University of Virginia Library

BOOK THE FIRST.
The Death.
The Sunlight is broken by the Cloud.

1. CHAPTER THE FIRST.
THE SIGNET RING OF ALBARONE.

HIGH-NOON AMID THE OLD CASTLE WALLS.

From the clear azure of the summer sky, the
mid-day sun shone over the lofty battlements and
massive towers of an ancient castle, which, rising
amid the heights of a precipitous rock, lay basking
in the warm sunlight; while along the spacious
court-yard, and among the nooks and crevices
of the dark grey walls, the mellow beams fell
lazily, gilding each point they touched, and turning
the blackened rocks to brightened gold, with
the voluptuous light of a summer noon.

The massive cliff, from whose stern foundations
the castle arose, sank suddenly down, with a preoipitous
descent, into the bed of the valley, while
around, in all the solemn grandeur of ages, swept
the magnificent forest, with its mass of verdure
mellowing in the sunlight; and, winding on its
way of silver, a broad and rapid stream, gleaming
from the deep green foliage of the encircling forest
trees, now gave each wave and ripple to the
kiss of day, and now sweeping in its shadowy
nooks, sheltered its beauty from the dazzling
light.

Far along the plain, verdant forest towered over
forest, and sloping meadows, dotted with cottages,
succeeded shelving fields, golden with wheat, or
gay with vines; while many a pleasant hill-side
arose from amid the embowering woods, with the
peaceful summit sleeping in the sunlight, and the
straight shadows of the still noon resting along
the depths of the valley, from which it greenly
ascended.

Along the edge of the horizon, amid the tall
peaks of the far-off mountains, summer clouds,
vast and gorgeous, lay basking in the sunlight,
with their fantastic forms, of every hue and shape
—now dark, now bright, now golden, now grey,
and again white as the unsunned snow—all clearly
and delicately relieved by the back-ground of
azure, transparent and glassy with its own unspotted
clearness.

The hour was still and solemn, with the peculiar
silence and solemnity of the high noon; the
broad banner floated heavily from the loftiest tower
of the castle, unruffled by a whisper of the wind;
and along the court-yard, and throughout the castle,
a death-like silence reigned, which betokened
aught else than the presence of numerous bodies
of armed men within the castle walls.

The sentinels who waited at the castle gate,
rested indolently upon their pikes, and glancing
over the spacious court-yard, marked, with a look
of discontent, the absence of all signs of animation
from those walls which had so often rung
with sounds of gay carousal and shouts of merriment.
All was still and solemn where, in days
bygone, not a sound had awoke the echoes of the

time-darkened walls save the loud laugh of the
careless reveller, the merry carol of the minstrel,
or the glee-song of the banquet hall.

A footstep—a mailed and booted footstep—broke
the silence of the air, and presently appearing from
the shadow of the lofty hall door of the castle, a
stout and strong-limbed soldier emerged into the
light of the sun. As he descended the steps of
stone, he paused for a moment, and glanced around
the court-yard. Stout, without being bulky in
figure, the person of the yeoman was marked by
broad shoulders, a chest massive and prominent,
arms that were all bone and muscle, and legs that
discovered the bold and rugged outline of strong
physical power and ability, hardened by fatigue
and toil.

He raised his cap of buff, surmounted by a dark
plume, and plated with steel, from his brow, and
the sunbeams fell upon a rugged countenance,
darkened by the sun, and seamed by innumerable
wrinkles, with a low, yet massive forehead, a nose
short, straight, yet prominent, a wide mouth, with
thin lips, cheek bones high and bold in outline,
while his clear blue eyes, with their quick and
varying glance, afforded a strange contrast to his
toil-hardened and sunburnt features. Around his
throat, and over his prominent chin, grew a thick
and rugged beard, dark as his eyebrows in hue,
while his hair, slightly touched by age, and worn
short and close, gave a marked outline to his head,
that completed the expression of dogged courage
and blunt frankness visible in every lineament of
his countenance.

Attired in doublet and hose of buff, defended by
a plate of massive steel in the breast, with smaller
plates on each arm and leg, the yeoman wore
boots of slouching buckskin, while a broad belt of
darkened leather, thrown over his manly chest,
supported the short, straight sword, which depended
from his left side.

Having glanced along the court-yard, and
marked the sentinels waiting lazily beside the
castle gate, the yeoman's eye wandered to the
banner which clung heavily around the towering
staff, and then depositing his cap on his head
with an air of discontent, he exclaimed, as he
again surveyed the castle yard—

“St. Withold!” he cried, in a voice as rugged
as his face—“St. Withold! but some foul spell
of the fiend's own making has fallen upon these
old walls! All dull—all dead—all stupid! Even
yon flag, which kissed the breeze of the Holy Land
not three months agone, looks dull and drowsy.
'Slife! a man might as well be dead as live in this
manner. No feasting—no songs—no carousing!
Ugh! A pest take it all, I say! No jousts—no
tournaments—no mellays! The foul fiend take
it, I say; and Sathanas wither the heathen hand
that winged the poisoned javelin at my knightly
Lord—Julian, Count of this gallant castle Di Albarone!
The foul fiend wither the hand of the
paynim dog, I say!”

“Ha, ha, ha! my good Robin,” laughed a clear
and youthful voice, “by my troth, thou'rt sadly
out of temper! What has ruffled thee, my buffand-buckskin?
Sancta Maria—what a face!”

Robin turned, and beheld the slender form of a
daintily apparelled youth, whose full cheeks were
wrinkled with laughter, while his merry hazel
eyes seemed dancing in the light of their own
glee.

“Out of temper!” exclaimed rough Robin, as
he glanced at the laughing youth; “out of temper?
By St. Withold! there's good reason for't,
too. Look ye, my bird of a page, never since I
left the service of mine own native prince, the
brave Richard, of the Lion Heart—never since
the day when the gallant Sir Geoffrey, o' th' Long-sword,
drew his sword in the wars of Palestine,
under the banner of Count Julian Di Albarone,
have I felt so sick, so wearied in heart, as I do
this day—mark ye, my page! `Out of temper,'
forsooth! Answer me, then, popinjay—does not
our gallant Lord Julian lie wasting away in yon
sick chamber, with the poison of an incurable
wound eating his very heart? Answer me that,
Guiseppo.”

“Aye, marry does he, my good Robin,” the page
answered, as he played with a jewelled chain that
hung depending from his neck; “but then thou
knowest he will recover. He will again mount
his war-horse! Aye, my good Lord Julian will
again lead armies to battle in the wilds of Palestine!
He will, by my troth, Rough Robin!”

“I fear me, never, never,” the yeoman replied,
in a solemn tone. “Look ye, Guiseppo, what
dost think of this thin-faced half brother of the
Count, the scholar Aldarin? There's a mystery
about the man—I like him not. Thy master, the
Duke of Florence, hath now been three days at
this good castle of Albarone—why is he so much
in the company of this keen-eyed Aldarin? By
St. Withold! I like it not. Marry, boy, but the
devil's a brewing a pretty pot of yeast for somebody's
bread! Guiseppo, canst tell me naught

concerning the object of the visit of thy master'
the Duke, to this castle—hey, boy?”

“Why, Robin,” replied the page, as, placing
one small hand on either side of his slender waist,
he glanced at the yeoman with a sidelong look;
“why, Robin, didst ever hear of—of—the fair
Ladye Annabel? Eh, Robin?”

“The fair Ladye Annabel! Tut! boy, thou triflest
with me. The fair Ladye Annabel—she is
the lovely daughter of this crusty old scholar.
Her mother was an Eastern woman; and the fair
girl first saw the light in the wilds of Palestine
when the scholar Aldarin accompanied his brother
thither. Marry, tis more than sixteen—seventeen
years since. 'Tis long ago—very long. By St.
Withold! those were merry days. But come, sir
page, why name the Ladye Annabel and the Duke
in the same breath?”

The restless Guiseppo sprang aside with a nimble
movement, and then folding his arms, stood at
the distance of a few paces, regarding the stout
yeoman with a look of mock gravity and solemn
humor.

“What wouldst give to know, Robin?” he exclaimed,
with a peculiar contortion of his mirthful
face. “Hark ye, my stout yeoman, `My Lord
Duke of Florence and the Ladye Annabel, Duchess
of Florence.' Dost like the sound? What says
my rough soldier, now?”

“I see a light,” slowly responded Robin; “I
see a light!” and he slowly drew his sword halfway
from the scabbard. “But as yet 'tis but a
pestilent Jack o' lanthorn light, dancing about a
tangled marsh of pits and bogs, with plenty o'
hidden traps to catch honest men by the heels, i'
faith. Annabel and the Duke! Ho—ho! Then
the game's up with the son o' th' Count—my
Lord Adrian?”

“Wag that clumsy tongue o' thine with a spice
o' caution, Robin,” whispered the merry page.
“See, the sharp-faced steward o' th' castle draws
nigh, and with him a group of sworn grumblers.
The four old esquires who followed our lord to
battle in the wilds o' Palestine—a soldier, with a
carbuncled visage, and a lounging servitor, the
huntsman o' th' castle. Hark! didst ever hear
such eloquent growling?”

And as Robin turned to listen, he beheld the
strangely contrasted party lounging slowly along
the castle yard, with the indolent gait of men
having little to do save to eat, to drink, to sleep,
and to gossip, while around them the lazy hours
of the silent castle walls dragged onward with
wings of lead.

“Talk not to me of thrift, sir steward,” cried
the bluff-faced and thick-headed huntsman. “My
Lord, Count Julian, was well—not a day passed
but a lusty buck was steaming on the castle
hearth—”

“Wine flowed like water,” chimed in the soldier
with the fiery nose. “Your true soldier swore by
his beaker alone—”

“Now!” interrupted the sharp-faced steward,
waving his thin hands, and with an expressive
shrug of the shoulders; “now, my lord, the Count,
is sick. The scholar Aldarin hath the rule. Tell
me, sir huntsman, and you, sir, of the fiery nose,
is there any waste o' flesh or liquor in the castle?
Is not the signor careful of the beeves of my lord.
No longer are we quiet folks disturbed by your
carousings; no silly dances, no rude catches o'
vile camp-follower songs! By the Virgin, no!”

“By the true wood o' th' cross, sir steward
thou'rt a rare one!” growled a white-haired esquire,
as his scarred and sunburnt visage was turned
angrily toward the sharp-faced steward. “Dost
think men o' mettle are made o' such broomstick
bones and mud-puddle blood as thou? Body o'
Bacchus, no! `No carousing!' I'd e'en like to
see thee on a jolly carouse!”

“Say rather, sir esquire,” Robin the Rough,
exclaimed, as the party reached his side, “say
rather, you'd e'en wish to see a death's head
making mirth at a feast, or a funeral procession
strike up a jolly fandago! Sir steward at a feast!
—the owl at a gathering o' nightingales!”

