 | CHAPTER THE FIRST.
THE MAIDEN IN HER BOWER. The Ladye Annabel, or, The doom of the poisoner |  |
ALDARIN PICTURES TO THE LADYE ANNABEL
THE GLORIES OF A LIVING-TOMB.
A lamp of alabaster, placed upon a small table
of ebony, beside which was seated the Ladye Annabel,
threw its softened beams around the apartment,
and leaving the hangings, the stately bed,
and the luxurious couches, wrapt in twilight
shadow, cast a lovelier tint upon a vase of flowers
standing upon the table, and revealed the fair
maiden's countenance and figure in soft and rosy
light.
Her flaxen tresses, unrestrained by band or
cincture, fell in a golden shower over her delicate
neck and finely-turned shoulders; and streaming
along the full and swelling bosom, but half concealed
by the boddice of white, bordered by finest
lace they flowed soft and waving down to her
very feet.
The figure of the Ladye Annabel realized an
old saying, that nature shows all her art, and lavishes
the richest of her beauties, upon her smallest
creations.
In form slight and delicate, in stature somewhat
below the usual size, the proportions of Annabel
were of the most exquisite tracery of outline; her
arms, full and softly rounded, were terminated by
hands small and white, with tapering fingers; her
feet, thin and slender, and marked by an high instep,
supported ancles as finely turned, as the
movements of the maiden were light and graceful;
the well-proportioned waist arose in lovely gradation
into the bosom of rich and budding promise;
the neck, gently arching, and graceful in every
attitude, blended sweetly into the small and half
dimpling chin, that harmonized with the face of
loveliness and soul. “Right beauteous shone those
eyes of blue,” says the chronicler of the ancient
MS., “glancing pure thoughts and light-hearted
fancies; and right lovely were those glowing
cheeks, in which the snow-white of the fair countenance
bloomed into a roseate hue; and lovely
was the small mouth of parting lips, delicious in
their maiden ripeness; and sweet, surpassing
sweet, was the expression of that face, where love
and innocence beaming from every feature, seemed
like the golden fruit of fairy land, only waiting
to be gathered.”
Her face was a poem, written by the finger of
God, in characters of youth and bloom; a poem
whose theme was ever beauty and love, speaking
its meaning through the deep glance of a shadowy
eye, sending forth its messages of sweetness from
the smile of the wreathing lip, or preaching its
lessons of thought and purity by the calm glory
of the unclouded brow.
A face lovely as a dream, when dreams are
loveliest, with an outline of youth and bloom; a
brow clear, calm, and cloudless, over-arching the
eyes of azure, whose brightness seemed unfathomable;
with full and swelling cheeks, varying the
snow-white of the maiden's countenance by the
damask of the budding rose; a small mouth, with
curving lips; a chin all roundness and dimple, receding,
with a waving outline, into the neck, all
lightness and grace; while all around, the luxuriance
of her golden hair, unbound and uncinctured,
fell sweeping and waving, with a soft, airy
motion, as though the sunbeams shimmered round
the fairy countenance of the maiden.
Alone in her bower sate the Ladye Annabel,
her lip curving with scorn while she glanced at the
letter of his grace of Florence, as it was flung
along the floor, unopened and unheeded.
Her soul was agitated by the fearful memory of
the last three days of mystery and blood, and then
came confused and wandering thoughts of the
scenes she had witnessed but an hour since, in
the cavern of the dead. Her mind was lost in a
maze of never-ending doubts, when she contemplated
the fearful death of the late Count. She
had never for an instant believed that Adrian
could be guilty of the accursed act, neither had
she dreamed that it was her father's hand that
dealt the blow. The thought would have driven
her mad.
Suddenly her thoughts were agitated by a fearful
picture. She saw Adrian stretched bleeding
and dead upon the wheel—his limbs severed and
torn, and his brow scarred by the instruments of
torture, while the doomsman's laugh rang in her
ears! As the picture grew upon her mind in all
its horrible details: the glazed eye and the writhen
lip, the chest heaving with the convulsive sobs
of death, and the throat straining with the death
rattle, the maiden covered her face with her hands,
and shrieked:
“Save me, holy Mary, save me from these fearful
fancies!”
And as she spoke, the maiden burst into a
flood of tears.
“Annabel!” whispered a voice at once deeptened
and full of affection.
She looked up, and her father, the Count Aldarin,
stood before her.
“My daughter,” he continued, drawing a seat
beside her, “how dost thou like these?”
He opened a casket which he held in his hand,
and the light of the alabaster lamp flashed upon
ornaments of gold and silver, such as might not
shame a queen to wear. There were bracelets
for the wrists, there were chains for the arching
neck, gems for the brow, pearls to be woven in
the flowing hair; and as their bright and star-like
blaze met the eye of the Ladye Annabel, she gave
utterance to a cry of delight.
