Cruel As The Grave Part 38

He successfully accomplished the difficult task of taking both horses over the river to the opposite bank, where he turned them loose.

Next with a strong pocket jack-knife he cut a leaping pole from a sapling near, and went still farther up the stream to the rapids, where, by a skilful use of his pole and dexterous leaping from rock to rock, he was enabled to recross the river almost dry-shod.

He rejoined Sybil, whom he found just where he had left her.

She was sitting on a piece of rock, with her head bowed upon her hands.

"Have I been gone long? Were you anxious or lonely, dearest?" he inquired, as he gave her his hand to a.s.sist her in rising.

"Oh, no! I take no note of time! But oh! Lyon, _when shall I wake?_" she exclaimed in wild despair.

"What is it you say, dear Sybil?" he gently asked.

"When shall I wake--wake from this ghastly nightmare, in which I seem to myself to be a fugitive from justice! an exile from my home! a houseless, hunted stranger in the land! It _is_ a nightmare! It can _not_ be real, you know! Oh, that I could wake!"

"Dear Sybil, collect your faculties. Do not let despair drive you to distraction. Be mistress of yourself in this trying situation," said Lyon Berners, gravely.

"But oh, Heaven! the crushing weight and stunning suddenness of this blow! It is like death! like perdition!" exclaimed Sybil, pressing her hands to her head.

Lyon Berners could only gaze on her with infinite compa.s.sion, expressed in every lineament of his eloquent countenance.

She observed this, and quickly, with a great effort, from a strong resolution, throwing her hands apart like one who disperses a cloud, and casts off a weight, she said:

"It is over! I will not be nervous or hysterical again. I have brought trouble on you as well as on myself, dear Lyon; but I will show you that I can bear it. I will look this calamity firmly in the face, and come what may, I will not drag you down by sinking under it."

And so saying, she gave him her hand, and arose and followed him as he pushed on before, breaking down or bearing aside the branches that overhung and obstructed the path.

Half an hour of this difficult and tedious travelling brought them down into a deep dark dell, in the midst of which stood the "Haunted Chapel."

It was an old colonial church, a monument of the earliest settlement in the valley. It was now a wild and beautiful ruin, with its surroundings all glowing with color and sparkling with light. In itself it was a small Gothic edifice, built of the dark iron-grey rock dug from the mountain quarries. Its walls, window-frames, and roof were all still standing, and were almost entirely covered by creepers, among which the wild rose vine, now full of scarlet berries, was conspicuous.

A broken stonewall overgrown with brambles enclosed the old church-yard, where a few fallen and mouldering gravestones, half sunk among the dead leaves, still remained.

All around the church, on the bottom of the dell, and up the sides of the steeps, were thickly cl.u.s.tered forest-trees, now glowing refulgent in their gorgeous autumn livery of crimson and gold, scarlet and purple.

A little rill, an offspring of the Black Torrent, tumbled down the side of the mountain behind the church, and ran frolicking irreverently through the old graveyard. The great cascade was out of sight, though very near for its thunder filled the air.

"See," said Sybil, pointing to the little singing rill; "Nature is unsympathetic. She can laugh and frolic over the dead, and, besides, the suffering."

"It would seem, then, that Nature is wiser as well as gladder than we are; since she, who is transitory, rejoices while we, who are immortal, pine," answered Lyon Berners, pleased that any thought should win her from the contemplation of her misfortune.

He then led the way into the old ruined church through the door frames, from which the doors had long been lost. The stone floor, and the stone altar still remained; all else within the building was gone.

Lyon Berners looked all around, up and down the interior, from the arched ceiling to the side-walls with their window s.p.a.ces and the flagstone floor with its mouldy seams. The wild creeping vines nearly filled the window s.p.a.ces, and shaded the interior more beautifully than carved shutters, velvet curtains, or even stained gla.s.s could have done.

The flagstone floor was strewn with fallen leaves that had drifted in.