The sharp-faced steward was about to make an
angry reply, when a sudden thrill ran through the
party. Each tongue was stilled, and each man
stood motionless in the full glare of the noonday
beams.

THE STRANGE FEAR OF THE SIGNIOR ALDARIN.

“Hist! The Signor Aldarin approaches,” whispered
the page Guiseppo. “He comes from the
castle gate along to the castle hall.”

And as each head was stealthily turned over the
shoulder toward the castle gate, there came gliding
along, with cat-like steps and down cast look,
a man of severe aspect, whose grey eye—cold,
flashing, and clear, in its unchangeable glance—
seemed as though it could read the very heart.

A tunic of dark velvet, disclosing the spare outlines
of his slim figure, reached to his ancles, and

over this garment, depending from his right shoulder,
he wore a robe of similar color, passed under
his left arm, joined in front by a chain of gold,
and then falling in sweeping folds to his sandalled
feet.

A cap of dark fur, bright with a single gem of
strange lustre, gave a striking relief to his high,
pale forehead, seamed by a single deep wrinkle
shooting upward from between the eyebrows,
while his grey hair fell in slight masses down
along the hollow cheeks and over his neck and
shoulders.

“This is the—scholar!” growled one of the
white-haired esquires. “His days have been passed
in the labaratory, while his brother's sword
hath flashed at the head of armies.”

“The saints preserve me from the wizard-tribe,
say I!” muttered Robin the Rough; and as he
spoke, with an involuntary movement of fear, the
party separated on either side of the castle hall,
leaving room for the passage of the Signor Aldarin.

He came slowly onward, with his head downcast,
neither looking to the one side or to the other.
He ascended the steps of stone, and in a moment
was lost to the view of the loiterers in the castle
yard.

The hall of the castle passed, a passage traversed,
and another stairway ascended, the stooping
scholar stood in a small ante-chamber, with
the light of the noonday sun subdued to a twilight
obscurity by the absence of windows from
the place, while an evening gloom hung around
the narrow walls, the arching ceiling of darkened
stone, and the floor of tesselated marble. A single
casement, long and narrow, reaching from
floor to arch, gave entrance to a straggling beam
of daylight, disclosing the stout and muscular form
of a man-at-arms, with armor and helmet of steel,
who, pike in hand, waited beside a massive door,
opening into one of the principal apartments of
the castle.

With a soft, gliding footstep, the Signor Aldarin
glided along the tesselated floor, and stood
beside the man-at-arms, ere he was aware of his
approach.

“Ha! Balvardo, thou keepest strict watch beside
the sick chamber of my lord.” The words broke
from the Signor Aldarin. “Hast obeyed my behest?”

“E'en so, my lord,” the sentinel began, in a
rough, surly tone.

“How, schelm! Dost name me with the title
of my brother? Have a care, good Balvardo,
have a care!”

“He chides me in a rough voice,” murmured
the sentinel, as though speaking to his own ear;
“and yet a wild light flashes over his features at
the word. Signor, I but mistook the word—a
slip o' th' tongue,” he exclaimed aloud. “Thy
behests have been obeyed. No one has been suffered
to pass into the chamber of my Lord Di Albarone
since morning dawn, save the fair Ladye
Annabel, who waits beside the couch of the
wounded knight.”

“Come hither, Balvardo. Look from this narrow
window: mark you well the dial-plate in the castle
yard. In a few moments the shadow will
sweep across the path of high noon. When high
noon and the shadow meet, thy charge is over.
The soothing potion which I gave my brother at
daybreak, will have taken its proper effect. Until
that moment, keep strict watch: let not a soul
enter the Red Chamber on the peril of thy life!”

And with the command, the Signior swept from
the ante-chamber, gliding along a corridor opposite
the one from which he had just emerged, and
his low footsteps in a moment had ceased to echo
along the dark grey arches.

“He is gone,” the sentinel murmured, slowly
pacing the tesselated floor. “He comes like a cat
—he glides hence like a ghost. Hark! footsteps
from opposite corridors meeting in this ante-chamber.
By'r our Lady! here comes Adrian, the
son of this sick lord, and from the opposite gallery
emerges the monk Albertine, the tool and counsellor
of my Lord of Florence. 'Tis a moody
monk and a shrewd boy. I'faith, there's a pain
o' 'em.”

And as he spoke, sweeping from the shadow of
the northern gallery, came a dark-robed monk,
walking with hastened step, his arms folded on
his breast, and his head drooped low, as if in
thought, while the outlines of his face were enveloped
in the folds of his priestly cowl. And as he
swept onward toward the centre of the ante-chamber,
from the southern gallery, with slow and solemn
steps, advanced a youth of some twenty summers,
attired in the gay dress of a cavalier, with
a frank, open visage, marked by the lines of premature
thought, and relieved by rich and luxuriant
locks of golden hair sweeping along each
cheek down to the shoulders.

“Whither speed ye, Lord Adrian?” exclaimed
the deep, sonorous voice of the monk, as the twain

met breast to breast in the centre of the rich mosaic
floor. “Whither speed ye, heir of Albarone, at
this hour?”

“Whither do I speed?” cried the cavalier
starting with sudden surprise. “Sir monk, I
wend to the sick chamber of my father.”

The monk grasped the cavalier suddenly by
the right hand, and raised it as suddenly in the
light of the sunbeams streaming through the solitary
window.

“An hour since, this hand was graced by a signet
ring: the signet ring which has been an heir
loom in thy house for centuries. Dost remember
the prophecy spoken of that strange ring? Dost
remember the rude lines of the vandal seer:

“Sir monk, the lines are rude; yet I mind me
well the words of the prophecy are an household
sound to an heir of Albarone. Yet why this sudden
grasp of my hand? Why thus urgent? The
fire in thine eye seems not of earth.”

“Lord Adrian, by the Virgin tell me how long
since parted this finger from the ruby signet ring
of thy house? Never parted that ring from the
hand of heir of Albarone, without sudden evil,
fearful doom, or unheard of death, gathering thick
and dark around thy house!”

“I missed not the signet ring till this moment.
An instant ago, I was in my chamber. Thy air
is strange and solemn for the confessor of this jovial
Duke, yet I will turn me, and seek the signet
without delay. Thy warning may be well-timed.”

“Boy, a word in thine ear. My life has been
strange and dark. I have loved the shadow rather
than the light. I have courted the glare of
corruption in the midnight charnel house, rather
than the blaze of the noonday sun. I have made
me a home amid strange mysteries, and from the
tomes of darksome lore I have wrung the secrets
of the hidden world.”

“To what tends all this, sir monk? By'r our
Ladye, thou'rt strangely moved!”

“And from my hidden lore have I learned this
mystery of mysteries. When the stillness of mid
night hangs like lead over the noonday hour—
when at mid-noon, a strange, solemn, and voiceless
silence pervades the air, spreads through the
universe, and impresses the heart of each living
thing with a feeling of unutterable AWE, then wick
ed men are doing, in the sight of heaven, with the
laughter of fiends in their ears, some deed of horror,
that the fiends tremble 'mid their laughter to
behold. Some deed of nameless horror which
thrills the universe with AWE, making the hour
of noon more terrible than midnight in the charnel
house. Look abroad, Adrian—'tis high noon.
Dost hear a sound, a whisper of the wind? All
silent as death—all still as the grave! The silence
of this nameless AWE is upon the noonday
hour. Adrian, to thy chamber, to thy chamber,
and rest not till the signet ring again encircles thy
finger! There is a doom upon this hour!”

And with these words, uttered in a low, yet
deep and piercing tone, the monk glided from the
ante-chamber; and the cavalier, without a word,
as hastily retraced his steps, and in an instant had
disappeared in the shadow of the southern gallery.

“Whispered words!” muttered the bull-headed
man-at-arms. “A ring! What about a ring?
Ha—ha! The Monk and the Springald commune
together—well! I could not make out their secret,
but—but, the ring!”

And raising his sturdy form to its full height,
with a grim smile on his bearded face, Balvardo
glanced around the ante-chamber, and then, with
a low chuckle, he let his pike fall heavily upon
the pavement of stone.

2. CHAPTER THE SECOND.
THE WHITE DUST IN THE GOBLET
OF GOLD.

THE WARRIOR AND THE MAIDEN.

In a lofty apartment of the castle, hung with
rich folds of crimson tapestry, and designated from
time past memory as the Red-Chamber, on a
couch of gorgeous hangings, lay the once muscular,
but now disease-stricken, Julian, Count of
Albarone, shorn of his warrior strength, divested
of the glory of his manhood's prime.

The warm sunlight which filled the place, fell
with a golden glow, over the outlines of his lofty
brow indented with wrinkles, the long grey hair
parted on either side, the eye brows, snow-white,
over-arching the clear, bold eyes, that sent
forth their glance with all the fire and intensity
of youth, rendered more vivid and flame-like by
the contrast of sunken eyelid and hollow cheek.

And by the bedside of the warrior, bending like
an angel of good, as she ministered to his slightest
wants, the form of a fair and lovely maiden, was

disclosed in the noonday-light, while her flaxen
curls, fell lightly, and with a waving motion, over
the rich bloom of her cheek, glowing with the
warmth of fifteen summers, and her full, large
eyes of liquid blue, gleamed with the expression
of a soul, whose fruits were pure and happy
thoughts, the blossoms and the buds of youth and
innocence.

“Annabel,”—said the warrior, in a voice faint
with disease—“Methinks I feel the strength of
youth again returning, the sleeping potion of my
good brother, Aldarin, has done me wondrous service.
Assist me to the casement, niece of mine
heart, that I may gaze once more upon the broad
lands and green woods of my own native domain
of Albarone —.”

As he spoke, the Count rose on his feet, with
a tottering movement, and had fallen to the floor,
but for the fair arm of the maiden wound around
his waist, while his muscular hand rested upon
her shoulder.

“Lean upon my arm, my uncle,—tread with a
careful footstep. In a moment we will reach the
casement.”

They stood, within the recess of the emblazoned
window, the warrior and the maiden, while
around them floated and shimmered the golden
sunshine, falling over the tesselated stone of the
pavement, throwing a glaring light around the
hangings of the bed, and streaming in flashes of
brightness along the distant corners and nooks
of the Red-Chamber.

“'Tis a fair land, niece of mine,—a fair and
lovely land”—

“A land of dreams, a land of magnificent visions,
overshadowed by yon blue mountains of
romance. Look, my uncle, how the noonday sun
is showering his light over the deep woods that
encircle the rock of Albarone—yonder, beyond the
verdure of the trees, winds the silvery Arno, yonder
are hills and rugged steeps, and far away tower
the blue heights of the Appenines!”

