Cruel As The Grave Part 12

"Oh! more blackness!" shivered Rosa.

"But it is a beautiful cascade! All beautiful things are not necessarily light, you know."

"No, indeed," answered Rosa, "for the most beautiful woman I have ever seen in my life is very dark." And she raised and pressed the hand of her hostess, to give point to her words.

Sybil did not like the implied flattery, delicately as it was conveyed.

She drew her hand away; and then, to heal the little hurt she might have made in doing so, she opened the window and said, pleasantly:

"Look, Mrs. Blondelle! You see the lights of our home now."

Rosa leaned across Sybil to look in the direction indicated, and she saw scattered lights that seemed to be set in the side of the mountain. She saw no house, and she said so.

"That is because the house is built of the very same dark iron-gray rocks that form the mountain; and being immediately at the foot of the mountain, and closely surrounded with trees, can not at night be distinguished from the mountain itself."

Here the carriage road curved around an expansion of the river that might have been taken either for a very small lake, or a very large pond. And about midway of this curve, or semi-circle, the carriage drew up.

On the left-hand was dimly seen the lake; on the right-hand the gate letting into the elm-tree avenue that led straight up to the house.

"That is the Black Pond, and there is Black Hall. More 'blackness,' Mrs.

Blondelle," smiled Sybil, who was so delighted to get home that she forgot her jealousy.

The carriage waited only until the gates could be opened by the slow old porter, whom Sybil laughingly greeted as "Cerberus," although the name given him in baptism was that of the keeper of the keys of heaven, and not that of the guardian of the entrance to the other place.

"Cerberus," or rather Peter, warmly welcomed his young mistress back, and widely stretched the gates for her carriage to pa.s.s.

As the carriage rolled easily along the avenue, now thickly carpeted with forest leaves, and as it approached the house, the fine old building, with its many gable ends and curiously twisted chimneys, its steep roofs and latticed windows--all monuments of the old colonial days--came more and more distinctly into view from its background of mountains. Lights were gleaming from upper and lower and all sorts of windows, and the whole aspect of the grand old hospitable mansion proclaimed, "WELCOME."

CHAPTER IX.

THE GUEST-CHAMBERS.

Deserted rooms of luxury and state, Which old magnificence had rudely furnished With pictures, cabinets of ancient date, And carvings, gilt and burnished,--HOOD.

The carriage drew up at the foot of a flight of stone steps, leading to the front entrance of the house. The double oak doors stood wide open, showing the lighted hall and a group of people waiting.

Sybil looked eagerly from the carriage window.

"I do declare," she exclaimed, "if there is not, not only Miss Tabby, but Miss Libby and Mrs. Winterose besides; Mrs. Winterose," she explained, turning to her guest, "is the widow of our late land steward.

She is also my foster-mother, and the mother of the two maiden ladies, Miss Tabby, who is our housekeeper, and Miss Libby, who lives with the widowed parent at home. They have come to welcome us back. Heaven bless them!"

As Sybil spoke, Mr. Berners dropped down from his perch on the coachman's box, and opened the carriage door.

He a.s.sisted first his wife, and then their guest, to alight. And then he took the sleeping child from the nurse's arms, while she herself got out.

"You know the way, dearest Sybil! Run on before, and I will take charge of our fair friend," said Mr. Berners, as he gave his arm to Mrs.

Blondelle to lead her up the steps.

But Sybil had not waited for this permission. Too eager to meet the dear old friends of her childhood to care for any one else just then, or even to feel a twinge of jealousy at the words and actions of her husband, she flew past him up the stairs and into the arms of her foster-mother, who folded the beautiful, impetuous creature to her bosom, and welcomed her home with heartfelt emotion.

Miss Tabby and Miss Libby next took their turns to be embraced and kissed.

And then the old servants crowded around to welcome their beloved young mistress; to every one of them she gave a cordial grasp of her hand, and loving words.

"It is very delightful," she said, with tears of joy in her eyes, "it is very, very delightful to be so warmly welcomed home."

"Everything as well as everybody welcomes you home, Miss Sybil! Even the Black Torrent! I never heard the cascade sing so loud and merry as it does to-night!" said Old Abe, or Father Abraham, as he was called, for being a full centenarian, and the oldest negro, by twenty years, of any on the estate.

"Thank you, dear old Uncle Abe! I _know_ you all welcome me home! And I love to think that my torrent does too! And now, Miss Tabby, you got the letter I wrote from Underhill, asking you to have the spare rooms prepared for the visitors we were to bring with us?" inquired Sybil, turning to her housekeeper.

"Yes, ma'am, and your orders is obeyed, and the rooms is all ready, as well as yourn and Mr. Berners', even to the kindling of the fires, which has been burning in the chimneys to air them rooms all this blessed day," answered Miss Tabby.

"That is right, and I thank you; and now here comes our visitor," said Sybil, as her guest approached leaning on her husband's arm. They had certainly lingered a little on the way; but Sybil was too happy to notice that circ.u.mstance now. The jealous wife was for the time subdued within her, and all the hospitable hostess was in the ascendant.

"You are welcome to Black Hall, my dear Mrs. Blondelle," she said, advancing to receive her guest. "And now, will you walk into our sitting parlor and rest awhile before taking off your wraps; or shall I show you at once to your rooms, which are quite ready for you?"

"At once to my rooms, if you please, Mrs. Berners; for, you see, my poor little Cromartie is already fast asleep."

"Come, then; you will not have far to go. It is on this floor," said Sybil, with a smile, as she led the way down the wide hall, past the great staircase, and then turned to the right and went down a long pa.s.sage, until she came to a door, which she opened.

"Here is your bed-chamber," said Sybil, inviting her guest to enter a large and richly furnished room; "and beyond this, and connected with it, is another and a smaller apartment, which is properly the dressing-room, but which I have had fitted up as a nursery for your child and his nurse."

"Many thanks," replied Rosa Blondelle, as she followed her hostess into the room, and glanced around with the natural curiosity we all feel in entering a strange place.

The room was very s.p.a.cious, and had many doors and windows. Its furniture was all green, which would have seemed rather gloomy, but for the bright wood fire on the hearth, that lighted up all the scene with cheerfulness.

Sybil drew an easy-chair to the chimney corner, and invited her guest to sit down.

But Rosa was too curious about her surroundings to yield herself immediately to rest.

"What an interesting old place!" she said, walking about the chamber and examining every thing.

Meanwhile the nurse-maid, more practical than her mistress, had found the door of the adjoining nursery and pa.s.sed into it to put her infant charge to bed.

"Oh!" exclaimed Rosa, who had drawn aside one of the green moreen window curtains and was looking out--"Oh! what a wild, beautiful place! But these windows open right upon the grounds, and there are no outside shutters! Is there no danger?"

"No danger whatever, my dear Mrs. Blondelle. These windows open at the back of the house, upon the grounds, which run quite back to the foot of the mountain. These grounds are _very_ private, being quite inaccessible, except through the front grounds of the house," said Sybil, soothingly.

"But oh!" whispered Mrs. Blondelle, nowise tranquilized by the answer of her hostess--"Oh! what are those white things that I see standing among the bushes at the foot of the mountain? They look like--tombstones!" she added, with a shudder.

"They _are_ tombstones," replied Sybil in a low, grave voice; "that is our family burial-ground, and all the Berners, for seven generations, lie buried there."

"Oh, good gracious!" gasped Rosa Blondelle, dropping the curtain and turning away.