and pleasant piquancy that came from his Italian mixture of blood? Was there no spiritual whisper here?

So the time wore on; and Redclyffe began to be sensible that he must soon decide upon the course that he was to take; for his diplomatic position waited for him, and he could not loiter many days more away in this half delicious, half painful reverie and quiet in the midst of his struggling life. He was yet as undetermined what to do as ever; or, if we may come down to the truth, he was perhaps loath to acknowledge to himself the determination that he had actually formed.

One day, at dinner, which now came on after candle-light, he and Lord Braithwaite sat together at table, as usual, while Omskirk waited at the sideboard. It was a wild, gusty night, in which an autumnal breeze of later autumn seemed to have gone astray, and come into September intrusively. The two friends—for such we may call them—had spent a pleasant day together, wandering in the grounds, looking at the old house at all points, going to the church, and examining the cross- legged stone statues; they had ridden, too, and taken a great deal of healthful exercise, and had now that pleasant sense of just weariness enough which it is the boon of the climate of England to incite and permit men to take. Redclyffe was in one of his most genial moods, and Lord Braithwaite seemed to be the same; so kindly they were both disposed to one another, that the American felt that he might not longer refrain from giving his friend some light upon the character in which he appeared, or in which, at least, he had it at his option to appear. Lord Braithwaite might or might not know it already; but at all events it was his duty to tell him, or to take his leave, having thus far neither gained nor sought anything from their connection which would tend to forward his pursuit—should he decide to undertake it.

When the cheerful fire, the rare wine, and the good fare had put them both into a good physical state, Redclyffe said to Lord Braithwaite,—

"There is a matter upon which I have been some time intending to speak to you."

Braithwaite nodded.

"A subject," continued he, "of interest to both of us. Has it ever occurred to you, from the identity of name, that I may be really, what we have jokingly assumed me to be,—a relation?"

"It has," said Lord Braithwaite, readily enough. "The family would be proud to acknowledge such a kinsman, whose abilities and political rank would add a public lustre that it has long wanted."

Redclyffe bowed and smiled.

"You know, I suppose, the annals of your house," he continued, "and have heard how, two centuries ago, or somewhat less, there was an ancestor who mysteriously disappeared. He was never seen again. There were tales of private murder, out of which a hundred legends have come down to these days, as I have myself found, though most of them in so strange a shape that I should hardly know them, had I not myself a clue."

"I have heard some of these legends," said Lord Braithwaite.

"But did you ever hear, among them," asked Redclyffe, "that the lost ancestor did not really die,—was not murdered,—but lived long, though in another hemisphere,—lived long, and left heirs behind him?"

"There is such a legend," said Lord Braithwaite.

"Left posterity," continued Redclyffe,—"a representative of whom is alive at this day."

"That I have not known, though I might conjecture something like it," said Braithwaite.

The coolness with which he took this perplexed Redclyffe. He resolved to make trial at once whether it were possible to move him.

"And I have reason to believe," he added, "that that representative is myself."

"Should that prove to be the case, you are welcome back to your own," said Lord Braithwaite, quietly. "It will be a very remarkable case, if the proofs for two hundred years, or thereabouts, can be so distinctly made out as to nullify the claim of one whose descent is undoubted. Yet it is certainly not impossible. I suppose it would hardly be fair in me to ask what are your proofs, and whether I may see them."

"The documents are in the hands of my agents in London," replied Redclyffe; "and seem to be ample, among them being a certified genealogy from the first emigrant downward, without a break. A declaration of two men of note among the first settlers, certifying that they knew the first emigrant, under a change of name, to be the eldest son of the house of Braithwaite; full proofs, at least on that head."

"You are a lawyer, I believe," said Braithwaite, "and know better than I what may be necessary to prove your claim. I will frankly own to you, that I have heard, long ago,—as long as when my connection with this hereditary property first began,—that there was supposed to be an heir extant for a long course of years, and that there, was no proof that that main line of the descent had ever become extinct. If these things had come fairly before me, and been represented to me with whatever force belongs to them, before my accession to the estate,—these and other facts which I have since become acquainted with,—I might have deliberated on the expediency of coming to such a doubtful possession. The property, I assure you, is not so desirable that, taking all things into consideration, it has much increased my happiness. But, now, here I am, having paid a price in a certain way,—which you will understand, if you ever come into the property,—a price of a nature that cannot possibly be refunded. It can hardly be presumed that I shall see your right a moment sooner than you make it manifest by law."

"I neither expect nor wish it," replied Redclyffe, "nor, to speak frankly, am I quite sure that you will ever have occasion to defend your title, or to question mine. When I came hither, to be your guest, it was almost with the settled purpose never to mention my proofs, nor to seek to make them manifest. That purpose is not, I may say, yet relinquished."

"Yet I am to infer from your words that it is shaken?" said Braithwaite. "You find the estate, then, so delightful,—this life of the old manor-house so exquisitely agreeable,—this air so cheering,— this moral atmosphere so invigorating,—that your scruples are about coming to an end. You think this life of an Englishman, this fair prospect of a title, so irresistibly enticing as to be worth more than your claim, in behalf of your American birthright, to a possible Presidency."

There was a sort of sneer in this, which Redclyffe did not well know how to understand; and there was a look on Braithwaite's face, as he said it, that made him think of a condemned soul, who should be dressed in magnificent robes, and surrounded with the mockery of state, splendor, and happiness, who, if he should be congratulated on his fortunate and blissful situation, would probably wear just such a look, and speak in just that tone. He looked a moment in Braithwaite's face.

"No," he replied. "I do not think that there is much happiness in it. A brighter, healthier, more useful, far more satisfactory, though tumultuous life would await me in my own country. But there is about this place a strange, deep, sad, brooding interest, which possesses me, and draws me to it, and will not let me go. I feel as if, in spite of myself and my most earnest efforts, I were fascinated by something in the spot, and must needs linger here, and make it my home if I can."

"You shall be welcome; the old hereditary chair will be filled at last," said Braithwaite, pointing to the vacant chair. "Come, we will drink to you in a cup of welcome. Take the old chair now."

In half-frolic Redclyffe took the chair.

He called to Omskirk to bring a bottle of a particularly exquisite Italian wine, known only to the most deeply skilled in the vintages of that country, and which, he said, was oftener heard of than seen,— oftener seen than tasted. Omskirk put it on the table in its original glass, and Braithwaite filled Redclyffe's glass and his own, and raised the latter to his lips, with a frank expression of his mobile countenance.

"May you have a secure possession of your estate," said he, "and live long in the midst of your possessions. To me, on the whole, it seems better than your American prospects."

Redclyffe thanked him, and drank off the glass of wine, which was not very much to his taste; as new varieties of wine are apt not to be. All the conversation that had passed had been in a free, careless sort of way, without apparently much earnestness in it; for they were both men who knew how to keep their more serious parts within them. But Redclyffe was glad that the explanation was over, and that he might now remain at Braithwaite's table, under his roof, without that uneasy feeling of treachery which, whether rightly or not, had haunted him hitherto. He felt joyous, and stretched his hand out for the bottle which Braithwaite kept near himself, instead of passing it.

"You do not yourself do justice to your own favorite wine," observed Redclyffe, seeing his host's full glass standing before him.

"I have filled again," said Braithwaite, carelessly; "but I know not that I shall venture to drink a second glass. It is a wine that does not bear mixture with other vintages, though of most genial and admirable qualities when taken by itself. Drink your own, however, for it will be a rare occasion indeed that would induce me to offer you another bottle of this rare stock."