“And here, niece of mine, in my youthful
prime I stood, when my aged father's hand had
dubbed me—knight. 'Twas such a quiet noonday
hour, on a calm and dreamlike day, as this, that
from the recess of this window, I gazed upon yon
gorgeous land. How the blood swelled in my
youthful veins, how dreams of ambition fired my
boyish fancy, as the words broke from my lips,—
Here they ruled, my fathers, in days bygone
with the iron-sword of the Goth, here they reigned
as sovereign princes—as Dukes of Florence.'
”

“Since that noonday hour thy sword has
flashed in the van of a thousand battles!”

“It has—it has! And yet what am I now?
Old before my time, swept away from the path
of glory, as I neared the goal! A warrior should
never utter a word of complaint—and yet—by
the Sacrament of Heaven, I had much rather
died with sword in hand, at the head of my hosts,
than to wither away with this festering wound on
yonder couch! I like not to count the pulsations
of my dying heart.”

“Nay, my uncle,—chide not so bitterly. Thou
wilt recover—thy sword will again flash at the
head of armies!”

“My sword, Annabel, my sword,”—cried the
warrior, as his eye lit up with a strange brilliancy,
and his wan features were crimsoned by a
ruddy flush.

In a moment, the fair hands of the maiden bore
the sword from its resting place, in a nook of the
Red-Chamber, with a slow and weary movement,
as though the massive piece of iron she trailed
along the marble floor, exceeded her maidenly
strength to lift on high.

“It is my sword, it is my sword”—shrieked the
warrior, as he flung the robes of purple back
from his muscular, though attenuated shoulder
and raised his proud form to its full height—
“Look, Annabel, how it gleams in the light! So
it gleamed on the walls of Jerusalem, so it shone
aloft over the desert-sands of the Syrian wilderness!
It will gleam over the battle field again!
Age, again will the snow-white plume of Julian
Di Albarone, wave over the ranks of the fray,
while ten thousand warriors, hail that plume as
their beacon-light!”

He swung the sword aloft in the air, his whole
form was moved by excitement, every vein filled
and every pulse throbbed, his eye flashed like a
thing of flame, and his whitened lip trembled
with the glorious expression of battle-scorn.

Thrice he waved the sword around his head,
when the wild impulse of his sudden excitement
died away, his eyes lost their flashing brightness,
his limbs their vigor, and Julian of Alberone, tottered
as he stood upon the marble-floor, and stepping

hurriedly backward, fell heavily upon the
couch of the Red-Chamber.

“The goblet, fair niece—the goblet on the
beaufet.—Haste thee—I am faint.”

As the words broke gaspingly from the sick
man's lips, the Ladye Annabel turned hastily to
bring the goblet, and as she turned, she beheld
the head of Lord Julian resting uneasily on his pillow,
while his left arm hung heavily over the side
of the couch.

She turned again with trembling footsteps, and
hastened to arrange the pillow of the sick warrior.
Her fair hands smoothed the pillow of down, and
she gently raised his head from the couch.

At the very instant, the tapestry in a dark corner
of the Red-Chamber rustled quickly to and
fro, as a figure muffled in a sweeping cloak of
crimson, emerged into view, and treading across
the tesselated pavement, with a footstep like a
spirit of the unreal air, it approached the beaufet of
ebony, and a white hand, glittering with a single
ring was extended for a moment over the goblet
of gold.

The Ladye Annabel placed the head of Lord
Julian, gently upon the pillow of down.

The glittering ring shone in the sun, as it fell
in the goblet of gold, and the hand of the figure,
white as alabaster, was again concealed in the
thick folds of the crimson robe.

The Ladye Annabel, with her delicate hands,
parted the grey hairs from the sick man's face,
and swept them back from his brow.

The figure in robes of crimson, strode with a
noiseless footstep across the apartment, and
sought the shelter of the hangings of tapestry,
with as strange a silence as it had emerged from
their folds.

Without taking notice of the white dust that
covered the bottom of the empty goblet, Annabel
filled it with generous wine, and approached the
bedside of her uncle. The Count raised himself
from the pillow, and lifted the goblet to his lips.
As his wan face was reflected in the ruddy wavelets
of the wine, he fixed his full large eyes upon
the lovely face of Annabel, with a look of affection,
mingled with an expression, so strange, so
solemn and dread, that it dwelt in the soul of the
maiden for years.

He drank, and drained the goblet to the dregs.

“Thank thee—fair niece—thank thee.”

He paused suddenly, his arms he flung wildly
from him, a thin, glassy film gathered over his
eyes, a gurgling noise sounded in his throat, and
he fell heavily upon the couch.

His features were knit in a fearful expression of
pain and suffering, his mouth opened with a ghastly
grimace, leaving the teeth visible, the lips
were writhen with a quick convulsive pang, and
his eyes sternly fixed, glanced wildly from beneath
the eyebrows woven in a frown.

“My uncle—my father,”—shrieked the Ladye
Annabel, rushing to the bedside—“Look not so
wildly, gaze not so sternly upon me. Speak my
uncle, oh, speak!”

Her utterance failed, and an indistinct murmur
broke from her lips. Her hands ran hurriedly over
the brow of the warrior—it was cold with beaded
drops of moisture. She bent hastily over the form
of Lord Julian, she imprinted a kiss on his parted
lips. She kissed the lips of the dead!

Then the tapestry, the hangings of the Red-Chamber,
the couch, with its ghastly corse, all
swam round her in a fearful dance, and the Ladye
Annabel fell insensible on the floor.

The great bell of the Castle of Albarone tolled
forth the hour of noon. The shadow of death
had been flung across the dial-plate in the castle-yard.

While the thunder-like tones of the bell, went
swinging, and quivering, and echoing among the
old castle halls, a footstep was heard without the
Red-Chamber, and the door was flung suddenly
open.

A young Cavalier, with a face marked by frank
open features, locks of rich gold, and an eye of
blue, while his handsome form was clad in a gay
dress of velvet, entered the apartment, and strode
with hurried steps to the couch.

He cast one look at the face of the corse, marked
by the ghastly grimace of death, he cast one
quick and hasty glance at the form of the Ladye
Annabel, thrown insensible along the floor of
stone, and then he covered his face with his trembling
hands, and his manly form was convulsed by
a shuddering tremor, that shook the folds of his
blue doublet, as though every sinew writhed in
agony beneath the gay apparel.

The heavy sob, which unutterable anguish
alone can bring from the heart of a proud man,
broke on the deep silence of the room, and the

big, heavy tear-drops of man's despair, came
trickling between the clasped fingers, pressed over
his countenance.

“He is dead—my father—he is dead!”

He mastered the first terrible impulse of grief,
and raised the swooning maiden from the floor.

THE ACCUSATION.

“He is dead—my father”—again sounded the
husky voice of the Cavalier. “Thou, Annabel,
art all that is left to me—I am—”

“A murderer—a parricide!” cried a sharp and
piercing voice, that thrilled to the very heart of
the cavalier.

He turned hurriedly as he grasped the maiden
with his good right arm, he turned and beheld,—
the Scholar Aldarin.

His glance was fixed and stern, while with one
hand half-upraised, with his thick eyebrows woven
in a frown, he stood regarding the Cavalier
with a look that was meant to rend his very heart
of hearts.

“What means this outcry in the presence of the
dead!” exclaimed Adrian in a determined tone—
“Let our past disputes be forgotten, old man, in
this terrible hour. See you not, my father lies
stark and dead?”

“Murdered by thee, vile parricide!”—rang out
the voice of the Signior Aldarin, as with a determined
step he advanced to the bedside—“Ho!
Guards, I say”—he shouted, raising his voice—
“Vassals of Albarone, to the rescue!”

The eye of the young Cavalier flashed, his brow
was knit, and his form crected to its full height
as he spoke in a quiet, determined tone.

“Look ye, old man, thou mayst taunt and gibe
with thy magpie tongue, as long as the humor
pleases thee. My father's brother need fear no
wrong from me—this maiden's father can fear no
harm from Adrian Di Albarone. Heap taunt on
taunt, good Signior, but see that this spirit of insuit
is not carried into action. I am lord in the
Castle of my fathers!”

“Father, what mean those wild words, these
looks of anger?” shrieked the Ladye Annabel, as
she awoke from her swoon of terror, and supported
by the arm of Adrian, glanced round the scene—
“Surely my father, you speak not aught against
Lord Adrian?”

And as she spoke, the chamber was filled with
men-at-arms, in their glittering armour, and servitors
of Albarone, all attired in the livery of the
house, who came thronging into the apartment,
and circled round the scene, while their mouths
were agape, and their eyes protruding with astonishment.

Aldarin glanced around the throng, he
marked each stalwart man-at-arms, each strong-limbed
yeoman of the guard, and then his chest
heaved and his eye flashed as he shouted—

“Seize him, men of Albarone, seize the murderer
of your lord!”

He pointed to Adrian Di Albarone as he spoke.
There was one wild thrill of terror and amazement,
spreading thro' the group, a confused
murmur, bursting involuntarily from every lip,
and then all was still as death.

Not a man stirred, not a servitor moved, but
all remained like statues, clustering round the
group in their centre, where Aldarin stood with
his slender form raised to its full stature, his arm
outstretched and his eye flashing like a flame-coal,
while Adrian gathered the Ladye Annabel
in his good right arm, and gazed upon the Signor
with a look of concentrated scorn.

“Seize him guards”—again shouted Aldarin—
“see the Parricide!”

There was the sound of a heavy footstep, and
the form of the stout yeoman emerged from the
group.

“Not quite so fast—marry, my good Signior,
not quite so fast”—he cried as he advanced. “By
St. Withold, I have followed my old lord to many
a hard fought fight, I have served him by night
and by day, with hand and heart, for a score of
long years. Shall I stand by, and see his brave
son suffer wrong?”

“What means this wild uproar?” exclaimed a
calm yet half-indignant voice, as the stately dame
of the Lord Di Albarone, yet unaware of her bereavement,
crossed the threshold with a lofty
step and an extended arm, advancing with the
port of a queen, to the centre of the group. “Vassals—what
means this wild uproar? Know ye
not that your lord lies deadly sick? Brother Aldarin,
I take it ill of you to suffer the clamor!
What can our liege of Florence think of ye, vassals,
when he beholds ye thus assail the sick
chamber of your lord with noise and outcry!”

The stately dame, pointed to a richly attired
cavalier, who had followed her into the apartment.
He was a well formed nan with a face marked
by no definite expression. His dark hair, gathered
in short, stiff curls around a low and unmeaning
forehead, his small dark eyes protruding from

his head, seemed to be trying their utmost to outstrip
his faintly delineated eyebrows, the nose
neither aquiline, classic, or Judaic, seemed composed
of all the varieties of nasal organ, his upper
lip was garnished with a portion of the wiry
beard that flourished on his prominent chin, his
lips were thick, and sensual, while his entire
face was as inexpressive as might be. The
throng bowed low, as they became aware of the
presence of the guest of their late lord. They
bowed to the Duke of Florence.

