The Haunted Chamber - Margaret Wolfe Hungerford (latest books to read .TXT) 📗

sweetly, tears standing in her bright blue eyes. She presses his hand warmly, and even raises it to her lips in a transport of emotion. Standing there in the pretty pink dressing-gown that shows off her complexion to perfection, Dora Talbot looks lovely.

"You are very good--very kind," returns Sir Adrian, really touched by her concern, but still with eyes only for the white vision in the door-way; "but you make too much of nothing. I am only sorry I have been the unhappy cause of rousing you from your rosy dreams; you will not thank me to-morrow when there will be only lilies in your cheeks."

The word lily brings back to him his last interview with Florence. He glances hurriedly at her right hand; yes, the same lily is clasped in her fingers. Has she sat ever since with his gift before her, in her silent chamber? Alone--in grief perhaps. But why has she kept his flower? What can it all mean?

"We shall mind nothing, now you are safe," Dora assures him tremulously.

"I think I might be shown some consideration," puts in Arthur, trying by a violent effort to assert himself, and to speak lightly. "Had anything happened, surely I should have been the one to be pitied. It would have been my fault, and, Mrs. Talbot, I think you might show some pity for me." He holds out his hand, and mechanically Dora lays her own in it.

But it is only for an instant, and she shudders violently as his touch meets hers. Her eyes are on the ground, and she can not bring herself to look at him. Drawing her fingers hurriedly from his, she goes to the door and disappears from view.

In the meantime, Sir Adrian, having made his way to Florence, points to the lily.

"You have held it ever since?" he asks, in a low tone. "I hardly hoped for so much. But you have not congratulated me, you alone have said nothing."

"Why need I speak? I have seen you with my own eyes. You are safe. Believe me, Sir Adrian, I congratulate you most sincerely upon your escape."

Her words are cold, her eyes downcast. She is deeply annoyed with herself for having carried the lily into his presence here. The very fact of his having noticed it and spoken to her about it has shown her how much importance he has attached to her doing so. What will he think of her. He will doubtless picture her to himself sitting weeping and brooding over a flower given to her by a man who loves her not, and to whom she has given her love unsolicited.

Her marked coldness so oppresses him that he steps back, and does not venture to address her again. It occurs to him that she is reserved because of Arthur's presence.

Presently, Lady FitzAlmont, marshaling her forces anew, carries them all away to their rooms, soundly rating the sobbing Lady Gertrude for her want of self-control.

The men too, shortly afterward disperse, and one by one drift away to their rooms. Captain Ringwood and Maitland the surgeon being the last to go.

"Who is the next heir to the castle?" asks the latter musingly, drumming his fingers idly on a table near him.

"Dynecourt, the fellow who nearly did for Sir Adrian this evening!" replies Ringwood quietly.

"Ah!"

"It would have meant a very good thing for Arthur if the shot had taken effect," says Ringwood, eying his companion curiously.

"It would have meant murder, sir!" rejoins the surgeon shortly.


CHAPTER VI.

"Dear Sir Adrian," says Dora Talbot, laying down her bat upon a garden-chair, and forsaking the game of tennis then proceeding to go forward and greet her host, "where have you been? We have missed you so much. Florence"--turning to her cousin--"will you take my bat, dearest? I am quite tired of trying to defeat Lord Lisle."

Lord Lisle, a middle-aged gentleman of sunburned appearance, looks unmistakably delighted at the prospect of a change in the game. He is married; has a large family of promising young Lisles, and a fervent passion for tennis. Mrs. Talbot having proved a very contemptible adversary, he is charmed at this chance of getting rid of her.

So Florence, _vice_ Dora retired, joins the game, and the play continues with unabated vigor. When however Lord Lisle has scored a grand victory, and all the players declare themselves thoroughly exhausted and in need of refreshment, Sir Adrian comes forward, and walks straight up to Miss Delmaine, to Dora's intense chagrin and the secret rage of Arthur Dynecourt.

"You have often asked to see the 'haunted chamber,'" he says; "why not come and visit it now? It isn't much to see, you know; but still, in a ghostly sense, it is, I suppose, interesting."

"Let us make a party and go together," suggests Dora, enthusiastically clasping her hands--her favorite method of showing false emotion of any kind. She is determined to have her part in the programme, and is equally determined that Florence shall go nowhere alone with Sir Adrian.

"What a capital idea!" puts in Arthur Dynecourt, coming up to Miss Delmaine, and specially addressing her with all the air of a rightful owner.

"Charming," murmurs a young lady standing by; and so the question is settled.

"It will be rather a fatiguing journey, you know," says Captain Ringwood, confidentially, to Ethel Villiers. "It's an awful lot of stairs; I've been there, so I know all about it--it's worse than the treadmill."

"Have you been there too?" demands Miss Ethel saucily, glancing at him from under her long lashes.

"Not yet," answers the captain, with a little grin. "But, I say, don't go--will you?"