Redclyffe sipped his second glass, endeavoring to find out what was this subtile and peculiar flavor that hid itself so, and yet seemed on the point of revealing itself. It had, he thought, a singular effect upon his faculties, quickening and making them active, and causing him to feel as if he were on the point of penetrating rare mysteries, such as men's thoughts are always hovering round, and always returning from. Some strange, vast, sombre, mysterious truth, which he seemed to have searched for long, appeared to be on the point of being revealed to him; a sense of something to come; something to happen that had been waiting long, long to happen; an opening of doors, a drawing away of veils; a lifting of heavy, magnificent curtains, whose dark folds hung before a spectacle of awe;—it was like the verge of the grave. Whether it was the exquisite wine of Braithwaite, or whatever it might be, the American felt a strange influence upon him, as if he were passing through the gates of eternity, and finding on the other side the revelation of some secret that had greatly perplexed him on this side. He thought that Braithwaite's face assumed a strange, subtile smile,— not malicious, yet crafty, triumphant, and at the same time terribly sad, and with that perception his senses, his life, welled away; and left him in the deep ancestral chair at the board of Braithwaite.



CHAPTER XXIV.

When awake [Endnote: 1], or beginning to awake, he lay for some time in a maze; not a disagreeable one, but thoughts were running to and fro in his mind, all mixed and jumbled together. Reminiscences of early days, even those that were Preadamite; referring, we mean, to those times in the almshouse, which he could not at ordinary times remember at all; but now there seemed to be visions of old women and men, and pallid girls, and little dirty boys, which could only be referred to that epoch. Also, and most vividly, there was the old Doctor, with his sternness, his fierceness, his mystery; and all that happened since, playing phantasmagoria before his yet unclosed eyes; nor, so mysterious was his state, did he know, when he should unclose those lids, where he should find himself. He was content to let the world go on in this way, as long as it would, and therefore did not hurry, but rather kept back the proofs of awakening; willing to look at the scenes that were unrolling for his amusement, as it seemed; and willing, too, to keep it uncertain whether he were not back in America, and in his boyhood, and all other subsequent impressions a dream or a prophetic vision. But at length something stirring near him,—or whether it stirred, or whether he dreamed it, he could not quite tell,—but the uncertainty impelled him, at last, to open his eyes, and see whereabouts he was.

Even then he continued in as much uncertainty as he was before, and lay with marvellous quietude in it, trying sluggishly to make the mystery out. It was in a dim, twilight place, wherever it might be; a place of half-awakeness, where the outlines of things were not well defined; but it seemed to be a chamber, antique and vaulted, narrow and high, hung round with old tapestry. Whether it were morning or midday he could not tell, such was the character of the light, nor even where it came from; for there appeared to be no windows, and yet it was not apparently artificial light; nor light at all, indeed, but a gray dimness. It was so like his own half-awake state that he lay in it a longer time, not incited to finish his awaking, but in a languor, not disagreeable, yet hanging heavily, heavily upon him, like a dark pall. It was, in fact, as if he had been asleep for years, or centuries, or till the last day was dawning, and then was collecting his thoughts in such slow fashion as would then be likely.

Again that noise,—a little, low, quiet sound, as of one breathing somewhere near him. The whole thing was very much like that incident which introduced him to the Hospital, and his first coming to his senses there; and he almost fancied that some such accident must again have happened to him, and that when his sight cleared he should again behold the venerable figure of the pensioner. With this idea he let his head steady itself; and it seemed to him that its dizziness must needs be the result of very long and deep sleep. What if it were the sleep of a century? What if all things that were extant when he went to sleep had passed away, and he was waking now in another epoch of time? Where was America, and the republic in which he hoped for such great things? Where England? had she stood it better than the republic? Was the old Hospital still in being,—although the good Warden must long since have passed out of his warm and pleasant life? And himself, how came he to be preserved? In what musty old nook had he been put away, where Time neglected and Death forgot him, until now he was to get up friendless, helpless,—when new heirs had come to the estate he was on the point of laying claim to,—and go onward through what remained of life? Would it not have been better to have lived with his contemporaries, and to be now dead and dust with them? Poor, petty interests of a day, how slight!

Again the noise, a little stir, a sort of quiet moan, or something that he could not quite define; but it seemed, whenever he heard it, as if some fact thrust itself through the dream-work with which he was circumfused; something alien to his fantasies, yet not powerful enough to dispel them. It began to be irksome to him, this little sound of something near him; and he thought, in the space of another hundred years, if it continued, he should have to arouse himself and see what it was. But, indeed, there was something so cheering in this long repose,—this rest from all the troubles of earth, which it sometimes seems as if only a churchyard bed would give us,—that he wished the noise would let him alone. But his thoughts were gradually getting too busy for this slumberous state. He begun, perforce, to come nearer actuality. The strange question occurred to him, Had any time at all passed? Was he not still sitting at Lord Braithwaite's table, having just now quaffed a second glass of that rare and curious Italian wine? Was it not affecting his head very strangely,—so that he was put out of time as it were? He would rally himself, and try to set his head right with another glass. He must be still at table, for now he remembered he had not gone to bed at all. [Endnote: 2.]

Ah, the noise! He could not bear it, he would awake now, now!—silence it, and then to sleep again. In fact, he started up; started to his feet, in puzzle and perplexity, and stood gazing around him, with swimming brain. It was an antique room, which he did not at all recognize, and, indeed, in that dim twilight—which how it came he could not tell—he could scarcely discern what were its distinguishing marks. But he seemed to be sensible, that, in a high-backed chair, at a little distance from him, sat a figure in a long robe; a figure of a man with snow-white hair and a long beard, who seemed to be gazing at him, quietly, as if he had been gazing a hundred years. I know not what it was, but there was an influence as if this old man belonged to some other age and category of man than he was now amongst. He remembered the old family legend of the existence of an ancestor two or three centuries in age.

"It is the old family personified," thought he.

The old figure made no sign, but continued to sit gazing at him in so strangely still a manner that it made Redclyffe shiver with something that seemed like affright. There was an aspect of long, long time about him; as if he had never been young, or so long ago as when the world was young along with him. He might be the demon of this old house; the representative of all that happened in it, the grief, the long languor and weariness of life, the deaths, gathering them all into himself, and figuring them in furrows, wrinkles, and white hairs,—a being that might have been young, when those old Saxon timbers were put together, with the oaks that were saplings when Caesar landed, and was in his maturity when the Conqueror came, and was now lapsing into extreme age when the nineteenth century was elderly. His garb might have been of any time, that long, loose robe that enveloped him. Redclyffe remained in this way, gazing at this aged figure; at first without the least wonder, but calmly, as we feel in dreams, when, being in a land of enchantment, we take everything as if it were a matter of course, and feel, by the right of our own marvellous nature, on terms of equal kindred with all other marvels. So it was with him when he first became aware of the old man, sitting there with that age-long regard directed towards him.

But, by degrees, a sense of wonder had its will, and grew, slowly at first, in Redclyffe's mind; and almost twin-born with it, and growing piece by piece, there was a sense of awful fear, as his waking senses came slowly back to him. In the dreamy state, he had felt no fear; but, as a waking man, it was fearful to discover that the shadowy forms did not fly from his awaking eyes. He started at last to his feet from the low couch on which he had all this time been lying.

"What are you?" he exclaimed. "Where am I?"