“Adrian, my son,” cred the Lady of Albarone
turning to her son in utter amazement, “what
means this scene of confusion and alarm!”

Adrian took his mother by the hand, and led
her to the couch. He spoke not a word, but waved
his hand toward the couch. Her form was concealed
for a moment amid the hangings of the
bed, and then a shrick of wild emphasis startled
the ears of the bystanders.

“He is dead,” exclaimed the Lady of Albarone,
in a voice of unatural calmness, as she again appeared
from amid the hangings of the bed, with a
face ghastly and livid as the face of death, “Vassals
of Albarone, your lord is dead!”

There was one wild thrill of horror ran around
the group, and the Lady of Albarone, sank leaning
for support upon the arm of her son, while
Annabel in the intervals of her own sobs and
sighs, whispered hurried words of consolation in
her car.

Aldarin stood regarding the group with a glance
of deep and searching meaning. He gazed upon
the vacant features of the Duke distended by surprise,
the countenance of Adrian marked by a settled
frown of indignation, the visage of the Countess
livid as death, and then the fair face of his
daughter Annabel, her eyes swimming in tears,
the parted lips and the cheek pale and flushed by
turns, met the glance of Aldarin, and a strange
expression trembled on his compressed lip, and
darkened over his high forehcad.

“Lady of Albarone,” exclaimed the Scholar, advancing.
“Lady of Albarone, my brother died not
thro' the course of nature, he died not by the hand
of disease, he was murdered!”

“Murdered!” repeated the Countess with a hollow
echo.

And the Duke took up the word, echoing with
a trembling voice, that word of fear, “murdered,”
while the Servitors of Albarone sent the cry shrieking
around the nooks and corners of the Red-Chamber.

Adrian of Albarone looked around the scene
and smiled as if in scorn, but said not a word.

Aldarin made one stride to the couch of death.

“Behold the corse,” he shrieked, “behold the
blackened face, the sunken eyelid and the livid lips,
behold the ghastly remains of the Lord of Albarone!”

Another stride and he reached the beaufet. He
seized the goblet of gold, and held it aloft.

“Behold,” he cried, “behold the instrument of
his murder!”

“God save me now,” shrieked the Countess.—
“There has been foul work here—Adrian—oh,
Adrian, thy sire hath been poisoned!”

“This is some new mysterie, Sir Scholar,” exclaimed
Adrian with a look of scorn.

The Lady fell insensible, and the goblet rung
with a clanging sound upon the marble floor,
while from its depths there rolled a small compact
substance, encrusted in some chemical compound
white as snow in hue.

The Duke of Florence stooped hurriedly to the
very floor and seized both the goblet and the encrusted
substance, with an eager grasp.

“Ha! There is a white sediment deposited at
the bottom of this goblet. Albertine advance;
thou art skilled in such mysteries. Tell me, Sir
Monk, the nature of this white powder.”

THE BLOODHOUND SALADIN.

The monk Albertine, whose dark eyes had for
a moment been gleaming over the shoulders of the
bystanders, now advanced with a slow and measured
footstep, and confronted the Signior Aldarin,
with a look full of meaning and thought. Aldarin
returned the look, with a keen and searching
glance, and their eyes then mingled in one long
and ardent gaze, as though each man wished to
read the heart of his fellow.

With a look of calmness and perfect self-posession
Albertine turned to the Duke and took the
goblet from his hand.

He gazed at its depths for a moment, he was
about to speak, when the heart of every man in
the Red-Chamber was thrilled by a wild and terrific
howl, more fearful even than the yell of the dying,
that proceeded from among the curtains of the
death-couch, and echoed around the apartment.

“That sound,” exclaimed Aldarin, with a nervous
start; “That sound is from the couch of death!
It means, it means—”

A ruddy glow passed over his pale countenance,
and suddenly pausing he gazed round the group
in silence.

“It is the poor hound of our good Lord;” muttered
Robin the Rough, advancing. “The hound,
with skin black as death, which Lord Julian
brought from Palestine—he is howling over the
dead corse of his master. So have I heard him
howl for three days past, as the castle-bell tolled
the hour of high noon, beside the panels of yonder
door. Come hither brute; come hither Saladin.”

The hound, black as night, with an eye like
fire, came leaping through the throng and crouched
whining at the feet of the stout yeoman.

It was, in sooth, a noble hound, with full chest,
slender limbs, long neck, and tapering body,
marked by all that delicacy of proportion, that
beauty of shape, and grace of motion, which tradition
ascribes to the bloodhounds of the Eastern
lands. The head was like the head of a snake,
while the eye seemed almost instinct with a human
soul.

“Sir monk,” cried the Duke, in an imperious
tone, “were it not better for thee to tell us at once
whether the white powder in the goblet is poison?
or shall we wait thy pleasure while thou dost
weary thine eyes with gazing at yonder hound?”

The monk Albertine made a solemn inclination
of his head, and kneeling on the marble floor in
the centre of the group, he struck the edge of the
goblet upon the tesselated stone with a quick and
sudden motion of his hand.

The diamond-shaped stone of black marble was
strewn with the white sediment deposited in the
bottom of the goblet.

The hound sprang forward, and while his wild
eyes flashed and blazed, his nostrils dilated and
the sable animal snuffed the atmosphere of the
Red-Chamber, as he leaped quickly around the
group.

“He snuffs the smell of human blood!” muttered
the stout yeoman.

And while all was intense interest and suspense,
while a mingled feeling of surprise and terror and
nameless fear ran around the group, while every
eye was fixed upon the kneeling form of Albertine,
with the goblet upraised in his hand, the hound
Saladin passed from man to man, scenting the
garments of the bystanders, and glancing wildly
from face to face, from eye to eye.

He paused for a moment in front of the Signior
Aldarin, and uttered a low whining sound as he
gazed in the scholar's face.

“How long is this mummery to last?” exclaimed
Aldarin, advancing with a sudden step—“Tell
me, sir monk, is thy study over?”

The hound Saladin sprang suddenly aside from
the robes of the Signior and eagerly snuffing the
marble floor approached the monk Albertine, and
with a wild howling sound licked the white substance
from the diamond-shape stone.

“Is it poison?” asked the Duke, and the interest
of the group clustered around became absorbing
and intense.

“Some new mysteric of thine, learned scholar”
exclaimed Adrian Di Alberone, with a smile of
incredulity. “The man does not live, so false in
heart as to place a death-bowl to the lips of a warrior
like Julian of Albarone!”

“Is it poison!” exclaimed Albertine, gazing
round upon the group—“Behold!”

And as he spoke, the hound Saladin fell stiffened
and dead, upon the marble pavement, with a
single fearful struggle, a single terrible howl.—
His limbs were fearfully distorted, and his eyes
were starting from their sockets, while a thin white
foam hung round his serpent-like jaw.

There was one quick yell of horror thundering
around the apartment, and then you might have
heard the footsteps of the Invisible Death, all was
so fearfully silent and still.

“As God lives, my father has been murdered!”
shouted Adrian Di Albarone, as the expression of
incredulity lately visible in his manly face changed
to a look of pallid horror—“Now by the Sacrament
of God, he shall be avenged as never was murdered
man avenged before! “Who,” he shricked in
a husky voice, turning to the throng—“Who hath
done this murder?”

“Sir Duke,” exclaimed Aldarin, as though he
had not heard Adrian, “the encrusted substance
which fell from the death-bowl may be poisonous—”

THE SIGNET-RING—THE ROBE—THE SECRET
DOOR

The small white ball, which the Duke had absently
clenched in his fingers, fell to the floor, and
every ear heard a ringing sound as it fell, and
every eye beheld the fragments splintering as it
touched the floor. The whole substance had
vanished, and along the floor there rolled a massive
signet ring, glittering with a single ruby.

The Duke of Florence stooped hastily and again
grasped the ring; he held it aloft, and shouted with
a tone of amazement and horror—

“It is the ring of the murderer, dropped by accident
into the death-bowl! It bears a crest and
an inscription—look Signior Aldarin—can'st make
out crest or inscription?”

Aldarin replied with a look of horror—

“The crest, 'tis a Winged Leopard—the motto
—`Grasp boldly, and bravely strike!' Both crest
and motto are those of Albarone”—his voice sank
to a deathlike whisper—“Lord Adrian—behold—
it is, it is the signet ring of Albarone!”

Aldarin turned with a voice of fierce emphasis—

“Thy question has its answer—let the signet-ring
tell the tale. Adrian, oh, Adrian,” he con
tinued as his voice changed with mingled compassion
and anguish—“what moved thee to this
fearful deed? Oh, that I, a weak old man, should
live to see my brother's son accused of that brother's
murder!”

“This is some damning plot!” calmly responded
Adrian, though his chest heaved and swelled with
the tempest aroused in his soul—“Tell me, Sig
nior Aldarin, what were the contents of the `soothing'
potion administered by thee to the late Lord
Julian at day break?”

“Tell me, good Albertine, thou didst aid in its
composition, and thou can'st witness when I gave
it to my murdered brother.”

“I aided in its composition—it was harmless.—
I saw thee minister the potion to Lord Julian.”

“Thou alone, Aldarin, thou alone has had access
to this chamber since daybreak”—spoke Adrian,
with his calm eye fixed full on the Signior's visage
—“Now tell me who it was that drugged you bowl
with death?”

“Balvardo, thou didst stand sentinel at yon door
from daybreak until high noon—did a soul enter
the Red-Chamber from the first moment to the
last second of thy watch?”

“Not a living man”—muttered the hoarse voice
of Balvardo from the crowd—“not a soul save the
Ladye Annabel.”

“Search the apartments!” shouted the Duke
“the assassin may be yet lurking in some dark
nook or corner!”

The doors were closed, the search commenced.
Every nook was ransacked, every corner thrown
open to the light, not even the bed of death and
its pillows of down and its hangings of purple was
spared.

While the search was in progress, the Countess
of Albarone awoke from her swoon, and striding
from the recess of an emblazoned window, where
the Ladye Annabel remained glancing with a vacant
look over the strange and terrible scene progressing
in the Red-Chamber, she was soon made
aware of the fearful crime charged upon her son,
the signet-ring and the terrible mystery.

“There is mystery,” she cried with a proud
voice, “there is mystery, but—no dishonour!—
Who can believe Adrian Di Albarone guilty of so
accursed an act!”

“For one, I do not!” bluntly cried the stout
yeoman.

“Nor I!” cried one of the servitors, and the cry
went round the apartment.

“Nor I”—“nor I”—“He is guiltless.”