"I must; I'm dying to see it," replies Ethel. "You needn't come, you know; I dare say I shall be able to get on without you for half an hour or so."

"I dare say you could get on uncommonly well without me forever," retorts the captain rather gloomily. To himself he confesses moodily that this girl with the auburn hair and the blue eyes has the power of taking the "curl out of him" whensoever she wishes.

"I believe you are afraid of the bogies hidden in this secret chamber, and so don't care to come," says Miss Villiers tauntingly.

"I know something else I'm a great deal more afraid of," responds the gallant captain meaningly.

"Me?" she asks innocently, but certainly coquettishly. "Oh, Captain Ringwood"--in a tone of mock injury--"what an unkind speech! Now I know you look upon me in the light of an ogress, or a witch, or something equally dreadful. Well, as I have the name of it, I may as well have the gain of it, and so--I command you to attend me to the 'haunted chamber.'"

"You order--I obey," says the captain. "'Call and I follow--I follow, though I die!'" After which quotation he accompanies her toward the house in the wake of Dora and Sir Adrian, who has been pressed by the clever widow into her service.

Florence and Arthur Dynecourt follow them, Arthur talking gayly, as though determined to ignore the fact that he is thoroughly unwelcome to his companion; Florence, with head erect and haughty footsteps and eyes carefully averted.

Past the hall, through the corridor, up the staircase, through the galleries, along more corridors they go, laughing and talking eagerly, until they come at last to an old and apparently much disused part of the house.

Traversing more corridors, upon which dust lies thickly, they come at last to a small iron-bound door that blocks the end of one passage.

"Now we really begin to get near to it," says Sir Adrian encouragingly, turning, as he always does, when opportunity offers, to address himself solely to Florence.

"Don't you feel creepy-creepy?" asks Ethel Villiers, with a smothered laugh, looking up at Captain Ringwood.

Then Sir Adrian pushes open the door, revealing a steep flight of stone steps that leads upward to another door above. This door, like the lower one, is bound with iron.

"This is the tower," explains Sir Adrian, still acting as cicerone to the small party, who look with interest around them. Mrs. Talbot, affecting nervousness, clings closely to Sir Adrian's arm. Indeed she is debating in her own mind whether it would be effective or otherwise to subside into a graceful swoon within his arms. "Yonder is the door of the chamber," continues Sir Adrian. "Come, let us go up to it."

They all ascend the last flight of stone stairs; and presently their host opens the door, and reveals to them whatever mysteries may lie beyond. He enters first, and they all follow him, but, as if suddenly recollecting some important point, he turns, and calls loudly to Captain Ringwood not to let the door shut behind him.

"There is a peculiar spring in the lock," he explains a moment later; "and, if the door slammed to, we should find it impossible to open it from the inside, and might remain here prisoners forever unless the household came to the rescue."

"Oh, Captain Ringwood, pray be careful!" cries Dora falteringly. "Our very lives depend upon your attention!"

"Miss Villiers, do come here and help me to remember my duty," says Captain Ringwood, planting his back against the open door lest by any means it should shut.

The chamber is round, and has, instead of windows, three narrow apertures in the walls, through which can be obtained a glimpse of the sky, but of nothing else. These apertures are just large enough to admit a man's hand. The room is without furniture of any description, and on the boards the dark stains of blood are distinctly visible.

"Dynecourt, tell them a story or two," calls out Ringwood to Sir Adrian. "They won't believe it is veritably haunted unless you call up a ghost to frighten them."

But they all protest in a body that they do not wish to hear any ghost stories, so Sir Adrian laughingly refuses to comply with Ringwood's request.

"Are we far from the other parts of the house?" asks Florence at length, who has been examining some writing on the walls.

"So far that, if you were immured here, no cry, however loud, could penetrate the distance," replies Sir Adrian. "You are as thoroughly removed from the habitable parts of the castle as if you were in the next county."

"How interesting!" observes Dora, with a little simper.

"The servants are so afraid of this room that they would not venture here even by daylight," Sir Adrian goes on. "You can see how the dust of years is on it. One might be slowly starved to death here without one's friends being a bit the wiser."

He laughs as he says this, but, long afterward, his words come back to his listeners' memories, filling their breasts with terror and despair.

"I wonder you don't have this dangerous lock removed," says Captain Ringwood. "It is a regular trap. Some day you'll be sorry for it."

Prophetic words!

"Yes; I wish it were removed," responds Florence, with a strange quick shiver.

Sir Adrian laughs.

"Why, that is one of the old tower's greatest charms," he says. "It belongs to the dark ages, and suggests all sorts of horrible possibilities. This room would be nothing without its mysterious lock."

At this moment Dora's eyes turn slowly toward Arthur Dynecourt. She herself hardly knows why, at this particular time, she should look at him, yet she feels that some unaccountable fascination is compelling her gaze