“I thank thee, father, I thank thee!” she exclaimed,
as, clasping a bracelet of gold, bordered
by pearls, around her fair and well-rounded wrist,
she received it with a glance of admiration. “See,
father, see! How beauteous are those pearls,
how bright that gold, and the shape—how exquisite!
O! father, this is kind of thee! 'Tis indeed
a rich gift!”
“It is a bridal gift!” exclaimed the Count, in
a low and quiet tone, and with his eyes fixed upon
his daughter's countenance, as if to note each varying
expression of the fair and lovely features.
Annabel started as if an adder had stung her.
“A bridal gift? Said you not so? A bridal
gift? From whom is it, my father?”
“His grace, the Duke of Florence, sends thee
this rare and costly present. He sends it with
his ardent wishes for thy health. He sends these
jewels with the hope that ere three days have run
their sands, he may behold them shining on the
brow of his fair bride—the Ladye Annabel, Duchess
of Florence.”
As in a calm and determined tone he spoke
these words, a deadly paleness came over the damsel's
face; her lips dropped apart, and her fair
blue eyes distended with a vacant look, the slender
fingers of each hand slowly straightened, unclasping
their grasp of the casket, which fell
heavily to the floor, as her arms dropped listlessly
by her side.
The old man surveyed his child for an instant
with a look which told of his deep, his yearning
affection, combined with the strange fancies ruling
his destiny through life. In an instant he again
spoke, and his voice, as it came from the depths
of his chest, sounded wild and thrilling to the
maiden's ear.
“My daughter!” said he, taking her by the
hand, “thou shalt wed this man!”
Annabel replied not.
“Thou shalt, I say, wed the Lord of Florence.
It must be so; therefore it were well that thou
dost prepare thee for the bridal. I say it shall be
so, my daughter. The word of Aldarin is passed!”
“Father,” replied the Ladye Annabel, in tremulous
tones; “father, O! look not so sternly at
me, your eyes chill my very heart. I would do
your bidding—the Virgin and all the saints witness
me, I would—but, father—”
“Annabel,” said the Count, in his deep tones
of enthusiasm, “I have said, it, and it shall be soWed
the Duke of Florence, and behold thyself a—
queen! All that heart can wish, or the wildest
fancy desire, shalt thou possess, and claim as thine
own. Wealth shall lavish its stores around thee,
and honour shall bring the fairest and the noblest
to bow low at the feet of the Ladye Annabel,
Duchess of Florence! Lo! thou art in the ducal
hall of Florence: behold thyself encircled by the
gay and glittering throng; a thousand eyes are
fixed upon thee in admiration, a thousand tongues
speak their words of eloquence but to syllable that
admiration, and a thousand swords, flashing in
the light, are slaves to the slightest word of Ladye
Annabel—the queen. The robes of a queen shall
gird this lovely form, the stars of a coronet shall
flash from that beauteous brow, and this fair hand,
so beautiful in its alabuster whiteness, shall wave
the sceptre over the heads of kneeling myriads!
With a queenly port and a flashing eye, thou
shalt look around thee, and behold the princely
halls illumined by lamps, diffusing at once both
light, soft as moonbeams, and fragrance sweeter
than the breath of spring flowers. The lofty windows,
with their rare carvings, shall give to view
gardens rich with golden fruit, won from the fair
gay with flowers, while ancient trees, in leafy
magnificence, sweep their arching bows overhead.
Fountains fling their columns of liquid diamonds
up from the arbored paths, lulling waterfalls soothe
the ear, distant music wakes delightful visions in
the soul, solemn palaces, in all their grandeur of
outline, break through the air of night! Palaces,
gardens, unbounded wealth, rank, pride, place,
honor—all, all shall be thine own!”
“All, my father, all—all—but love.”
As Annabel spoke, her eyes filled with tears,
and her voice was choked with the sobs that convulsed
her bosom. To say that the picture of the
Count had no effect upon the maiden, would be
uttering an absurd and unnatural fiction. In
bright and glowing colors arose the gorgeous pageantry
before the mind of Annabel: it was all
that a woman could wish, the fruition of a woman's
most ardent aspiration. With Adrian, the companion
of her childhood, the princely palace would
have been like an abode of fairy land; with the
Duke, it would have been a living-tomb—a golden
sepulchre for the living-dead.
The answer of Aldarin was contemptous and
bitter.
“Love!—a dream—a phantom—a bubble!—
Love, forsooth! the vision of warm-blooded youth,
which all have felt, and none but fools obey. Girl,”
continued he, “I have said thou shouldst wed the
Duke, and—by my soul!—thou shalt wed him!
My word—the word of Aldarin—is passed. Think
not to deceive me. I know thy motive in thus
setting the bidding of a father at defiance. It is
because thou dost affect the murderer of my only
brother,—of thy kind uncle,—the PARRICIDE,
Adrian—”
O! father, he cannot—cannot be the doer of so
dread a crime.”