A wild and prolonged shriek from a nook of the
Red-Chamber near the death-couch sent a sudden
thrill through the group assembled in this terrible
mystery.

Every form wheeled suddenly round, every eye
was fixed in the direction from whence issued the
shriek, and the aged Steward of the Castle was
seen upholding with one trembling hand the folds
of the gorgeous crimson tapestry, while as his aged
face grew livid as death, he pointed with the other
hand to a recess beyond.

“A secret passage—the door, cut into the solid
wall is flung wide open—a robe laid across the
threshold—a robe of crimson faced with gold.”

And as he spoke he flung the hangings yet farther
aside, and the bright sunshine gleamed over
the panel of the secret door, flung wide open, the
crimson robe thrown over the threshold, but no
beam lighted up the gloom of the passage beyond.

The Lady of Albarone rushed hurriedly forward,
she seized the robe, she held it aloft in the
sunbeams, and—every eye beheld the robe of
Adrian Di Albarone!

“Adrian!” shrieked the Countess, “Adrian of
Albarone—yonder secret passage leads to thy
sleeping chamber—thy departed sire, myself and
thou, alone were aware of its existence. It has
ever been a secret of our house. Tell me, by yon
murdered corse, I implore thee, tell me who flung
this door open, who laid thy robe across the threshhold?”

Adrian passed his hand wildly over his forehead
and with a cry of horror fell lifeless upon the
floor.

3. CHAPTER THE THIRD.
THE EMBRACE OF A BROTHER.

The sun was setting, calmly and solemnly setting,
behind a gorgeous pile of rainbow-hued
clouds, magnificent with airy castle and pinnacle,
while the full warmth of his beams shone through
the arching window of the Red Chamber, its

casement panels thrown wide open, filling that
place of death with light and splendor.

In the recess of the lofty casement, with the
sunshine falling all around, and the shadow of her
slender figure thrown like a belt of gloom over the
mosaic floor, stood the Ladye Annabel, silent and
motionless; her rounded arms half raised, with
the slonder hands crossed over her bosom, her
robe of pale blue velvet, with the inner vest of undimmed
white made radiant by the sunbeams;
while, swept aside from her features, the golden
hair fell with a floating motion down over her
shoulders, and along the breast of snow.

And as she stood thus still and immovable, gazing
with one unvarying glance along the court-yard,
the sunshine revealed her face of beauty,
every lineament and feature disclosed in the golden
light, seeming more like the face of a dream-spirit,
than the countenance of a mortal maiden.
The soul shone from her face. The eyes full,
large, and lustrous with their undimmed blue, dilating
and enlarging with one wild glance; the
cheek white as alabaster, yet tinted by the bloom,
and swelled with the fullness of the budding rose;
the lips small, and curvingly shaped, slightly parted,
revealing a glimpse of the ivory teeth; the
chin, with its dimple; the brow, with its clear
surface, marked by the parted hair, waving aside
like clustered sunbeams—such was the face of the
Ladye Annabel, all vision, all loveliness, and soul.

“He is bound; yes, bound with the cord and
thong! They gather around him, with looks of
insult; they place him on the steed; they move—
oh, mother of Heaven!—they move toward the
castle gate! And shall I never see him again—
never, never? It is a dream; it is no reality.
It is a dream! Was it a dream, yesterday, when
he stood in this recess, his hand clasped in mine,
his eyes calm and eloquent, gazing in mine, while
his voice spoke of the sunset glories of the summer
sky?”

One long, wild glance at the scene in the court-yard,
and then veiling her eyes from the sight,
she started wildly from the window.

“It is a dream,” murmured the Ladye Annabel,
as she hurriedly glided from the room, and
the echoes returned her whisper. “It is, it is a
dream!”

Her footsteps had scarce ceased to echo along
the ante-chamber, when another footstep was
heard, and ere a moment passed, Aldarin stood
in the recess of the lofty window of the Red Chamber.
His face was agitated by strange and va
rying expressions, as with a keen and anxious
eye he glanced over the spears and pennons of a
long line of men-at-arms, passing under the raised
portcullis of the castle gate.

The portcullis was lowered with a thundering
clang, the spears and pennons, the gallant steeds
and their stalwart riders, were lost to sight, but
presently came bursting into view again, beyond
the castle gate, where the highway to Florence,
appearing from amid surrounding woods, led up
a steep and precipitous hill. And there, flashing
with gold and glowing with embroidery, the broad
banner of the Duke of Florence was borne in the
van of the calvacade. Then came four men-at-arms,
in armor of blazing gold; and then, distinguished
by his rich array, rode the Duke, mounted
upon a snow-white charger, and behind him,
environed by guards, his arms lashed behind his
back, came Lord Adrian Di Albarone, accused of
the most foul and atrocious murder of his sire.
Beside her son, her face closely veiled, and her
form bowed low, the Countess rode; and in the
rear, their steeds gaily prancing, their spears
flashing, and their pennons glancing in the sun,
came the men-at-arms in long and gallant array.

With parted lips and strained eyes did Signior
Aldarin watch the movements of this company.

As the steed of the last man-at-arms was lost
in the shades of the forest, Aldarin smiled grimly,
and, extending his shrivelled hand, shouted in
tones of exultation:

“One hour ago I was the stooping scholar,—
The Signior Aldarin. Now!” full boldly did he
swell that little word; “Now, I am the Count Aldarin
Di Albarone, lord of the wide domains of
Albarone!”

He laughed the short, husky laugh which was
peculiar to him.

“Adrian swept from my path—and is he not
already swept from my path?—that brainless
idiot, my liege of Florence, swallowed the charge
against that forward boy as greedily as the fish
swallows the tempting bait; the signet and the
robe will bring the changeling to the block, and
thus, my only obstacle swept away, I, as next
heir, succeed to the titles and estates of Albarone!
And Annabel, my fair daughter! thy brow shall
be decked with a coronet; thou shall reign Duchess
of Florence! Ha—ha!”

And here, as the wide prospect of ambition
opened to his mind's eye, he became silent, and,
hurriedly pacing the floor, resigned his soul to
the dreams of his excited fancy.

Suddenly his visions were interrupted by a
deep sigh, that seemed to proceed from the corse
upon the couch.

Aldarin started, and for a moment stood still
as a statue, his ear inclined toward the couch, as
if intently listening; his lips apart, and his quivering
hands stretched forth as though he would
defend himself from some unreal foe.

At last, gaining courage, he approached the bed.
There, without the slightest signs of animation,
lay the faded form of the gallant warrior; the
eyes closed, the stern expression of the features
vanished, and the whole attitude that of unconscious
repose.

Turning away, Aldarin was chiding himself for
his childish terror, when a deep, sonorous groan
met his ear. With a beating heart he once more
turned, and beheld a sight that caused the cold
sweat of intense terror to ooze from his person,
and every nerve to quake with alarm.

The eyes of the Count were wide open; a slight
flush pervaded his cheeks, and his entire attitude
was changed. A voice came from his pallid lips:

“Annabel, dearest Annabel! a fearful dream
but now possessed my fancy! Methought I lay
dead—dead, Annabel, dead; and that I died ere
thy nuptials were solemnized—thy nuptials, Annabel,
and thine Adrian!”

A fearful expression came over the scholar Aldarin's
features, as though he was stringing his
mind to one great effort. In an instant his countenance
became calm again, and approaching the
bedside, he enquired, in a soft voice, if his dear
brother wanted anything?

The Count answered hurriedly, as if a sudden
light burst upon him:

“Ah! the Virgin save us! good Aldarin, art
thou here? Surely, I saw Adrian and Annabel
but a moment since? Surely—”

“Nay, my brother;” answered Aldarin, “'twas
but mere phantasy. Annabel is not with us, nor
is my Lord Adrian here; but I, dear brother, I
am by your side.”

Speaking these words in a voice tremulous with
affection, Signior Aldarin passed his left arm
around the body of the Count, while the other enclosed
his neck. He clasped him in an ardent
embrace, as he continued:

“I am with you, dear brother; I will minister
to your slightest wish; I, Aldarin, your own devoted
friend.”

Here he inserted his right hand beneath the
long gray locks of the Count, and clasping his
neck, pressed him yet closer to his bosom.

“Kind Aldarin,” the Count began, but the sentence
was cut short by a piercing cry, and the
right hand of Aldarin clutched tighter and tighter
around his brother's throat.

“Nay, brother, thou shalt have rest, an' thou
wishest it,” cried Signor Aldarin. “There, sleep
softly, and pleasant dreams attend you!”

The Count fell heavily upon the bed; his bloodshot
eyes protruded from his blackened face, a
livid circle was around his throat, and a thin
line of blood trickled from his mouth. A heavy,
deep, prolonged sigh came from his chest, and
the murdered man ceased to live.

“The fiend be thanked!—it is done!”

Having thus spoken, in a voice that came from
his clenched teeth, the murderer looked up and
saw—the dogged, rough, yet honest visage of the
stout yeoman peeping from among the curtains,
on the opposite side of the bed, his eyes steadily
fixed on the corse, and a curious look of inquiry
visible in every feature of his face.

ALDARIN, THE SCHOLAR, AND ROBIN, THE
SOLDIER.

The Signior drew back, trembling in every
limb, and pale as death. It was a moment ere he
recovered his speech, when, assuming a haughty
air, he exclaimed:

“Slave, what do you here? Is it thus you intrude
upon my privacy? Speak, sir—your excuse!”

The stout yeoman replied in his usual manner,
speaking in the Italian, but with a sharp English
accent:

“Why, most worshipful Signior, you will please
to bear in mind that for twenty long years have I
followed my lord, he who now lies cold and senseless,
to the wars. That withered arm have I
seen bearing down upon the foe in the thickest of
the fight; that sunken eye have I beheld glance
with the stern look of command. By his side
have I fought and bled; for him did I leave my
own native land—merrie, merrie England,—and
I will say, a more generous, true-hearted, and valiant
knight, never wore spurs, or broke a lance,
than my lord, the noble Count Julian Di Albarone.”

The yeoman passed the sleeve of his blue doublet
across his eyes.

“Well, sirrah,” cried the Signior, “to what
tends all this?”

“Marry, to this does it tend: that wishing to
behold that noble face yet once more, I stole silently
to this chamber, thinking to be a little
while alone with my brave lord. I did not discover
your presence, till I looked through the curtains
and saw—”

The stout Englishman suddenly stopped; there
was a curious twitch in his left eye, and a grim
smile upon his lip.

“Saw what, sirrah?” hurriedly asked the scholar
Aldarin.

“Marry, I saw thee, worshipful Signior, in the
act of embracing the Count; and such a warm,
kind, brotherly embrace as it was! By St. Withold!
it did me more good than a hundred of Father
Antonio's homilies—by my faith, it did!”

