The Haunted Chamber by The Duchess

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He speaks with such an air of truth, of thorough belief in her guilt,
that Dora is dazed, bewildered, and, falling back from him, covers her
face with her hands. The fear of publicity, of having her late intrigue
brought into the glare of day, fills her with consternation. And then,
what will she gain by it? Nothing; she has no evidence on which to
convict this man; all is mere supposition. She bitterly feels the
weakness of her position, and her inability to follow up her accusation.

"Ah, how like a guilty creature you stand there!" exclaims Dynecourt,
regarding her bowed and trembling figure. "I see plainly that this must
be looked into. Miserable woman! If you know aught of my cousin, you had
better declare it now."

"Traitor!" cries Dora, raising her pale face and looking at him with
horror and defiance. "You triumph now, because, as yet, I have no
evidence to support my belief, but"--she hesitates.

"Ah, brazen it out to the last!" says Dynecourt insolently. "Defy me
while you can. To-day I shall set the blood-hounds of the law upon your
track, so beware--beware!"

"You refuse to tell me anything?" exclaims Dora, ignoring his words, and
treating them as though they are unheard. "So much the worse for you."

She turns from him, and leaves the room as she finishes speaking; but,
though her words have been defiant there is no kindred feeling in her
heart to bear her up.

When the door closes between them, the flush dies out of her face, and
she looks even more wan and hopeless than she did before seeking his
presence. She can not deny to herself that her mission has been a
failure. He has openly scoffed at her threats, and she is aware that she
has not a shred of actual evidence wherewith to support her suspicion;
the bravado with which he has sought to turn the tables upon herself
both frightens and disheartens her, and now she confesses to herself
that she knows not where to turn for counsel.

CHAPTER X.

In the meantime the daylight dwindles, and twilight descends. Even that
too departs, and now darkness falls upon the distressed household, and
still there is no news of Sir Adrian.

Arthur Dynecourt, who is already beginning to be treated with due
respect as the next heir to the baronetcy, has quietly hinted to old
Lady FitzAlmont that perhaps it will be as well, in the extraordinary
circumstances, if they all take their departure. This the old lady,
though strongly disinclined to quit the castle, is debating in her own
mind, and, being swayed by Lady Gertrude, who is secretly rather bored
by the dullness that has ensued on the strange absence of their host,
decides to leave on the morrow, to the great distress of both Dora and
Florence Delmaine, who shrink from deserting the castle while its
master's fate is undecided. But they are also sensible that, to remain
the only female guests, would be to outrage the conventionalities.

Henry Villiers, Ethel's father, is also of opinion that they should all
quit the castle without delay. He is a hunting man, an M.F.H. in his own
county, and is naturally anxious to get back to his own quarters some
time before the hunting-season commences. Some others have already gone,
and altogether it seems to Florence that there is no other course open
to her but to pack up and desert him, whom she loves, in the hour of his
direst need. For there are moments even now when she tells herself that
he is still living, and only waiting for a saving hand to drag him into
smooth waters once again!

A silence has fallen upon the house more melancholy than the loudest
expression of grief. The servants are conversing over their supper in
frightened whispers, and conjecturing moodily as to the fate of their
late master. To them Sir Adrian is indeed dead, if not buried.

In the servants' corridor a strange dull light is being flung upon the
polished boards by a hanging-lamp that is burning dimly, as though
oppressed by the dire evil that has fallen upon the old castle. No sound
is to be heard here in this spot, remote from the rest of the house,
where the servants seldom come except to go to bed, and never indeed
without an inward shudder as they pass the door that leads to the
haunted chamber.

Just now, being at their supper, there is no fear that any of them will
be about, and so the dimly lighted corridor is wrapped in an unbroken
silence. Not quite unbroken, however. What is this that strikes upon the
ear? What sound comes to break the unearthly stillness? A creeping
footstep, a cautious tread, a slinking, halting, uncertain motion,
belonging surely to some one who sees an enemy, a spy in every flitting
shadow. Nearer and nearer it comes now into the fuller glare of the
lamp-light, and stops short at the door so dreaded by the castle
servants.

Looking uneasily around him, Arthur Dynecourt--for it is he--unfastens
this door, and, entering hastily, closes it firmly behind him, and
ascends the staircase within. There is no halting in his footsteps now,
no uncertainty, no caution, only a haste that betokens a desire to get
his errand over as quickly as possible.