The old figure made no answer; nor could Redclyffe be quite sure that his voice had any effect upon it, though he fancied that it was shaken a little, as if his voice came to it from afar. But it continued to gaze at him, or at least to have its aged face turned towards him in the dim light; and this strange composure, and unapproachableness, were very frightful. As his manhood gathered about his heart, however, the American endeavored to shake off this besetting fear, or awe, or whatever it was; and to bring himself to a sense of waking things,—to burst through the mist and delusive shows that bewildered him, and catch hold of a reality. He stamped upon the floor; it was solid stone, the pavement, or oak so old and stanch that it resembled it. There was one firm thing, therefore. But the contrast between this and the slipperiness, the unaccountableness, of the rest of his position, made him the more sensible of the latter. He made a step towards the old figure; another; another. He was face to face with him, within a yard of distance. He saw the faint movement of the old man's breath; he sought, through the twilight of the room, some glimmer of perception in his eyes.

"Are you a living man?" asked Redclyffe, faintly and doubtfully.

He mumbled, the old figure, some faint moaning sound, that, if it were language at all, had all the edges and angles worn off it by decay,— unintelligible, except that it seemed to signify a faint mournfulness and complainingness of mood; and then held his peace, continuing to gaze as before. Redclyffe could not bear the awe that filled him, while he kept at a distance, and, coming desperately forward, he stood close to the old figure; he touched his robe, to see if it were real; he laid his hand upon the withered hand that held the staff, in which he now recognized the very staff of the Doctor's legend. His fingers touched a real hand, though, bony and dry, as if it had been in the grave.

"Then you are real?" said Redclyffe doubtfully.

The old figure seemed to have exhausted itself—its energies, what there were of them—in the effort of making the unintelligible communication already vouchsafed. Then he seemed to lapse out of consciousness, and not to know what was passing, or to be sensible that any person was near him. But Redclyffe was now resuming his firmness and daylight consciousness even in the dimness. He ran over all that he had heard of the legend of the old house, rapidly considering whether there might not be something of fact in the legend of the undying old man; whether, as told or whispered in the chimney-corners, it might not be an instance of the mysterious, the half-spiritual mode, in which actual truths communicate themselves imperfectly through a medium that gives them the aspect of falsehood. Something in the atmosphere of the house made its inhabitants and neighbors dimly aware that there was a secret resident; it was by a language not audible, but of impression; there could not be such a secret in its recesses, without making itself sensible. This legend of the undying one translated it to vulgar apprehension. He remembered those early legends, told by the Doctor, in his childhood; he seemed imperfectly and doubtfully to see what was their true meaning, and how, taken aright, they had a reality, and were the craftily concealed history of his own wrongs, sufferings, and revenge. And this old man! who was he? He joined the Warden's account of the family to the Doctor's legends. He could not believe, or take thoroughly in, the strange surmise to which they led him; but, by an irresistible impulse, he acted on it.

"Sir Edward Redclyffe!" he exclaimed.

"Ha! who speaks to me?" exclaimed the old man, in a startled voice, like one who hears himself called at an unexpected moment.

"Sir Edward Redclyffe," repeated Redclyffe, "I bring you news of Norman Oglethorpe!" [Endnote: 3.]

"The villain! the tyrant! mercy! mercy! save me!" cried the old man, in most violent emotion of terror and rage intermixed, that shook his old frame as if it would be shaken asunder. He stood erect, the picture of ghastly horror, as if he saw before him that stern face that had thrown a blight over his life, and so fearfully avenged, from youth to age, the crime that he had committed. The effect, the passion, was too much,—the terror with which it smote, the rage that accompanied it, blazed up for a moment with a fierce flame, then flickered and went out. He stood tottering; Redclyffe put out his hand to support him; but he sank down in a heap on the floor, as if a thing of dry bones had been suddenly loosened at the joints, and fell in a rattling heap. [Endnote: 4.]



CHAPTER XXV.

Redclyffe, apparently, had not communicated to his agent in London his change of address, when he left the Warden's residence to avail himself of the hospitality of Braithwaite Hall; for letters arrived for him, from his own country, both private and with the seal of state upon them; one among the rest that bore on the envelope the name of the President of the United States. The good Warden was impressed with great respect for so distinguished a signature, and, not knowing but that the welfare of the Republic (for which he had an Englishman's contemptuous interest) might be involved in its early delivery at its destination, he determined to ride over to Braithwaite Hall, call on his friend, and deliver it with his own hand. With this purpose, he mounted his horse, at the hour of his usual morning ride, and set forth; and, before reaching the village, saw a figure before him which he recognized as that of the pensioner. [Endnote: 1.]

"Soho! whither go you, old friend?" said the Warden, drawing his bridle as he came up with the old man.

"To Braithwaite Hall, sir," said the pensioner, who continued to walk diligently on; "and I am glad to see your honor (if it be so) on the same errand."

"Why so?" asked the Warden. "You seem much in earnest. Why should my visit to Braithwaite Hall be a special cause of rejoicing?"

"Nay," said the pensioner, "your honor is specially interested in this young American, who has gone thither to abide; and when one is in a strange country he needs some guidance. My mind is not easy about the young man."

"Well," said the Warden, smiling to himself at the old gentleman's idle and senile fears, "I commend your diligence on behalf of your friend."

He rode on as he spoke, and deep in one of the woodland paths he saw the flutter of a woman's garment, and, greatly to his surprise, overtook Elsie, who seemed to be walking along with great rapidity, and, startled by the approach of hoofs behind her, looked up at him, with a pale cheek.

"Good morning, Miss Elsie," said the Warden. "You are taking a long walk this morning. I regret to see that I have frightened you."

"Pray, whither are you going?" said she.

"To the Hall," said the Warden, wondering at the abrupt question.

"Ah, sir," exclaimed Elsie, "for Heaven's sake, pray insist on seeing Mr. Redclyffe,—take no excuse. There are reasons for it."

"Certainly, fair lady," responded the Warden, wondering more and more at this injunction from such a source. "And when I see this fascinating gentleman, pray what message am I to give him from Miss Elsie,—who, moreover, seems to be on the eve of visiting him in person?"

"See him! see him! Only see him!" said Elsie, with passionate earnestness, "and in haste! See him now!"

She waved him onward as she spoke; and the Warden, greatly commoted for the nonce, complied with the maiden's fantasy so far as to ride on at a quicker pace, uneasily marvelling at what could have aroused this usually shy and reserved girl's nervousness to such a pitch. The incident served at all events to titillate his English sluggishness; so that he approached the avenue of the old Hall with a vague expectation of something that had happened there, though he knew not of what nature it could possibly be. However, he rode round to the side entrance, by which horsemen generally entered the house, and, a groom approaching to take his bridle, he alighted and approached the door. I know not whether it were anything more than the glistening moisture common in an English autumnal morning; but so it was, that the trace of the Bloody Footstep seemed fresh, as if it had been that very night imprinted anew, and the crime made all over again, with fresh guilt upon somebody's soul.

When the footman came to the door, responsive to his ring, the Warden inquired for Mr. Redclyffe, the American gentleman.

"The American gentleman left for London, early this morning," replied the footman, in a matter-of-fact way.

"Gone!" exclaimed the Warden. "This is sudden; and strange that he should go without saying good by. Gone," and then he remembered the old pensioner's eagerness that the Warden should come here, and Elsie's strange injunction that he should insist on seeing Redclyffe. "Pray, is Lord Braithwaite at home?"