The thin visage of Aldarin became white as
snow and red as crimson by turns. Making an
effort to conceal his agitation, he replied;

“Well, well, Robin, thou art a good fellow, after
all, though, to be sure, thy manners are somewhat
rough. I tell thee, brave yeoman, I have
long had it in my mind to advance thy condition.
Follow me to the Round Room, good Robin, where
I will speak further to thee of this matter.”

“The Round Room!” murmured Robin, as he
followed the scholar Aldarin from the Red Chamber.
“Ha! 'tis the secret chamber o' th' scholar;
many, many have been seen entering its confines
—never a single man has been seen emerging
from its narrow door, save the scholar Aldarin!
I'll beware the serpent's pangs! I'll drink no
goblets o' wine, touch no food or dainty viands
while in this Round Room; or else, by St. Withold,
Rough Robin's place may be vacant in the
hall, forever and a day!”

With these thoughts traversing his mind, the
yeoman followed the scholar over the floor of the
ante-chamber, and as they entered the confines of
a gloomy corridor, a spectacle was visible, which,
to say the least, was marked by curious and singular
features.

Imagine the solemn scholar striding slowly
along the corridor with measured and gliding foot-steps,
while behind him walks Robin the Rough,
describing various eccentric figures in the air
with his clenched hands; now brandishing them
above the Signior's head, now exhibiting a remarkable
display of muscular vigor at the very
back of Aldarin; and again, making a pass with
all his strength apparently at the body of the alchymist,
but in reality at the intangible atmosphere.
These demonstrations did not appear to
give the stout yeoman much pain, for his cheeks
were very much agitated, and from his eyes were
rolling thick, large tears of laughter.

The corridor terminated in a long, dark gallery
hung with pictures colored by age, and framed in
massive oak. Traversing this gallery, they ascended
a staircase of stone, and passed along another
corridor, terminated by a winding staircase. This
the scholar and the yeoman descended, and then
came another gallery, another ascending stairway,
and then various labyrinthine passages traversed,
Rough Robin at last found himself standing side
by side with Aldarin, in front of the dark panels
of the narrow door leading into the Round Room.

This room was scarce ever visited by any living
being in the castle save Aldarin, and strange legends
concerning its mysterious secrets were current
among the servitors of Albarone.

Many had been seen entering its confines with
the Signior, but never was any one, save Aldarin,
seen to emerge from its gloomy door.

4. CHAPTER THE FOURTH.
THE DEATH-TRAP.

ROBIN THE ROUGH IS ADVANCED TO HONOR,
WHILE THE SKELETON-GOD LAUGHS
OVER HIS SHOULDER.

The door flew suddenly open, and Robin, gazing
around, found himself standing in a small room,
circular in form, with arching ceiling, and floor
of stone. The walls were lined with shelves,
piled with massive books, clasped by fastenings of
silver and of gold, thrown among scrolls of parchment,
richly illuminated, and emblazoned with
strange figures, relieving pictures of dark and
hidden meaning.

The apartment having no casement, light was
supplied by a small lamp of curious workmanship,
depending from the arched ceiling, and diffusing
its intense and radiant beams all around the place,
making the lonely room as bright as though the
noonday sun shone over its shelves and walls.

Around the chamber were scattered strange instruments
pertaining to the science of astrology
or mysteries of alchemy; here richly emblazoned
parchments, inscribed with curious characters,
glittered in the light; and yonder, the ghastly
skull, with its hideous grin of mockery, was strown
along the floor, mingled with the bones of the human
skeleton, the last fragments of the tenement
of the living soul.

While Robin's eyes distended in wonder, as he hastily
glanced around the room, he stumbled and fell
against an object reared in the centre of the floor.

“The foul fiend take thee, slave!” shouted Aldarin,
as, with his extended arms, he stayed the
soldier in his fall. “Wouldst thou destroy the
labor of thrice seven long years? Wouldst thou
destroy a Mighty Thought? Stand aside from the
altar, and come not near it again, or by the body
of * * *, I will brain thee with this dagger! Thou
slave!” he shrieked, in tones of wild indignation,
as his blazing eye was fixed upon the face of the
yeoman, who stood confused and silent, “for what
dost thou suppose I have watched yon beechen
flame, by day and night, for twenty-one long years?
For what have I wasted the youth and the vigor
of my days before yon altar? Was it to have my
labor, the mighty thought, for which I have dared
what mortal never dared before, destroyed by thy
clumsy carcase? Dost think so, slave?”

Rough Robin murmured an excuse for his awkwardness,
and, while the Signior's features subsided
into their usual deep and solemn expression,
he again gazed around the room.

From the centre of the oaken floor arose a small
altar, built of snow-white marble, with a light blue
flame arising from a vessel of gold on its surface:
the fire sweeping along the sides of an alembic,
suspended over the altar by four chains, attached
to as many rods of gold placed at each corner of
the structure.

There was something so strange and solemn in
the entire aspect of the place—the light blue flame
arising in tongues of fire from the vessel of gold
on the snow-white altar, burning for ever beneath
the hanging alembic, the chains and rods of gold,
the pure and undimmed white of the marble, varied
by no sculpturing or ornament, combined with
the utter stillness and solitude of the room—that
Robin felt awed, he scarce knew why; and dark
forebodings crept like shadows over his brain.

The scholar seated himself upon a small stool
placed near the other, and pointing to another, in
a mild voice, desired Robin to follow his example.
The yeoman hesitated.

“It is not meet for a poor yeoman o' th' Guard
to rest himself in the presence of so great a scholar.”

“Nay, nay, good Robin, rest thyself. I was
angered with thee a moment hence, but now it is
all past. Seat thyself, brave yeoman.”

The soldier complied, and rested his stout person
upon a stool of oak, placed some six feet
from the spot where sat the Signior Aldarin. Robin
had but time to note a singular circumstance,
ere the scholar spoke. The stool upon which the
stout yeoman sat, was firmly jointed in a large
slab of red stone, which, spreading before him for
the space of some six feet, was curiously fixed in
the planks of the oaken floor.

With a mild and smiling look, the scholar
spoke:—

“Robin, thou hast been a true and faithful vassal
to my late brother. Thou didst right carefully
attend Lord Julian, when forced by the incurable
wound of a poisoned arrow, some three months
since, he returned from Palestine, leaving Sir
Geoffrey o' th' Long-sword, at the head of his
men-at-arms. Robin, I have long designed to testify
the good opinion in which I hold thee by
some substantial gift—thou shalt be Seneschal of
this mighty castle of Albarone!”

“Marry, good Signior—”

“How, sir!—dost thou address me as Signior?
Vassal, I am the Lord of Albarone!”

“But Adrian—”

“What sayest thou of Adrian? A murderer—
a parricide—his death is certain. The Duke of
Florence hath sworn it.”

“Well, my Lord Count, then, an' it pleases you
better, I was about to say that if I had my choice
I would sooner be made an esquire.”

“This thou shalt be:—first promise to serve
me faithfully in all that I shall command.”

“Well, as far as an honest man may, so far do
I promise.”

The scholar Aldarin mused a moment, and then
said carelessly:

“Was it not an exceeding wicked deed—this
murder of my good brother?”

“Aye, marry was it,” replied Robin, looking
fixedly at Aldarin, “and the fiend of hell, himself,
could not have done a more damned, or a more
accursed thing.”

“True, good Robin, 'twas a horrid murder.
What could have prompted Adrain to raise his
hand against his father, eh? good Robin?”

The yeoman did not reply. He cast his eyes
to the floor, and confusedly fingered his cap.

The Count Aldarin—so must I style him—
reached a folded parchment from a writing-desk,
and then asked:

“Why dost thou not speak, good Robin? What
art thinking of?”

“Why, heaven save your lordship,” said Robin,
speaking in a whisper, and gazing full in Aldarin's

face, “I was just wondering whether the
murderer embraced the Count ere he strangled
him?”

Aldarin started aside—his features were writhen
into a fearful contortion, and his whole frame
shook like a leaf of the aspen tree. Again he
turned his visage: it was calm as the face of innocence,
and a smile was on his pinched lip.

“Receive thy warrant as seneschal of the Castle
Di Albarone,” said Aldarin, as he held forth
the parchment. “Nay, kneel not, good Robin;
keep thy seat.”

Robin held forth his hand to reach the parchment;
his fingers touched it, when Aldarin stamped
his foot upon the floor, and the slab of red
stone fell quick as lightning beneath the yeoman.
A deep and dark well was discovered. In an instant
the stool affixed to the stone was empty, and
far below, in the depths of the pit, the echo of the
falling slab sank with a sound like the rushing of
the winter wind through the corridors of a deserted
mansion.

A face, with eyes rolling ghastlily, with the
lower jaw sunken, and the tongue protruding
from the mouth, appeared above the side of the
cavity, at the very feet of Aldarin, and a muscular
hand convulsively clutched the oaken planks;
while the body of the stout yeoman was seen
through the darkness of the pit, as he clung, with
the grasp of despair, to the floor of the room.

“Devil!” shouted the desperate soldier, as he
made a convulsive effort to tighten the grasp of
his hand on the smooth plank, “I'll foil thee yet.
'Tis not the fate of an honest man to die thus!
My doom—”

“Is death!” shrieked the scholar, and drawing
the glittering dagger from his robe, he smote the
fingers of the yeoman with its unerring steel.
The joints of the hand were severed, the grasp of
the soldier failed, he gave one dying look, and
then far, far down in the pit a whizzing noise like
the sound of a falling body was heard, and as it
grew fainter and fainter did Aldarin stand in attitude
of listening, gazing down into the shadowy
void, his arms outstretched, his eyes wildly glaring,
his lips apart, and every lineament of his
face expressive of triumph, mingled with hate and
scorn.

A wild, maniac laugh came from the murderer's
lips:

“Ha—ha—ha! caitiff and slave! Thou hast
met thy fate. The scholar hath enemies, but—
ha—ha!—they all disappear!”

Again he cast his eyes into the well. All was
still as death. A single look into the dark cavity,
and, with his bitter smile, Aldarin pictured the
mangled corse of the yeoman, lying in bloody
fragments, strewn over the vaults of the castle,
amid the corses of the ghastly dead. He stamped
his foot on the floor, and the red slab, bearing the
empty stool, slowly arose on its hinges, and was
again fixed in the oaken planks.

“Silent forever, prying fool! My secret is
safe. Thou shalt no more prate of a certain warm
embrace. Nay, nay; now for my schemes. I
must send on to Florence fresh proofs of Adrian's
guilt: witnesses, and so on, and so on. That
matter arranged, then comes the marriage of Annabel
and the Duke. Ha—ha! Let me think.”