Up and down, in every nook and corner of the roof and windows, last year's empty birds nests perched. And here and there along the walls, the humble "mason's" little clay house stuck.

But there seemed no resting place for the weary travellers, until Sybil, with a serious smile, went up to the altar and sank upon the lowest step, and beckoned Lyon to join her, saying:

"At the foot of the altar, dear Lyon, there was sanctuary in the olden times. We seem to realize the idea now."

"You are cold. Your clothes are all damp. Stop! I must try to raise a fire. But you, in the meantime, must walk briskly up and down, to keep from being chilled to death," answered Lyon Berners very practically, as he proceeded to gather dry leaves and twigs that had drifted into the interior of the old church.

He piled them up in the centre of the floor, just under the break in the roof, and then he went out and gathered sticks and brushwood, and built up a little mound. Lastly he took a box of matches from his pocket and struck a light, and kindled the fire.

The dried leaves and twigs crackled and blazed, and the smoke ascended in a straight column to the hole in the roof through which it escaped.

"Come, dear Sybil, and walk around the fire until your clothes are dry, and then sit down by it. This fire, with its smoke ascending and escaping through that aperture, is just such a fire as our forefathers in the old, old times enjoyed, as the best thing of the kind they knew anything about. Kings had no better," said Lyon Berners, cheerfully.

Sybil approached the fire, but instead of walking around it, she sat down on the flagstones before it. She looked very weary, thoroughly prostrated in body, soul, and spirit.

"What are we waiting for, in this horrible pause?" she inquired at length.

"We are waiting for Pendleton. He is to bring us news, as soon as he can slip away and steal to us without fear of detection," answered Lyon Berners.

"Oh, Heaven! what words have crept into our conversation about ourselves and friends too! 'Steal,' 'fear,' 'detection!' Oh, Lyon!--But there, I will say no more. I will _not_ revert to the horror and degradation of this position again, if I can help it," groaned Sybil.

"My wife, you are very faint. Try to take some nourishment," urged Lyon, as he began to open the small parcel of refreshments thoughtfully provided by Captain Pendleton.

"No, no, I cannot swallow a morsel. My throat is parched and constricted," she answered.

"If I only had a little coffee for you," said Lyon.

"If we only had liberty to go home again," sighed Sybil, "then we should have all things. But there; indeed I will not backslide into weak complaints again," she added, compunctuously.

"Modify your grief, dear Sybil, but do not attempt entirely to suppress it. Nature is not to be so restrained," said Lyon Berners, kindly.

There was silence between them for a little while, during which Sybil still sat down upon the flagstones, with her elbows resting on her knees, and her head bowed upon the palms of her hands; and Lyon stood up near her with an att.i.tude and expression of grave and sad reflection and self-control.

At length Sybil spoke:

"Oh, Lyon! who could have murdered that poor woman, and brought us into such a horrible position?"

"My theory of the tragedy is this, dear Sybil: that some robber, during the confusion of the fancy ball, found an opportunity of entering and concealing himself in Mrs. Blondelle's room; that his first purpose might have been simple robbery, but that, being discovered by Mrs.

Blondelle, and being alarmed lest her shrieks should bring the house upon him and occasion his capture, he impulsively sought to stop her cries by death; and then that, hearing your swift approach down the stairs leading into her room, he made his escape through the window."

"But then the windows were all found, as they had been left, fastened,"

objected Sybil.

"But, dearest, you must remember that these windows, having spring bolts, may be fastened by being pushed to from the outside. It is quite possible for a robber, escaping through them, to close them in this manner to conceal his flight."

"That must have been the case in this instance. Everybody must see now that that was the manner in which the miscreant escaped. Oh, Lyon! I think we were wrong to have left home."

"No, dear Sybil, we were not. Our only hope is in the discovery of the real murderer, and that may be a work of time; meanwhile we wish to be free, even at the price of being called fugitives from justice."

"Lyon, that poor child! If we ever go home again, we must adopt and educate him."

"We will do so, Sybil."