"I think, sir, he is in the library," said the servant, "but will see; pray, sir, walk in."

He returned in a moment, and ushered the Warden through passages with which he was familiar of old, to the library, where he found Lord Braithwaite sitting with the London newspaper in his hand. He rose and welcomed his guest with great equanimity.

To the Warden's inquiries after Redclyffe, Lord Braithwaite replied that his guest had that morning left the house, being called to London by letters from America; but of what nature Lord Braithwaite was unable to say, except that they seemed to be of urgency and importance. The Warden's further inquiries, which he pushed as far as was decorous, elicited nothing more than this; and he was preparing to take his leave,—not seeing any reason for insisting (according to Elsie's desire) on the impossibility of seeing a man who was not there,—nor, indeed, any reason for so doing. And yet it seemed very strange that Redclyffe should have gone so unceremoniously; nor was he half satisfied, though he knew not why he should be otherwise.

"Do you happen to know Mr. Redclyffe's address in London," asked the Warden.

"Not at all," said Braithwaite. "But I presume there is courtesy enough in the American character to impel him to write to me, or both of us, within a day or two, telling us of his whereabouts and whatabouts. Should you know, I beg you will let me know; for I have really been pleased with this gentleman, and should have been glad could he have favored me with a somewhat longer visit."

There was nothing more to be said; and the Warden took his leave, and was about mounting his horse, when he beheld the pensioner approaching the house, and he remained standing until he should come up.

"You are too late," said he, as the old man drew near. "Our friend has taken French leave."

"Mr. Warden," said the old man solemnly, "let me pray you not to give him up so easily. Come with me into the presence of Lord Braithwaite."

The Warden made some objections; but the pensioner's manner was so earnest, that he soon consented; knowing that the strangeness of his sudden return might well enough be put upon the eccentricities of the pensioner, especially as he was so well known to Lord Braithwaite. He accordingly again rang at the door, which being opened by the same stolid footman, the Warden desired him to announce to Lord Braithwaite that the Warden and a pensioner desired to see him. He soon returned, with a request that they would walk in, and ushered them again to the library, where they found the master of the house in conversation with Omskirk at one end of the apartment,—a whispered conversation, which detained him a moment, after their arrival. The Warden fancied that he saw in old Omskirk's countenance a shade more of that mysterious horror which made him such a bugbear to children; but when Braithwaite turned from him and approached his visitor, there was no trace of any disturbance, beyond a natural surprise to see his good friend the Warden so soon after his taking leave. [Endnote: 2.]

"I see you are surprised," said the latter. "But you must lay the blame, if any, on our good old friend here, who, for some reason, best known to himself, insisted on having my company here."

Braithwaite looked to the old pensioner, with a questioning look, as if good-humoredly (yet not as if he cared much about it) asking for an explanation. As Omskirk was about leaving the room, having remained till this time, with that nervous look which distinguished him gazing towards the party, the pensioner made him a sign, which he obeyed as if compelled to do so.

"Well, my friend," said the Warden, somewhat impatient of the aspect in which he himself appeared, "I beg of you, explain at once to Lord Braithwaite why you have brought me back in this strange way."

"It is," said the pensioner quietly, "that in your presence I request him to allow me to see Mr. Redclyffe."

"Why, my friend," said Braithwaite, "how can I show you a man who has left my house, and whom in the chances of this life, I am not very likely to see again, though hospitably desirous of so doing?"

Here ensued a laughing sort of colloquy between the Warden and Braithwaite, in which the former jocosely excused himself for having yielded to the whim of the pensioner, and returned with him on an errand which he well knew to be futile.

"I have long been aware," he said apart, in a confidential way, "of something a little awry in our old friend's mental system. You will excuse him, and me for humoring him."

"Of course, of course," said Braithwaite, in the same tone. "I shall not be moved by anything the old fellow can say."

The old pensioner, meanwhile, had been as it were heating up, and gathering himself into a mood of energy which those who saw him had never before witnessed in his usually quiet person. He seemed somehow to grow taller and larger, more impressive. At length, fixing his eyes on Lord Braithwaite, he spoke again.

"Dark, murderous man," exclaimed he. "Your course has not been unwatched; the secrets of this mansion are not unknown. For two centuries back, they have been better known to them who dwell afar off than to those resident within the mansion. The foot that made the Bloody Footstep has returned from its long wanderings, and it passes on, straight as destiny,—sure as an avenging Providence,—to the punishment and destruction of those who incur retribution."

"Here is an odd kind of tragedy," said Lord Braithwaite, with a scornful smile. "Come, my old friend, lay aside this vein and talk sense."

"Not thus do you escape your penalty, hardened and crafty one!" exclaimed the pensioner. "I demand of you, before this worthy Warden, access to the secret ways of this mansion, of which thou dost unjustly retain possession. I shall disclose what for centuries has remained hidden,—the ghastly secrets that this house hides."

"Humor him," whispered the Warden, "and hereafter I will take care that the exuberance of our old friend shall be duly restrained. He shall not trouble you again."

Lord Braithwaite, to say the truth, appeared a little flabbergasted and disturbed by these latter expressions of the old gentleman. He hesitated, turned pale; but at last, recovering his momentary confusion and irresolution, he replied, with apparent carelessness:—

"Go wherever you will, old gentleman. The house is open to you for this time. If ever you have another opportunity to disturb it, the fault will be mine."

"Follow, sir," said the pensioner, turning to the Warden; "follow, maiden![Endnote: 3] Now shall a great mystery begin to be revealed."

So saying, he led the way before them, passing out of the hall, not by the doorway, but through one of the oaken panels of the wall, which admitted the party into a passage which seemed to pass through the thickness of the wall, and was lighted by interstices through which shone gleams of light. This led them into what looked like a little vestibule, or circular room, which the Warden, though deeming himself many years familiar with the old house, had never seen before, any more than the passage which led to it. To his surprise, this room was not vacant, for in it sat, in a large old chair, Omskirk, like a toad in its hole, like some wild, fearful creature in its den, and it was now partly understood how this man had the possibility of suddenly disappearing, so inscrutably, and so in a moment; and, when all quest for him was given up, of as suddenly appearing again.

"Ha!" said old Omskirk, slowly rising, as at the approach of some event that he had long expected. "Is he coming at last?"

"Poor victim of another's iniquity," said the pensioner. "Thy release approaches. Rejoice!"

The old man arose with a sort of trepidation and solemn joy intermixed in his manner, and bowed reverently, as if there were in what he heard more than other ears could understand in it.

"Yes; I have waited long," replied he. "Welcome; if my release is come."

"Well," said Lord Braithwaite, scornfully. "This secret retreat of my house is known to many. It was the priest's secret chamber when it was dangerous to be of the old and true religion, here in England. There is no longer any use in concealing this place; and the Warden, or any man, might have seen it, or any of the curiosities of the old hereditary house, if desirous so to do."

"Aha! son of Belial!" quoth the pensioner. "And this, too!"

He took three pieces from a certain point of the wall, which he seemed to know, and stooped to press upon the floor. The Warden looked at Lord Braithwaite, and saw that he had grown deadly pale. What his change of cheer might bode, he could not guess; but, at the pressure of the old pensioner's finger, the floor, or a segment of it, rose like the lid of a box, and discovered a small darksome pair of stairs, within which burned a lamp, lighting it downward, like the steps that descend into a sepulchre.

"Follow," said he, to those who looked on, wondering.