“Who, then,” exclaimed the Count, bitterly,
“who then was the doer of so dread a crime?
Speak; my fair daughter, who was't?”
“It was thou!” exclaimed a voice that sounded
strange and hollow through the lonely apartment.
“Holy Mary, preserve us!” shrieked Annabel.
“Father, whence came that fearful voice?”
The Count Aldarin replied not. The convulsive
motion that heaved his breast, and strained
the lineaments of his countenance, showed that
he was making a desperate attempt to command
his soul.
“'Tis naught, my daughter,” he began; “'tis
fancy—'tis—”
He finished the sentence by a howl of horror,
that might have been uttered by a lost soul. Annabel
beheld him gazing fixedly at some object
behind her. She turned her head and saw a vision
that drove the life current back from her
heart.
A figure arrayed in the snow-white attire of
the grave, looked with a pale and ghastly countenance,
and hollow eyes, from among the folds of
the crimson tapestry on the opposite side of the
apartment.
With freezing blood, Annabel beheld the figure
advance with a slow and measured step towards
her. Her consciousness failed, and she fell insensible
on the floor, at the same instant that Aldarin
sank down with a yell of despair, while his mouth
frothed, and his eyes glared like those of a maniac.
On toward the light advanced the figure in
white. In a moment it stood beside the prostrate
forms of the father and child, and having gazed at
them for an instant, it threw back the robe from
its head, and the beams of the lamp flashed over
the wan and ghastly face of the strange figure.
“Ha—ha—ha!” he laughed, in tones sepulchral
with famine, “methinks I've frightened the
old caitiff enow! O, St. Withold! but I do feel
this fiend, Hunger, gnawing with its serpent teeth
at my very heart! Nothing to eat for three days
and as many nights! And this hand—half severed
at the finger joints—throbbing with pain all
the while! Thanks to the hard lessons of a soldier's
life, that taught me to wrap this rough bandage
round the wound! Had it been my good right
hand—St. Withold!—Robin had been a dead man
three days ago! True, I did make out to
crawl toward one of the dead soldiers in the cavern.
How sweetly the wine in his flask gurgled
down my parched throat! I am faint with lack
of food. By a soldier's faith, I could eat a whole
ox! St. Withold, an' I do not get some nourishment
in the shortest time possible, I may as well
wrap me up in this pall, so as to be ready for burial!
Ugh! the priest shall not say his prayers
over thee yet, my friend Robin; courage.”
Having first divested himself of the funeral pall
of the late lord, the famished soldier strode across
the apartment, and opening the door that led into
the ante chamber, he discovered Guiseppo and
Rosalind seated upon one of the couches, apparently
in the most amiable humor with each other.
“Look ye, sir page,” exclaimed Robin, as he
showed his wan and wasted features through the
opened door, “an' ye stir not yourself right quickly,
your master will be dead; and, fair damsel,
Annabel.”
Rosalind shrieked with affright at the hollow
voice and shrunken figure of the bold yeoman,
and Guiseppo sprang with one bound from the
couch half way across the apartment.
“Fear not, Rosalind,” he cried drawing his
dagger. “If it be a devil, I defy it in God's name;
and if it be a man why I will try what this good
steel can do.”
“Tut, tut,” exclaimed Robin, “put up your
cheese-knife boy. Come hither. Know you me
not?”
“No more than I do the devil.”
“Mayhap then, fair Sir, you have heard of a
certain youth, who on the night before he departed
from the castle—the castle where his infancy had
been passed—to be a page at court, took occasion
to pour a sleeping potion into the wine of a certain
yeoman; and then shaving one side of the yeoman's
face; concluded by tying a dead cat around
his neck, thus making an honest soldier a mock of
laughter for all the castle. Did'st ever hear of
such a page? Eh? Guiseppo?”
“Why the Virgin bless me,” exclaimed Rosalind,
“It's Rough Robin!”
“Eh?” cried the page with a stare of astonishment.
“If you value your life, Guiseppo,” continued
the yeoman; “Hie away, and bring me a dozen
flasks of wine or so, and a round of beef. Speak
not a word, but haste away. I am nigh starved to
death, and the devil may tempt me to cut a slice
from the trim figure of a certain page; away!”
As Guiseppo, left the apartment, Rosalind asked
the bold yeoman, where he had been for the
past three days, and wherefore he looked so much
like a ghost risen from the dead merely for its own
amusement.
“My Lord the Count Aldarin,” replied Robin
with a grim smile, “despatched me—upon a long
journey, to arrange matters of business entirely
relating to himself.”
Having thus spoken, he again entered the bower
of the Ladye Annabel, and laying hold of the
senseless body of Aldarin, he dragged him into the
ante-chamber, and then returned to assist the
damsel Rosalind in the recovery of her mistress.
| CHAPTER THE FIRST.
THE MAIDEN IN HER BOWER. The Ladye Annabel, or, The doom of the poisoner | |