Having gained the first landing, he walks slowly and on tiptoe again,
and, creeping up the stone stairs, crouches down so as to bring his ear
on a level with the lower chink of the door.

Alas, all is still; no faintest groan can be heard! The silence of Death
is on all around. In spite of his hardihood, the cold sweat of fear
breaks out upon Dynecourt's brow; and yet he tells himself that now he
is satisfied, all is well, his victim is secure, is beyond the power of
words or kindly search to recall him to life. He may be discovered now
as soon as they like. Who can fix the fact of his death upon him? There
is no blow, no mark of violence to criminate any one. He is safe, and
all the wealth he had so coveted is at last his own!

There is something fiendish in the look of exultation that lights Arthur
Dynecourt's face. He has a small dull lantern with him, and now it
reveals the vile glance of triumph that fires his eyes. He would fain
have entered to gaze upon his victim, to assure himself of his victory,
but he refrains. A deadly fear that he may not yet be quite dead keeps
him back, and, with a frown, he prepares to descend once more.

Again he listens, but the sullen roar of the rising night wind is all
that can be heard. His hand shakes, his face assumes a livid hue, yet he
tells himself that surely this deadly silence is better than what he
listened to last night. Then a ghostly moaning, almost incessant and
unearthly in its sound, had pierced his brain. It was more like the cry
of a dying brute than that of a man. Sir Adrian slowly starved to death!
In his own mind Arthur can see him now, worn, emaciated, lost to all
likeness of anything fair or comely. Have the rats attacked him yet? As
this grewsome thought presents itself, Dynecourt rises quickly from his
crouching position, and, flying down the steps, does not stop running
until he arrives in the corridor below again.

He dashes into this like one possessed; but, finding himself in the
light of the hanging lamp, collects himself by a violent effort, and
looks around.

Yes, all is still. No living form but his is near. The corridor, as he
glances affrightedly up and down, is empty. He can see nothing but his
own shadow, at sight of which he starts and turns pale and shudders.

The next moment he recovers himself, and, muttering an anathema upon his
cowardice, he moves noiselessly toward his room and the brandy-bottle
that has been his constant companion of late.

Yet, here in his own room, he can not rest. The hours go by with laggard
steps. Midnight has struck, and still he paces his floor from wall to
wall, half-maddened by his thoughts. Not that he relents. No feelings of
repentance stir him, there is only a nervous dread of the hour when it
will be necessary to produce the dead body, if only to prove his claim
to the title so dearly and so infamously purchased.

Is he indeed dead--gone past recall? Is this house, this place, the old
title, the chance of winning the woman he would have, all his own? Is
his hated rival--hateful to him only because of his fair face and genial
manners and lovable disposition, and the esteem with which he filled the
hearts of all who knew him--actually swept out of his path?

Again the lurking morbid longing to view the body with his own eyes,
the longing that had been his some hours ago when listening at the fatal
door, seizes hold of him, and grows in intensity with every passing
moment.

At last it conquers him. Lighting a candle, he opens his door and peers
out. No one is astir. In all probability every one is abed, and now
sleeping the sleep of the just--all except him. Will there ever be any
rest or dreamless sleep for him again?

He goes softly down-stairs, and makes his way to the lower door. Meeting
no one, he ascends the stairs like one only half conscious, until he
finds himself again before the door of the haunted chamber.

Then he wakes into sudden life. An awful terror takes possession of him.
He struggles with himself, and presently so far succeeds in regaining
some degree of composure that he can lean against the wall and wipe his
forehead, and vow to himself that he will never descend until he has
accomplished the object of his visit. But the result of this terrible
fight with fear and conscience shows itself in the increasing pallor of
his brow and the cold perspiration that stands thick upon his forehead.

Nerving himself for a final effort, he lays his hand upon the door and
pushes it open. This he does with bowed head and eyes averted, afraid to
look upon his terrible work. A silence, more horrible to his guilty
conscience than the most appalling noises, follows this act; and, again
the nameless terror seizing him, he shudders and draws back, until,
finding the wall behind him, he leans against it gladly, as if for
support.

And now at last he raises his eyes. Slowly at first and cringingly, as
if dreading what they might see. Upon the board at his feet they rest
for a moment, and then glide to the next board, and so on, until his
coward eyes have covered a considerable portion of the floor.