And he began to descend. Lord Braithwaite saw him disappear, then frantically followed, the Warden next, and old Omskirk took his place in the rear, like a man following his inevitable destiny. At the bottom of a winding descent, that seemed deep and remote, and far within, they came to a door, which the pensioner pressed with a spring; and, passing through the space that disclosed itself, the whole party followed, and found themselves in a small, gloomy room. On one side of it was a couch, on which sat Redclyffe; face to face with him was a white-haired figure in a chair.

"You are come!" said Redclyffe, solemnly. "But too late!"

"And yonder is the coffer," said the pensioner. "Open but that; and our quest is ended."

"That, if I mistake not, I can do," said Redclyffe.

He drew forth—what he had kept all this time, as something that might yet reveal to him the mystery of his birth—the silver key that had been found by the grave in far New England; and applying it to the lock, he slowly turned it on the hinges, that had not been turned for two hundred years. All—even Lord Braithwaite, guilty and shame- stricken as he felt—pressed forward to look upon what was about to be disclosed. What were the wondrous contents? The entire, mysterious coffer was full of golden ringlets, abundant, clustering through the whole coffer, and living with elasticity, so as immediately, as it were, to flow over the sides of the coffer, and rise in large abundance from the long compression. Into this—by a miracle of natural production which was known likewise in other cases—into this had been resolved the whole bodily substance of that fair and unfortunate being, known so long in the legends of the family as the Beauty of the Golden Locks. As the pensioner looked at this strange sight,—the lustre of the precious and miraculous hair gleaming and glistening, and seeming to add light to the gloomy room,—he took from his breast pocket another lock of hair, in a locket, and compared it, before their faces, with that which brimmed over from the coffer.

"It is the same!" said he.

"And who are you that know it?" asked Redclyffe, surprised.

"He whose ancestors taught him the secret,—who has had it handed down to him these two centuries, and now only with regret yields to the necessity of making it known."

"You are the heir!" said Redclyffe.

In that gloomy room, beside the dead old man, they looked at him, and saw a dignity beaming on him, covering his whole figure, that broke out like a lustre at the close of day.



APPENDIX

CHAPTER I.

Note 1. The MS. gives the following alternative openings: "Early in the present century"; "Soon after the Revolution"; "Many years ago."

Note 2. Throughout the first four pages of the MS. the Doctor is called "Ormskirk," and in an earlier draft of this portion of the romance, "Etheredge."

Note 3. Author's note.—"Crusty Hannah is a mixture of Indian and negro."

Note 4. Author's note.—"It is understood from the first that the children are not brother and sister.—Describe the children with really childish traits, quarrelling, being naughty, etc.—The Doctor should occasionally beat Ned in course of instruction."

Note 5. In order to show the manner in which Hawthorne would modify a passage, which was nevertheless to be left substantially the same, I subjoin here a description of this graveyard as it appears in the earlier draft: "The graveyard (we are sorry to have to treat of such a disagreeable piece of ground, but everybody's business centres there at one time or another) was the most ancient in the town. The dust of the original Englishmen had become incorporated with the soil; of those Englishmen whose immediate predecessors had been resolved into the earth about the country churches,—the little Norman, square, battlemented stone towers of the villages in the old land; so that in this point of view, as holding bones and dust of the first ancestors, this graveyard was more English than anything else in town. There had been hidden from sight many a broad, bluff visage of husbandmen that had ploughed the real English soil; there the faces of noted men, now known in history; there many a personage whom tradition told about, making wondrous qualities of strength and courage for him;—all these, mingled with succeeding generations, turned up and battened down again with the sexton's spade; until every blade of grass was human more than vegetable,—for an hundred and fifty years will do this, and so much time, at least, had elapsed since the first little mound was piled up in the virgin soil. Old tombs there were too, with numerous sculptures on them; and quaint, mossy gravestones; although all kinds of monumental appendages were of a date more recent than the time of the first settlers, who had been content with wooden memorials, if any, the sculptor's art not having then reached New England. Thus rippled, surged, broke almost against the house, this dreary graveyard, which made the street gloomy, so that people did not like to pass the dark, high wooden fence, with its closed gate, that separated it from the street. And this old house was one that crowded upon it, and took up the ground that would otherwise have been sown as thickly with dead as the rest of the lot; so that it seemed hardly possible but that the dead people should get up out of their graves, and come in there to warm themselves. But in truth, I have never heard a whisper of its being haunted."

Note 6. Author's note.—"The spiders are affected by the weather and serve as barometers.—It shall always be a moot point whether the Doctor really believed in cobwebs, or was laughing at the credulous."

Note 7. Author's note.—"The townspeople are at war with the Doctor.—Introduce the Doctor early as a smoker, and describe.—The result of Crusty Hannah's strangely mixed breed should be shown in some strange way.—Give vivid pictures of the society of the day, symbolized in the street scenes."



CHAPTER II.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Read the whole paragraph before copying any of it."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Crusty Hannah teaches Elsie curious needlework, etc."

Note 3. These two children are described as follows in an early note of the author's: "The boy had all the qualities fitted to excite tenderness in those who had the care of him; in the first and most evident place, on account of his personal beauty, which was very remarkable,—the most intelligent and expressive face that can be conceived, changing in those early years like an April day, and beautiful in all its changes; dark, but of a soft expression, kindling, melting, glowing, laughing; a varied intelligence, which it was as good as a book to read. He was quick in all modes of mental exercise; quick and strong, too, in sensibility; proud, and gifted (probably by the circumstances in which he was placed) with an energy which the softness and impressibility of his nature needed.—As for the little girl, all the squalor of the abode served but to set off her lightsomeness and brightsomeness. She was a pale, large-eyed little thing, and it might have been supposed that the air of the house and the contiguity of the burial-place had a bad effect upon her health. Yet I hardly think this could have been the case, for she was of a very airy nature, dancing and sporting through the house as if melancholy had never been made. She took all kinds of childish liberties with the Doctor, and with his pipe, and with everything appertaining to him except his spiders and his cobwebs."—All of which goes to show that Hawthorne first conceived his characters in the mood of the "Twice-Told Tales," and then by meditation solidified them to the inimitable flesh-and-blood of "The House of the Seven Gables" and "The Blithedale Romance."



CHAPTER III.

Note 1. An English church spire, evidently the prototype of this, and concerning which the same legend is told, is mentioned in the author's "English Mote-Books."

Note 2. Leicester Hospital, in Warwick, described in "Our Old Home," is the original of this charity.

Note 3. Author's note.—"The children find a gravestone with something like a footprint on it."

Note 4. Author's note.—"Put into the Doctor's character a continual enmity against somebody, breaking out in curses of which nobody can understand the application."



CHAPTER IV.