Here he fell into a musing fit, and having newly
fed the beechen flame upon the altar of marble,
he approached a point of the Round Room, where
a small knob of iron projected from the oaken
floor. Stamping upon the knob, a division of the
shelving receded, and a portion of the wall, leaving
an open space, while a passage was disclosed
into a secret chamber, beyond the Round Room.
A door of dark and solid wood, painted in imitation
of the walls of the Round Room, had been
made in an aperture of the wall, with shelving
placed on its panels, and every sign or mark of
the existence of such a door, carefully and effectually
erased. It bore a complete resemblance to
the other parts of the walls, and no one, save
Aldarin, could have dreamed of its existence.
The small knob in the oaken floor, communicated
with a spring, and the secret door rolled into the
adjoining room on grooves fixed in the floor.

Aldarin stepped through the secret passage,
the door rolled back, and the Round Room was
left to the silent flame and the grinning skull.

5. CHAPTER THE FIFTH.
THE CHAMBER OF MYSTERIES.

A chamber with a low, dark ceiling, supported
by massive rafters of oak, floor and wall of dark
stone, unrelieved by wainscot or plaster, bare,
rugged and destitute, in form, an oblong square,

narrow in width, and extensive in length, with
the impression of a coffin-like gloom and confinement,
resting upon each dark stone and rugged
rafter, while the air was insupportable with the
scent of decaying mortality.

In the centre of the room arose a rough table
of massive oak, with a smoking light, burning in
a vessel of iron, placed at each corner, flinging
a dreary brilliancy around the darkness of the
chamber.

The ruddy light threw its red and murky
beams over the fearful burden of the table. It
was piled with ghastly carcasses of the dead!
There were lifeless trunks, all hewn and hacked,
there were discolored faces, green with decay,
with the eyes scooped from the sockets, the livid
skin dropping from the forehead, the jaw torn
from its socket, and the brain, once the resting
place of the mighty soul, protruding in all its discoloration
and corruption over the bared brow;
there were arms and limbs torn from the body,
some yet wearing the hue of life, others rendered
hideous and disgusting by the revel of the worm;
there, in that lone room were piled up all these
ghastly remains of humanity, these fearful mockeries
of life, there rotting relics of what had once
enthroned the GIANT SOUL.

The form of a muscular man, with chest of
iron, and arms of brass, lay on the centre of the
table, side by side with the figure of a fragile woman,
the short, stiff locks of the one surmounting
the half peeled forehead of the warrior, while the
sweeping tresses of the other, drooped over the
white cheek, the alabaster neck, and fell twining
over the bosom, yet untainted by decay.

“Here,” cried Aldarin, with a wild and dilating
eye—“Here for twenty-one long years have I
toiled. The sun shone over the beauty of spring,
the luxury of summer, and yet I beheld him not.
Autumn came with its decay, and winter with
its cold, and yet Aldarin went not forth. Toil,
tiol, toil, while youth died in my veins, and age
came wrinkling over my brow; toil, toil, toil, unceasing
and eternal toil. Julian went to war, his
plume waved over the ranks of battle. Aldarin
toiled on, over the carcasses of the dead. Others
have made friends among the living, and won
honour from the great—it was mine to build a
home amid the carcasses of the rotting dead, and to
wring knowledge, wild and terrible, it is true, yet
mighty knowledge, from the grasp of death. Toil,
toil, toil, but not forever. It will come at last—
the glorious secret. A few more weary days, a
few more dreary nights, and the corse will speak,
the alembic will give forth the secret. The future
speaks two words that fill my heart with fire—
unbounded wealth—Immortal life!”

He looked around with a blazing eye and extended
arm—“They rise before me, the host of
victims—ghastly with the death-hue, gory with
blood they rise, they raise their hands, and shriek
my name! And yet, it was to be, it was to be,
and it was! And he, the last, the most dread and
fearful sacrifice—oh, Fiend, wring not my heart
with throes of fire, nor point to yon wan and pallid
form! I tell thee when the last secret shall have
been wrung from the lips of Death, then, then, he,
aye, he may, may—”

He paused, he drooped his head low on his
breast, a scarcely audible murmur broke from his
lips. Two phrases of doubtful purport might
alone be heard—

“Live again”—and then the murmur—“mighty
secret—from his body”—

Aldarin turned from his dread and mystic reveries,
he seized the scalpel, he commenced the
work of knowledge, among the carcasses of the
dead. Long he labored, and eagerly he toiled,
but at last, as the solemn hours of the night wore
on, he slept and dreamed a dream. Prostrate
among the bodies of the dead, his arms flung
carelessly on either side over the torn and mangled
faces, Aldarin slept and dreamed.

And this was the Dream of Aldarin the
Fratricide.

THE DREAM OF THE DAMNED.

He stood upon a lonely isle. His feet were
tortured by the sensation of burning, he looked
beneath in wonder, he found he stood upon a rock
of fire. He looked around—he beheld an ocean
of fire; as far as eye could see, nothing met his vision
but the waves of crimson flame, undulating
to and fro, with a gentle, yet solemn motion. Had
the waves arisen around him, in giant billows, or
swept above in mountains of liquid flame, the
dreamer would have rejoiced, his spirit would
have joined in the tumult, his soul become the
incarnation of the storm. But that strange calmness
of the waves, that quiet undulation, awed

him, chilled him to the heart. He looked again
over the shoreless sea, and saw with straining
eyes a sight of woe—unutterable woe.

From the surface of every wave, from the waves
breaking in spiral flames at his feet, afar and near,
on every side, from the surface of every wave was
thrust a discolored face, with burning eyes, that
gleamed with a strange life, while the lips were
colorless, the cheeks livid, and the brow green
with decay. As the Dreamer looked, low, faint
murmurs, unutterable sighs and sobs, broke on
the air, and a hollow whisper, more like the echo
of a thought than a sound, came to his ear—
THESE ARE THE FACES OF THE DAMNED—every
face you see, is the face of a Lost-soul—THESE
ARE THE FACES OF THE DAMNED.

Aldarin turned from side to side with a horror
he had never felt before. All around seemed turning
to fire, fire in every shape and form, fire intangible
and fire incarnate. Above, no sky with
Sun of Glory gave light to the ocean of flame,
with the faces of the damned, thrust from every
billow. A roof of brass, vast and awful, and magnificent,
arched over the waves of fire; it was
heated to a burning heat, and the eye of Aldarin
seemed turning to flame, as he looked upon the
brazen sky. The horizon of this fearful sky, was
concealed by great clouds, rolling slowly on, and
on, and on, over the waves of fire, far, far, from
the isle where stood Aldarin.

And while the hollow murmur broke over the
scene, and the wispering of suppressed voices, and
the sobs of soft voiced women, shrieking that unutterable
wail, Aldarin felt the very air burn into
his flesh, hotter, and more torturing than the air
of the simoom, he felt the rock beneath him turning
to red-hot fire, his feet were crumbling into
fragments, while agony and intense pain, quivered
along his veins, and the flame lapped up his blood.
He burned, and yet—he burned not. The air penetrated
into his flesh, entering the pores, burning
along his veins; he felt the fire at his very heart,
he drank in the flame with every breath, and yet
—he burned not. No sooner did his feet crumble
with the agonizing influence of the fire, than another
portion of his frame, seemed renewing its life,
his heart became young, and his brain flowed with
healthy blood. Again his feet renewed their flesh,
and then, with a hollow voice, he shrieked, mingling
in that unutterable wail of the damned, “I
burn, I burn, my heart is on fire, my brain is
turned to flame, and yet I am not consumed!”

A sudden change in the shape of the islet on
which he stood, attracted his attention. At first
wide and extensive in form, it was now narrow
and contracted. Every moment it grew smaller,
and yet smaller, and the waves of fire came rolling
wave after wave over its surface. Aldarin started
with a new and strange horror. Terrible it was
to stand on the rock of fire, his feet consuming, his
brain on fire, his heart aflame; air, sky and ocean,
all burning into his very soul, terrible, most terrible,
but those hollow murmurs, those fearful whispers
of the damned came breaking on his ear,
speaking of mysteries, yet more terrible, in the
Vast Beyond.

The wretched man clung to the rock. Oh!
God, how fearful was the first touch of the waves
of molten flame; how the liquid fire ate into his
flesh and corrupted his blood, as the spiral flames
cresting each wave came hissing and curling
round his limbs!

The waves rose higher and higher; the bodies of
the lost, offensive with decay, the loathsome, and
worm-eaten came floating around Aldarin. He
raised his hands, he pushed the ghastly carcasses
aside, but still they came floating on, and on,
throwing their crumbling arms around his neck
and fixing their livid lips upon his burning
cheek, in the kiss of the damned.

They hailed him—brother—with a hollow welcome,
and as innumerable voices whispered forth
the sound of awe, Aldarin missed his footing on
the rock, he felt his form changing with decay, he
raised his hands in the effort to keep on the surface
of the waves, and found the fingers with the
flesh dropping from the bones; he floated on the
surface of the boundless sea, he became one of the
damned. Forever and forever lost.

They were floating on and on, the boundless
legion of the lost, and with them floated Aldarin.
A strange distant sound burst on the ear, he heard
it grow louder and louder, now it was like the
roaring of a mighty ocean, now it was like the
hissing of a thousand furnaces.

Floating on the waves the of fire, crowded by
legion of the lost, Aldarin turned with a feeling of
intense awe, and murmured the question—“What
means yon sound of terror—yon murmur of fear?”

“We are floating on and on, toward the Cataract

of Hell”—was the hoarse murmur of the
living corse floating by his side, and a million
tongues, speaking from livid lips returned the
echo—“On and on toward the Cataract of Hell!”

Aldarin was carried on without the power of
resistance, with no object to stay his career, on
and on, every moment nearing the fearful Cataract,
whose roar, and hissing and surging, now
deafened his ears, and seemed to fall upon his
very brain, with the weight of a mighty burden.

Then came a pause of strange unconsciousness,
from which Aldarin presently awoke; and opening
his eyes, gazed around.

He hung on the verge of a rock, a rock of melting
bitumen, that burned his hands to masses of
crisped and blackened flesh as he hung. The rock
flung its projecting form over a gulf, to which the
cataracts of earth might compare, as the rivulet
to the mighty ocean. It seemed to Aldarin as
though the universe, with all the boundless fields
of space, was comprised in the sweep of the awful
rocks of bitumen and red-hot ore of lead, extending
for miles and miles innumerable, on either side,
with the waves of fire—each wave bearing its awful
burden of a damned soul—surging and foaming
over the edge of the precipice, while a hissing
and crackling sound, like the noise of ten thousand
forests, ravaged by flame, startled the very air of
hell, and mingled with the shrieks of the ******.