And now, grown bolder, he lifts his gaze to the wall opposite and
searches it carefully. Then his eyes turn again to the floor. His face
ghastly, and with his eyes almost darting from their sockets, he compels
himself to bring his awful investigation to an end. Avoiding the corners
at first, as though there he expects his vile deed will cry aloud to him
demanding vengeance, he gazes in a dazed way at the center of the
apartment, and dwells upon it stupidly, until he knows he must look
further still; and then his dull eyes turn to the corners where the
dusky shadows lie, brought thither by the glare of his small lantern.
Reluctantly, but carefully, he scans the apartment, no remotest spot
escapes his roused attention. But no object, dead or living, attracts
his notice! The room is empty!

He staggers. His hold upon the door relaxes. His lamp falls to the
ground; the door closes with a soft but deadly thud behind him,
and--he is a prisoner in the haunted chamber! As the darkness closes
in upon him, and he finds himself alone with what he hardly dares to
contemplate, his senses grow confused, his brain reels; a fearful scream
issues from his lips, and he falls to the floor insensible.

CHAPTER XI.

Dora, after her interview with Arthur Dynecourt, feels indeed that all
is lost. Hope is abandoned--nothing remains but despair; and in this
instance despair gains in poignancy by the knowledge that she believes
she knows the man who could help them to a solution of their troubles if
he would or dared. No; clearly he dare not! Therefore, no assistance can
be looked for from him.

Dinner at the castle has been a promiscuous sort of entertainment for
the past three or four days, so Dora feels no compunction in declining
to go to it. In her own room she sits brooding miserably over her
inability to be of any use in the present crisis, when she suddenly
remembers that she had promised in the afternoon when with Florence to
give her, later on, an account of her effort to obtain the truth about
this mystery which is harrowing them.

It is now eleven o'clock, and Dora decides that she must see Florence
at once. Rising, wearily, she is about to cross the corridor to her
cousin's room, when, the door opening, she sees Florence, with a face
pale and agitated, coming toward her.

"You, Florence!" she exclaims. "I was just going to you, to tell you
that my hopes of this afternoon are all--"

"Let me speak," interrupts Florence breathlessly. "I must, or--" She
sinks into a chair, her eyes close, and involuntarily she lays her hand
upon her heart as if to allay its tumultuous beating.

Dora, really alarmed, rushing to her dressing-case, seizes upon a flask
of eau-de-Cologne, and flings some of its contents freely over the
fainting girl. Florence, with a sigh, rouses herself, and sits upright.

"There is no time to lose," she says confusedly. "Oh, Dora!" Here she
breaks down and bursts into tears.

"Try to compose yourself," entreats Dora, seeing the girl has some
important news to impart, but is so nervous and unstrung as to be almost
incapable of speaking with any coherence. But presently Florence grows
calmer, and then, her voice becoming clear and full, she is able to
unburden her heart.

"All this day I have been oppressed by a curious restlessness," she says
to Dora; "and, when you left me this afternoon, your vague promises of
being able to elucidate the terrible secret that is weighing us down
made me even more unsettled. I did not go down to dinner--"

"Neither did I," puts in Mrs. Talbot sympathetically.

"I wandered up and down my room for at least two hours, thinking always,
and waiting for the moment when you would return, according to promise,
and tell me the success of your hidden enterprise. You did not come, and
at half past nine, unable to stay any longer in my own room with only
my own thoughts for company, I opened my door, and, listening intently,
found by the deep silence that reigned throughout the house that almost
every one was gone, if not to bed, at least to their own rooms."

"Lady FitzAlmont and Gertrude passed to their rooms about an hour
ago," says Dora. "But some of the men, I think, are still in the
smoking-room."

"I did not think of them. I stole from my room, and roamed idly
through the halls. Suddenly a great--I can not help thinking now a
supernaturally strong--desire to go into the servants' corridor took
possession of me. Without allowing myself an instant's hesitation, I
turned in its direction, and walked on until I reached it."

She pauses here, and draws her breath rapidly.

"Go on," entreats Dora impatiently.

"The lamp was burning very dimly. The servants were all down-stairs--at
their supper, I suppose--because there was no trace of them anywhere.
Not a sound could be heard. The whole place looked melancholy and
deserted, and filled me with a sense of awe I could not overcome. Still
it attracted me. I lingered there, walking up and down until its very
monotony wearied me; even then I was loath to leave it, and, turning
into a small sitting-room, I stood staring idly around me. At last,
somewhere in the distance I heard a clock strike ten, and, turning,
I decided on going back once more to my room."