Note 1. The Doctor's propensity for cobwebs is amplified in the following note for an earlier and somewhat milder version of the character: "According to him, all science was to be renewed and established on a sure ground by no other means than cobwebs. The cobweb was the magic clue by which mankind was to be rescued from all its errors, and guided safely back to the right. And so he cherished spiders above all things, and kept them spinning, spinning away; the only textile factory that existed at that epoch in New England. He distinguished the production of each of his ugly friends, and assigned peculiar qualities to each; and he had been for years engaged in writing a work on this new discovery, in reference to which he had already compiled a great deal of folio manuscript, and had unguessed at resources still to come. With this suggestive subject he interwove all imaginable learning, collected from his own library, rich in works that few others had read, and from that of his beloved University, crabbed with Greek, rich with Latin, drawing into itself, like a whirlpool, all that men had thought hitherto, and combining them anew in such a way that it had all the charm of a racy originality. Then he had projects for the cultivation of cobwebs, to which end, in the good Doctor's opinion, it seemed desirable to devote a certain part of the national income; and not content with this, all public-spirited citizens would probably be induced to devote as much of their time and means as they could to the same end. According to him, there was no such beautiful festoon and drapery for the halls of princes as the spinning of this heretofore despised and hated insect; and by due encouragement it might be hoped that they would flourish, and hang and dangle and wave triumphant in the breeze, to an extent as yet generally undreamed of. And he lamented much the destruction that has heretofore been wrought upon this precious fabric by the housemaid's broom, and insisted upon by foolish women who claimed to be good housewives. Indeed, it was the general opinion that the Doctor's celibacy was in great measure due to the impossibility of finding a woman who would pledge herself to co- operate with him in this great ambition of his life,—that of reducing the world to a cobweb factory; or who would bind herself to let her own drawing-room be ornamented with this kind of tapestry. But there never was a wife precisely fitted for our friend the Doctor, unless it had been Arachne herself, to whom, if she could again have been restored to her female shape, he would doubtless have lost no time in paying his addresses. It was doubtless the having dwelt too long among the musty and dusty clutter and litter of things gone by, that made the Doctor almost a monomaniac on this subject. There were cobwebs in his own brain, and so he saw nothing valuable but cobwebs in the world around him; and deemed that the march of created things, up to this time, had been calculated by foreknowledge to produce them."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Ned must learn something of the characteristics of the Catechism, and simple cottage devotion."



CHAPTER V.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Make the following scene emblematic of the world's treatment of a dissenter."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Yankee characteristics should be shown in the schoolmaster's manners."



CHAPTER VI.

Note 1. Author's note.—"He had a sort of horror of violence, and of the strangeness that it should be done to him; this affected him more than the blow."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Jokes occasionally about the schoolmaster's thinness and lightness,—how he might suspend himself from the spider's web and swing, etc."

Note 3. Author's note.—"The Doctor and the Schoolmaster should have much talk about England."

Note 4. Author's note.—"The children were at play in the churchyard."

Note 5. Author's note.—"He mentions that he was probably buried in the churchyard there."



CHAPTER VII.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Perhaps put this narratively, not as spoken."

Note 2. Author's note.—"He was privately married to the heiress, if she were an heiress. They meant to kill him in the wood, but, by contrivance, he was kidnapped."

Note 3. Author's note.—"They were privately married."

Note 4. Author's note.—"Old descriptive letters, referring to localities as they existed."

Note 5. Author's note.—"There should be symbols and tokens, hinting at the schoolmaster's disappearance, from the first opening of the scene."



CHAPTER VIII.

Note 1. Author's note.—"They had got up in remarkably good case that morning."

Note 2. Author's note.—"The stranger may be the future master of the Hospital.—Describe the winter day."

Note 3. Author's note.—"Describe him as clerical."

Note 4. Author's note.—"Represent him as a refined, agreeable, genial young man, of frank, kindly, gentlemanly manners."

Note 5. Alternative reading: "A clergyman."



CHAPTER IX.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Make the old grave-digger a laudator temporis acti,—especially as to burial customs."

Note 2. Instead of "written," as in the text, the author probably meant to write "read."

Note 3. The MS. has "delight," but "a light" is evidently intended.

Note 4. Author's note.—"He aims a blow, perhaps with his pipe, at the boy, which Ned wards off."



CHAPTER X.

Note 1. Author's note.—"No longer could play at quarter-staff with Ned."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Referring to places and people in England: the Bloody Footstep sometimes."

Note 3. In the original the following occurs, but marked to indicate that it was to be omitted: "And kissed his hand to her, and laughed feebly; and that was the last that she or anybody, the last glimpse they had of Doctor Grimshawe alive."

Note 4. Author's notes.—"A great deal must he made out of the spiders, and their gloomy, dusky, flaunting tapestry. A web across the orifice of his inkstand every morning; everywhere, indeed, except across the snout of his brandy-bottle.—Depict the Doctor in an old dressing-gown, and a strange sort of a cap, like a wizard's.—The two children are witnesses of many strange experiments in the study; they see his moods, too.—The Doctor is supposed to be writing a work on the Natural History of Spiders. Perhaps he used them as a blind for his real project, and used to bamboozle the learned with pretending to read them passages in which great learning seemed to be elaborately worked up, crabbed with Greek and Latin, as if the topic drew into itself, like a whirlpool, all that men thought and knew; plans to cultivate cobwebs on a large scale. Sometimes, after overwhelming them with astonishment in this way, he would burst into one of his laughs. Schemes to make the world a cobweb-factory, etc., etc. Cobwebs in his own brain. Crusty Hannah such a mixture of persons and races as could be found only at a seaport. There was a rumor that the Doctor had murdered a former maid, for having, with housewifely instinct, swept away the cobwebs; some said that he had her skeleton in a closet. Some said that he had strangled a wife with web of the great spider."

—"Read the description of Bolton Hall, the garden, lawn, etc., Aug. 8, '53.—Bebbington church and churchyard, Aug. 29, '53.—The Doctor is able to love,—able to hate; two great and rare abilities nowadays.— Introduce two pine trees, ivy-grown, as at Lowwood Hotel, July 16, '58.—The family name might be Redclyffe.—Thatched cottage, June 22, '55.—Early introduce the mention of the cognizance of the family,—the Leopard's Head, for instance, in the first part of the romance; the Doctor may have possessed it engraved as coat of arms in a book.—The Doctor shall show Ned, perhaps, a drawing or engraving of the Hospital, with figures of the pensioners in the quadrangle, fitly dressed; and this picture and the figures shall impress themselves strongly on his memory."

The above dates and places refer to passages in the published "English Note-Books."



CHAPTER XI.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Compare it with Spenser's Cave of Despair. Put instruments of suicide there."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Once, in looking at the mansion, Redclyffe is struck by the appearance of a marble inserted into the wall, and kept clear of lichens."

Note 3. Author's note.—"Describe, in rich poetry, all shapes of deadly things."



CHAPTER XII.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Conferred their best qualities": an alternative phrase for "done their utmost."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Let the old man have a beard as part of the costume."



CHAPTER XIII.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Describe him as delirious, and the scene as adopted into his delirium."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Make the whole scene very dreamlike and feverish."

Note 3. Author's note.—"There should be a slight wildness in the patient's remark to the surgeon, which he cannot prevent, though he is conscious of it."

Note 4. Author's note.—"Notice the peculiar depth and intelligence of his eyes, on account of his pain and sickness."

Note 5. Author's note.—"Perhaps the recognition of the pensioner should not be so decided. Redclyffe thinks it is he, but thinks it as in a dream, without wonder or inquiry; and the pensioner does not quite acknowledge it."

Note 6. The following dialogue is marked to be omitted or modified in the original MS.; but it is retained here, in order that the thread of the narrative may not be broken.

Note 7. Author's note.—"The patient, as he gets better, listens to the feet of old people moving in corridors; to the ringing of a bell at stated periods; to old, tremulous voices talking in the quadrangle; etc., etc."

Note 8. At this point the modification indicated in Note 5 seems to have been made operative: and the recognition takes place in another way.



CHAPTER XIV.

Note 1. This paragraph is left incomplete in the original MS.

Note 2. The words "Rich old bindings" are interlined here, indicating, perhaps, a purpose to give a more detailed description of the library and its contents.



CHAPTER XV.

Note 1. Author's note.—"I think it shall be built of stone, however."

Note 2. This probably refers to some incident which the author intended to incorporate in the former portion of the romance, on a final revision.



CHAPTER XVI.

Note 1. Several passages, which are essentially reproductions of what had been previously treated, are omitted from this chapter. It belongs to an earlier version of the romance.



CHAPTER XVII.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Redclyffe shows how to find, under the surface of the village green, an old cross."

Note 2. Author's note.—"A circular seat around the tree."

Note 3. The reader now hears for the first time what Redclyffe recollected.



CHAPTER XVIII.

Note 1. Author's note.—"The dinner is given to the pensioners, as well as to the gentry, I think."

Note 2. Author's note.—"For example, a story of three brothers, who had a deadly quarrel among them more than two hundred years ago for the affections of a young lady, their cousin, who gave her reciprocal love to one of them, who immediately became the object of the deadly hatred of the two others. There seemed to be madness in their love; perhaps madness in the love of all three; for the result had been a plot to kidnap this unfortunate young man and convey him to America, where he was sold for a servant."



CHAPTER XIX.

Note 1. The following passage, though it seems to fit in here chronologically, is concerned with a side issue which was not followed up. The author was experimenting for a character to act as the accomplice of Lord Braithwaite at the Hall; and he makes trial of the present personage, Mountford; of an Italian priest, Father Angelo; and finally of the steward, Omskirk, who is adopted. It will be noticed that Mountford is here endowed (for the moment) with the birthright of good Doctor Hammond, the Warden. He is represented as having made the journey to America in search of the grave. This alteration being inconsistent with the true thread of the story, and being, moreover, not continued, I have placed this passage in the Appendix, instead of in the text.

Redclyffe often, in the dim weather, when the prophetic intimations of rain were too strong to allow an American to walk abroad with peace of mind, was in the habit of pacing this noble hall, and watching the process of renewal and adornment; or, which suited him still better, of enjoying its great, deep solitude when the workmen were away. Parties of visitors, curious tourists, sometimes peeped in, took a cursory glimpse at the old hall, and went away; these were the only ordinary disturbances. But, one day, a person entered, looked carelessly round the hall, as if its antiquity had no great charm to him; then he seemed to approach Redclyffe, who stood far and dim in the remote distance of the great room. The echoing of feet on the stone pavement of the hall had always an impressive sound, and turning his head towards the visitant Edward stood as if there were an expectance for him in this approach. It was a middle-aged man—rather, a man towards fifty, with an alert, capable air; a man evidently with something to do in life, and not in the habit of throwing away his moments in looking at old halls; a gentlemanly man enough, too. He approached Redclyffe without hesitation, and, lifting his hat, addressed him in a way that made Edward wonder whether he could be an Englishman. If so, he must have known that Edward was an American, and have been trying to adapt his manners to those of a democratic freedom.

"Mr. Redclyffe, I believe," said he.

Redclyffe bowed, with the stiff caution of an Englishman; for, with American mobility, he had learned to be stiff.

"I think I have had the pleasure of knowing—at least of meeting—you very long ago," said the gentleman. "But I see you do not recollect me."

Redclyffe confessed that the stranger had the advantage of him in his recollection of a previous acquaintance.

"No wonder," said the other, "for, as I have already hinted, it was many years ago."

"In my own country then, of course," said Redclyffe.

"In your own country certainly," said the stranger, "and when it would have required a penetrating eye to see the distinguished Mr. Redclyffe. the representative of American democracy abroad, in the little pale- faced, intelligent boy, dwelling with an old humorist in the corner of a graveyard."

At these words Redclyffe sent back his recollections, and, though doubtfully, began to be aware that this must needs be the young Englishman who had come to his guardian on such a singular errand as to search an old grave. It must be he, for it could be nobody else; and, in truth, he had a sense of his identity,—which, however, did not express itself by anything that he could confidently remember in his looks, manner, or voice,—yet, if anything, it was most in the voice. But the image which, on searching, he found in his mind of a fresh- colored young Englishman, with light hair and a frank, pleasant face, was terribly realized for the worse in this somewhat heavy figure, and coarser face, and heavier eye. In fact, there is a terrible difference between the mature Englishman and the young man who is not yet quite out of his blossom. His hair, too, was getting streaked and sprinkled with gray; and, in short, there were evident marks of his having worked, and succeeded, and failed, and eaten and drunk, and being made largely of beef, ale, port, and sherry, and all the solidities of English life.

"I remember you now," said Redclyffe, extending his hand frankly; and yet Mountford took it in so cold a way that he was immediately sorry that he had done it, and called up an extra portion of reserve to freeze the rest of the interview. He continued, coolly enough, "I remember you, and something of your American errand,—which, indeed, has frequently been in my mind since. I hope you found the results of your voyage, in the way of discovery, sufficiently successful to justify so much trouble."

"You will remember," said Mountford, "that the grave proved quite unproductive. Yes, you will not have forgotten it; for I well recollect how eagerly you listened, with that queer little girl, to my talk with the old governor, and how disappointed you seemed when you found that the grave was not to be opened. And yet, it is very odd. I failed in that mission; and yet there are circumstances that have led me to think that I ought to have succeeded better,—that some other person has really succeeded better."

Redclyffe was silent; but he remembered the strange old silver key, and how he had kept it secret, and the doubts that had troubled his mind then and long afterwards, whether he ought not to have found means to convey it to the stranger, and ask whether that was what he sought. And now here was that same doubt and question coming up again, and he found himself quite as little able to solve it as he had been twenty years ago. Indeed, with the views that had come up since, it behooved him to be cautious, until he knew both the man and the circumstances.

"You are probably aware," continued Mountford,—"for I understand you have been some time in this neighborhood,—that there is a pretended claim, a contesting claim, to the present possession of the estate of Braithwaite, and a long dormant title. Possibly—who knows?—you yourself might have a claim to one or the other. Would not that be a singular coincidence? Have you ever had the curiosity to investigate your parentage with a view to this point?"

"The title," replied Redclyffe, "ought not to be a very strong consideration with an American. One of us would be ashamed, I verily believe, to assume any distinction, except such as may be supposed to indicate personal, not hereditary merit. We have in some measure, I think, lost the feeling of the past, and even of the future, as regards our own lines of descent; and even as to wealth, it seems to me that the idea of heaping up a pile of gold, or accumulating a broad estate for our children and remoter descendants, is dying out. We wish to enjoy the fulness of our success in life ourselves, and leave to those who descend from us the task of providing for themselves. This tendency is seen in our lavish expenditure, and the whole arrangement of our lives; and it is slowly—yet not very slowly, either—effecting a change in the whole economy of American life."

"Still," rejoined Mr. Mountford, with a smile that Redclyffe fancied was dark and subtle, "still, I should imagine that even an American might recall so much of hereditary prejudice as to be sensible of some earthly advantages in the possession of an ancient title and hereditary estate like this. Personal distinction may suit you better,—to be an Ambassador by your own talent; to have a future for yourself, involving the possibility of ranking (though it were only for four years) among the acknowledged sovereigns of the earth;—this is very good. But if the silver key would open the shut up secret to-day, it might be possible that you would relinquish these advantages."