Again, emotion overcoming her, Florence pauses, and leans back in her
chair.

"Well, but what is there in all this to terrify you so much?" demands
her cousin, somewhat bewildered.

"Ah, give me time! Now I am coming to it," replies Florence quickly.
"You know the large screen that stands in the corridor just outside
the sitting-room I have mentioned--put there, I imagined to break the
draught? Well, I had come out of the room and was standing half-hidden
by this screen, when I saw something that paralyzed me with fear."

She rises to her feet and grows deadly pale as she says this, as though
the sensation of fear she has been describing has come to her again.

"You saw--?" prompts Dora, rising too, and trembling violently, as
though in expectation of some fatal tidings.

"I saw the door of the room that leads to the haunted chamber slowly
move. It opened; the door that has been locked for nearly fifty years,
and that has filled the breasts of all the servants here with terror and
dismay, was cautiously thrown open! A scream rose to my lips, but I was
either too terrified to give utterance to it, or else some strong
determination to know what would follow restrained me, and I stood
silent, like one turned into stone. I had instinctively moved back a
step or two, and was now completely hidden from sight, though I could
see all that was passing in the corridor through a hole in the
framework of the screen. At last a figure came with hesitating
footsteps from behind the door into the full glare of the flickering
lamp. I could see him distinctly. It was--"

"Arthur Dynecourt!" cries the widow, covering her ghastly face with her
hands.

Florence regards her with surprise.

"It was," she says at last. "But how did you guess it?"

"I knew it," cries Dora frantically. "He has murdered him, he has hidden
his body away in that forgotten chamber. He was gloating over his
victim, no doubt, just before you saw him, stealing down from a secret
visit to the scene of his crime."

"Dora," exclaims Florence, grasping her arm, "if he should not have
murdered him after all, if he should only have secured him there,
holding him prisoner until he should see his way more clearly to getting
rid of him! If this idea be the correct one, we may yet be in time to
save, to rescue him!"

The agitation of the past hours proving now too much for her, Florence
bursts into tears and sobs wildly.

"Alas, I dare not believe in any such hope!" says Dora. "I know that man
too well to think him capable of showing any mercy."

"And yet 'that man,' as you call him, you would once have earnestly
recommended to me as a husband!" returns Florence, sternly.

"Do not reproach me now," exclaims Dora; "later on you shall say to me
all that you wish, but now moments are precious."

"You are right. Something must be done. Shall I--shall I speak to Mr.
Villiers?"

"I hardly know what to advise"--distractedly. "If we give our suspicions
publicity, Arthur Dynecourt may even yet find time and opportunity to
baffle and disappoint us. Besides which, we may be wrong. He may have
had nothing to do with it, and--"

"At that rate, if secrecy is to be our first thought, let you and me go
alone in search of Sir Adrian."

"Alone, and at this hour, to that awful room!" exclaims Dora, recoiling
from her.

"Yes, at once"--firmly--"without another moment's delay."

"Oh, I can not!" declares Dora, shuddering violently.

"Then I shall go alone!"

As Florence says this, she takes up her candlestick and moves quickly
toward the door.

"Stay, I will go," cries Dora, trembling. But a slight interruption
occurring at this instant, they are compelled to wait for awhile.

Ethel Villiers, coming into the room to make her parting adieus to
Mrs. Talbot, as she and her father intend leaving next morning, gazes
anxiously from Florence to Dora, seeing plainly that there is something
amiss.

"What is it?" she asks kindly, going up to Florence.

Miss Delmaine, after a little hesitation, encouraged by a glance at
Dora's terrified countenance, determines on taking the new-comer into
their confidence.

In a few words she explains all that has taken place, and their
suspicions. Ethel, though paling beneath the horror and surprise
occasioned by the recital, does not lose her self-possession.

"I will go with you," she volunteers. "But, let me say," she adds, "that
I think you are wrong in making this search without a man. If--if indeed
we are still in time to be of any use to poor Sir Adrian--always
supposing he really is secreted in that terrible room--I do not think
any of us would be strong enough to help him down the stairs, and, if he
has been slowly starving all this time, think how weak he will be!"