Before Redclyffe could reply, (and, indeed, there seemed to be an allusion at the close of Mountford's speech which, whether intended or not, he knew not how to reply to,) a young lady entered the hall, whom he was at no loss, by the colored light of a painted window that fell upon her, translating her out of the common daylight, to recognize as the relative of the pensioner. She seemed to have come to give her fanciful superintendence to some of the decorations of the hall; such as required woman's taste, rather than the sturdy English judgment and antiquarian knowledge of the Warden. Slowly following after her came the pensioner himself, leaning on his staff and looking up at the old roof and around him with a benign composure, and himself a fitting figure by his antique and venerable appearance to walk in that old hall.

"Ah!" said Mountford, to Redclyffe's surprise, "here is an acquaintance—two acquaintances of mine."

He moved along the hall to accost them; and as he appeared to expect that Redclyffe would still keep him company, and as the latter had no reason for not doing so, they both advanced to the pensioner, who was now leaning on the young woman's arm. The incident, too, was not unacceptable to the American, as promising to bring him into a more available relation with her—whom he half fancied to be his old American acquaintance—than he had yet succeeded in obtaining.

"Well, my old friend," said Mountford, after bowing with a certain measured respect to the young woman, "how wears life with you? Rather, perhaps, it does not wear at all; you being so well suited to the life around you, you grow by it like a lichen on a wall. I could fancy now that you have walked here for three hundred years, and remember when King James of blessed memory was entertained in this hall, and could marshal out all the ceremonies just as they were then."

"An old man," said the pensioner, quietly, "grows dreamy as he wanes away; and I, too, am sometimes at a loss to know whether I am living in the past or the present, or whereabouts in time I am,—or whether there is any time at all. But I should think it hardly worth while to call up one of my shifting dreams more than another."

"I confess," said Redclyffe, "I shall find it impossible to call up this scene—any of these scenes—hereafter, without the venerable figure of this, whom I may truly call my benefactor, among them. I fancy him among them from the foundation,—young then, but keeping just the equal step with their age and decay,—and still doing good and hospitable deeds to those who need them."

The old man seemed not to like to hear these remarks and expressions of gratitude from Mountford and the American; at any rate, he moved away with his slow and light motion of infirmity, but then came uneasily back, displaying a certain quiet restlessness, which Redclyffe was sympathetic enough to perceive. Not so the sturdier, more heavily moulded Englishman, who continued to direct the conversation upon the pensioner, or at least to make him a part of it, thereby bringing out more of his strange characteristics. In truth, it is not quite easy for an Englishman to know how to adapt himself to the line feelings of those below him in point of station, whatever gentlemanly deference he may have for his equals or superiors.

"I should like now, father pensioner," said he, "to know how many steps you may have taken in life before your path led into this hole, and whence your course started."

"Do not let him speak thus to the old man," said the young woman, in a low, earnest tone, to Redclyffe. He was surprised and startled; it seemed like a voice that has spoken to his boyhood.

Note 2. Author's note.—"Redclyffe's place is next to that of the proprietor at table."

Note 3. Author's note.—"Dwell upon the antique liveried servants somewhat."

Note 4. Author's note.—"The rose-water must precede the toasts."

Note 5. Author's note.—"The jollity of the Warden at the feast to be noticed; and afterwards explain that he had drunk nothing."

Note 6. Author's note.—"Mention the old silver snuffbox which I saw at the Liverpool Mayor's dinner."



CHAPTER XX.

Note 1. This is not the version of the story as indicated in the earlier portion of the romance. It is there implied that Elsie is the Doctor's granddaughter, her mother having been the Doctor's daughter, who was ruined by the then possessor of the Braithwaite estates, and who died in consequence. That the Doctor's scheme of revenge was far deeper and more terrible than simply to oust the family from its possessions, will appear further on.

Note 2. The foregoing passage was evidently experimental, and the author expresses his estimate of its value in the following words, —"What unimaginable nonsense!" He then goes on to make the following memoranda as to the plot. It should be remembered, however, that all this part of the romance was written before the American part.

"Half of a secret is preserved in England; that is to say, in the particular part of the mansion in which an old coffer is hidden; the other part is carried to America. One key of an elaborate lock is retained in England, among some old curiosities of forgotten purpose; the other is the silver key that Redclyffe found beside the grave. A treasure of gold is what they expect; they find a treasure of golden locks. This lady, the beloved of the Bloody Footstep, had been murdered and hidden in the coffer on account of jealousy. Elsie must know the baselessness of Redclyffe's claims, and be loath to tell him, because she sees that he is so much interested in them. She has a paper of the old Doctor's revealing the whole plot,—a death-bed confession; Redclyffe having been absent at the time."

The reader will recollect that this latter suggestion was not adopted: there was no death-bed confession. As regards the coffer full of golden locks, it was suggested by an incident recorded in the "English Note- Books," 1854. "The grandmother of Mrs. O'Sullivan died fifty years ago, at the age of twenty-eight. She had great personal charms, and among them a head of beautiful chestnut hair. After her burial in a family tomb, the coffin of one of her children was laid on her own, so that the lid seems to have decayed, or been broken from this cause; at any rate, this was the case when the tomb was opened, about a year ago. The grandmother's coffin was then found to be filled with beautiful, glossy, living chestnut ringlets, into which her whole substance seems to have been transformed, for there was nothing else but these shining curls, the growth of half a century, in the tomb. An old man, with a ringlet of his youthful mistress treasured in his heart, might be supposed to witness this wonderful thing."



CHAPTER XXIII.

Note 1. In a study of the plot, too long to insert here, this new character of the steward is introduced and described. It must suffice to say, in this place, that he was intimately connected with Dr. Grimshawe, who had resuscitated him after he had been hanged, and had thus gained his gratitude and secured his implicit obedience to his wishes, even twenty years after his (Grimshawe's) death. The use the Doctor made of him was to establish him in Braithwaite Hall as the perpetual confidential servant of the owners thereof. Of course, the latter are not aware that the steward is acting in Grimshawe's interest, and therefore in deadly opposition to their own. Precisely what the steward's mission in life was, will appear here-after.

The study above alluded to, with others, amounting to about a hundred pages, will be published as a supplement to a future edition of this work.



CHAPTER XXIV.

Note 1. Author's note.—"Redclyffe lies in a dreamy state, thinking fantastically, as if he were one of the seven sleepers. He does not yet open his eyes, but lies there in a maze."

Note 2. Author's note.—"Redclyffe must look at the old man quietly and dreamily, and without surprise, for a long while."

Note 3. Presumably the true name of Doctor Grimshawe.

Note 4. This mysterious prisoner, Sir Edward Redclyffe, is not, of course, the Sir Edward who founded the Hospital, but a descendant of that man, who ruined Doctor Grimshawe's daughter, and is the father of Elsie. He had been confined in this chamber, by the Doctor's contrivance, ever since, Omskirk being his jailer, as is foreshadowed in Chapter XL He has been kept in the belief that he killed Grimshawe, in a struggle that took place between them; and that his confinement in the secret chamber is voluntary on his own part,—a measure of precaution to prevent arrest and execution for murder. In this miserable delusion he has cowered there for five and thirty years. This, and various other dusky points, are partly elucidated in the notes hereafter to be appended to this volume.



CHAPTER XXV.

Note 1. At this point, the author, for what reason I will not venture to surmise, chooses to append this gloss: "Bubble-and-Squeak!"

Note 2. Author's note.—"They found him in the hall, about to go out."

Note 3. Elsie appears to have joined the party.

THE END