"Oh, what a wretched picture you conjure up!" exclaims Florence,
nervously clasping her hands. "But you are right, and now tell me who
you think can best be depended upon in this crisis."

"I am sure," says Ethel, blushing slightly, but speaking with intense
earnestness, "that, if you would not mind trusting Captain Ringwood, he
would be both safe and useful."

As this suggestion meets with approval, they manage to convey a message
to the captain, and in a very few minutes he is with them, and is made
acquainted with their hopes and fears.

Silently, cautiously, without any light, but carrying two small lamps
ready for ignition, they go down to the corridor where is the door that
leads to the secret staircase.

Turning the handle of this door, Captain Ringwood discovers that it is
locked, but, nothing daunted, he pulls it so violently backward and
forward that the lock, rusty with age, gives way, and leaves the passage
beyond open to them.

Going into the small landing at the foot of the staircase, they close
the door carefully behind them, and then, Captain Ringwood producing
some matches, they light the two lamps and go swiftly, with anxiously
beating hearts, up the stairs.

The second door is reached, and now nothing remains but to mount the
last flight of steps and open the fatal door.

Their hearts at this trying moment almost fail them. They look into one
another's blanched faces, and look there in vain for hope. At last
Ringwood, touching Ethel's arm, says, in a whisper--

"Come, have courage--all may yet be well!"

He moves toward the stone steps, and they follow him. Quickly mounting
them, he lays his hand upon the door, and, afraid to give them any more
time for reflection or dread of what may yet be in store for them,
throws it open.

At first the feeble light from their lamps fails to penetrate the
darkness of the gloomy apartment. At the cursory glance, such as they
at first cast round the room, it appears to be empty. Their hearts sink
within them. Have they indeed hoped in vain!

Dora is crying bitterly; Ethel, with her eyes fixed upon Ringwood, is
reading her own disappointment in his face, when suddenly a piercing cry
from Florence wakes the echoes round them.

She has darted forward, and is kneeling over something that even now is
only barely discernible to the others as they come nearer to it. It
looks like a bundle of clothes, but, as they stoop over it, they, too,
can see that it is in reality a human body, and apparently rigid in
death.

But the shriek that has sprung from the very soul of Florence has
reached some still living fibers in the brain of this forlorn creature.
Slowly and with difficulty he raises his head, and opens a pair of
fast-glazing eyes. Mechanically his glance falls upon Florence. His lips
move; a melancholy smile struggles to show itself upon his parched and
blackened lips.

"Florence," he rather sighs than says, and falls back, to all
appearance, dead.

"He is not dead!" cries Florence passionately. "He can not be! Oh, save
him, save him! Adrian, look up--speak to me! Oh, Adrian, make some sign
that you can hear me!"

But he makes no sign. His very breath seems to have left him. Gathering
him tenderly in her arms, Florence presses his worn and wasted face
against her bosom, and pushes back the hair from his forehead. He is so
completely altered, so thorough a wreck has he become, that it is indeed
only the eyes of love that could recognize him. His cheeks have fallen
in, and deep hollows show themselves. His beard has grown, and is now
rough and stubbly; his hair is uncombed, the lines of want, despair, and
cruel starvation have blotted out all the old fairness of his features.
His clothes are hanging loosely about him; his hands, limp and
nerveless, are lying by his side. Who shall tell what agony he suffered
during these past lonely days with death--an awful, creeping, gnawing
death staring him in the face?

A deadly silence has fallen upon the little group now gazing solemnly
down upon his quiet form. Florence, holding him closely to her heart, is
gently rocking him to and fro, as though she will not be dissuaded that
he still lives.

At length Captain Ringwood, stooping pitifully over her, loosens her
hold so far as to enable him to lay his hand upon Adrian's heart. After
a moment, during which they all watch him closely, he starts, and,
looking still closer into the face that a second ago he believed dead,
he says, with subdued but deep excitement--

"There may yet be time! He breathes--his heart beats! Who will help me
to carry him out of this dungeon?"

He shudders as he glances round him.

"I will," replies Florence calmly.

These words of hope have steadied her and braced her nerves. Ethel
and Mrs. Talbot, carrying the lamps, go on before, while Ringwood and
Florence, having lifted the senseless body of Adrian, now indeed
sufficiently light to be an easy burden, follow them.

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