Aldarin looked below. God of Heaven, what a
sight! A gulf, like the space occupied by a thousand
worlds—deep, vast, immense, and yet perceptible
to the eye—sunk beneath him, with its
surface of fiery waves, all convulsed and foaming
with innumerable whirlpools, all crimsoned by
bubbles of flame, each whirlpool swallowing the
millions of the lost, each bubble hearing on its surface
the face of a soul, damned and damned forever.
Forever and forever. And as the lost were borne
on by the waves and swallowed by the whirlpools,
they raised their hands and cast their burning
eyes to the brazen sky, and shrieked, with low
and muttering voices, the eternal death-wail of the
lost.

Over the cataract, shrieking and wailing, were
pitched the millions and ten thousand millions or
living-dead; each one swelling that unutterable
murmur as he fell, each soul yelling with a more
intense horror as they sank below, and all around,
innumerable echoes bursting from the rocks or
bitumen and melting lead, breaking from the
heated air, gave back the shriek, the wail and murmur
of the lost. Forever and forever lost.

And over this scene, awful and vast, towered a
figure of ebony darkness; his blackened brow concealed
in the clouds, his extended arms seemed
grasping the infinitude of the cataract, while his
feet rested upon islands of bitumen far in the gulf
below.

The eyes of the figure were fixed upon Aldarin,
as he clung with the nervous grasp of despair, to
the rock of melting bitumen, and their gaze curdled
his heated blood.

Every moment he was losing his grasp, sliding
and sliding from the rock, now his feet were
loosened and hung dangling over the gulf. There
was no hope for him, he must fall—fall, and fall forever.
At this moment, when his burning hands
clung to the rock, when his feet were dangling in
the air, when his blood-shot eyes, protruding from
their sockets, glared ghastlily above, a new and
sudden wonder attracted the gaze of Aldarin.

A stairway, built of white marble, wide, roomy,
and secure, seemed to spring from the very rock
to which he clung, and winding up from the cataract,
encircled by white and rainbow-hued clouds,
was lost in the distance, far, far above.

Aldarin beheld two figures slowly descending
the stairway from the distance—the figure of a
warrior and the form of a dark-eyed woman. As
they drew near and nearer, he felt a strange feeling
of awe gathering round his heart. He knew
the figures, he knew them well. Her face of
beauty wore a smile, her dark eyes were brilliant
as ever, brilliant as when first he wooed and won
her in the wilds of Palestine. Yet there was blood
upon her vestments near the heart; and his lip was
spotted with one drop of thick red blood.

It was most fearful to see them thus calmly approach;
it was most terrible to recognize every
line of their features, every part of their vestments.
“This,” muttered Aldarin, “this indeed, is Hell.—
And yet he must call for aid, and call to the warrior
and the woman. How the thought worked
like a serpent round his very heart!

He was sliding from the rock, slowly, yet certainly
sliding. Another moment and he would
plunge below. There was but one hope. He
might, by a desperate effort, drag his carcass
along the pointed rock; by a single extension
of his arm, his hand would grasp the lowest
step of the stairway. He prepared himself for the
effort, his feet hung dangling below, it is true, and

his body was gradually slipping, but he gathered
all the strength of his living corse for that single
effort. Slowly he passed his hand along the rock
of bitumen, clutching the red-hot masses of lead
in the action, and with his heart all aflame, he
supported his trembling carcass with the other
hand, and passed the extended hand yet further
along the rock.

It wanted but a single inch, a little inch, and
his hand would grasp the marble of the stairway.
And yet that inch he could not compass with the
hand so nervously outstretched, all his strength
had been expended in the effort, and there he
hung trembling on the verge of the abyss, when
had he but the additional vigor of a mere child,
he might grasp the stairway—he might be saved.

Another and a desperate effort! His fingers
touched the carved marble-work of the stair-way,
but had not freedom of action to hold in their
grasp. With an eye of horrible intensity he looked
above him, ere he made the last effort. The
figures stood before him on the second step of the
stairway. The woman, beautiful and bright-eyed,
smiled, and the stern warrior shared her smile.

“Thou, thou wilt save me Ilmerine—my wife,
my love, thou wilt—drag—drag—my hand to thee,
and I can reach the staircase.”

She stooped, the beautiful woman, she reached
forth a fair and lily hand, she grasped the blackened
fingers of Aldarin.

“Thanks, beautiful Ilmerine. I have wronged
thee, but—the Secret—a little nearer—drag—
drag my hand—a moment—and I will grasp the
staircase—I will be saved.”

She placed his fingers round a projecting ornament
of the staircase, his grasp was tight and desperate.

“Ascend!” she cried in a sweet and soft toned
voice.

“Julian—oh, Julian—grasp this hand—aid me,
oh Julian my brother!”

The figure of the Warrior slowly stooped and
seized the other hand, and drawing it towards the
staircase wound the fingers round another piece
of the carved work of the staircase.

“Ascend, Aldarin, brother of mine, ascend!”
cried his deep toned and awful voice.

“Ascend, brother of mine, I would, but my
strength fails—seize me, by the body, and drag
me from this rock of terror—oh, seize me.”

The Warrior seized Aldarin by the shoulder,
and dragged him slowly along the rock, but the
flesh he clenched, crumbled in his grasp. Alda
rin again trembled over the verge of the abyss—
the blow of a single straw, might suffice to hurl
him into the world below.

“Julian my brother. Ilmerine my wife, save
me—oh, save me!”

The woman, dark-haired and beautiful, stooped,
she slowly unwound the fingers of Aldarin from
the ornament of the staircase. And as she unwound
finger after finger, she looked upon his
horror-stricken face and smiled, and pointed to
the red-wound near her heart. He returned her
smile with a ghastly grimace, he looked to
the Warrior, and tightened the grasp of his other
hand.

“Thou Julian, wilt save me—thou wilt not unwind
my fingers, thou wilt hurl this beautiful demon
aside.”

“Aldarin my brother!” said the Figure in a
voice of awe, as kneeling on the lowest step of the
staircase, he cast the glance of his full and
burning eyes upon the livid visage of Aldarin,
while for a moment he wound the folds of his
robe yet closer around his warrior-form.—“Aldarin,
my brother, I will save thee.”

He smiled—Aldarin returned his smile.

“Reach me thy hand, Julian, thy hand, or I
perish.”

The Warrior slowly reached forth his hand,
from beneath the folds of his cloak, he held it before
the face of Aldarin, and the eyes of the doomed
man saw that the fingers clenched a Goblet of
Gold, that shone and glimmered thro' the air, like
a beacon-fire of hell.

“Oh—Fiend—the Death-bowl!”

As these words shrieked from Aldarin's livid
lips, he drew back from the maddening sight,
with horror, he missed his hold, he slid from the
rock—HE FELL.

A thousand fires burned before his eyes, ten
thousand horrid sounds fell on his very brain,
serpents loathsome and noxious crawled thro' his
hair, all around, above and beneath was fire,
waves of flame eating into his soul, sky of
brass, burning his eyes from their sockets, all was
fire and horror and death, and—still he fell.

And a hoarse hollow voice, rising above the
murmurs of the damned, spoke forth the words
—“Forever and Forever”—and all hell gave
back the echo—“Ever, Ever, Ever!” Still he
fell! The whirlpool sucked him within its circles
of flame, around and around he dashed, with

the bodies of the living—dead floating over him,
with ghastly faces, upturned to his vision, with
foul arms, clenching him in a loathsome embrace,
around and around he dashed, joining in the low
deep murmur of the damned, and his heart gave
back the murmur. This, This, is hell!

Suddenly all was dark. Aldarin heard no sound,
no murmur of the lost. All was dark, all was
still. He touched his brow, and was amazed to
find it untortured by flame. Yet big beaded drops
of sweat stood from his forehead, his frame was
chilled, a feeling of unutterable AWE was upon
him, he feared to stir. He had been dreaming.
His dream was past, his consciousness gradually
returned, he found himself reclining among the
foul remnants of decay, amid the carcasses of the
dead.

He drooped his head low on his bosom, his face
rested on his knees, his arms were folded across
his eyes, and there in that lone chamber, while
the silent hours of the night wore on, with his
own weird soul, communed Aldarin the Fratricide.

6. CHAPTER THE SIXTH.
THE CELL OF THE DOOMED.

THE DOOMSMAN.

“He dies at daybreak—ha, ha, ha—he dies by
the wheel.”

And as he laughed, the man-at-arms, Hugo, let
fall the end of his pike upon the dark pavement,
and the sound echoed along the gloom of the gallery,
like thunder, every arch repeating the echo,
and every nook and corner of the obscure passage
taking up the sound, until, an indistinct murmur
swelled from all sides, and the voices of the Invisible
seemed whispering from the old and blood-stained
walls.

“He dies at day-break! Right, Hugo—the Goblet
and the Ring, sent him to the doomsman!”

“And I—I—the Doomsman will have his
blood! How looked he, good Balvardo, when the
sentence of the Duke rang thro' the hall—“Death,
Death to the Parricide?” Quailed he or begged
for mercy?”

“Quail? 'Slife I've seen the eye of the dying
war-horse, when the poisoned arrow was in his
heart, and the death-cry of his master in his ears,
but the mad glare of his eye never thrilled me,
like the deep glance of this—murderer! Blood o'
th' Turk, his eye burned like a coal!”

“Tell me, tell me, how was the murder fixed
upon him? Who laid it to his hands?”

Blood o' th' Turk! Must thou know everything!
Then go ask the gossips, at the corners of the
streets, and hear them tell in frightened murmurs,
how the Poisoned Bowl was found on the beaufet,
how the Signet-Ring was found in the bowl, how
the Robe was thrown over the secret threshold,
and— ha, ha, how one Balvardo swore to certain
words uttered by the—Parricide, wishes for
the old lord's death, hopes of hot-brained youth,
and mysterious whispers about that Ring, and”—

“How one Hugo—ha, ha,—swore to his guilt
in like manner. Faith did I—how I met the
young Lord, in the southern corridor about high
noon, how he turned pale when I told him, with
every mark of respect, be sure, that he had forgotten
his crimson robe, and—”

“So ye gave him to the Doomsman?” shrieked
the executioner, as his thick-set hump-backed
figure was disclosed in the solitary light, hanging
from the ceiling of the gallery—“So ye gave him—
Lord Adrian—to me, to the pincers and the knife,
to the hot lead, and the wheel of torture! You are
brave fellows—ha, ha, he dies at day-break—and
the Doomsman thanks ye!”

The two sentinels watching in the Gaol of Florence,
besides the gloomy door of the Doomed Cell,
started with a sudden thrill of fear, as they looked
upon the distorted form, and hideous face, of the
wretch who stood laughing and chattering before
their eyes.

Balvardo drew his stout form to its full height,
and bent the darkness of his beetle-brows, upon
the deformed Doomsman, and Hugo, clad in armour
of shining steel, like his comrade, started
nervously aside, as his squinting eyes were fixed
upon the distorted face, the wide mouth, opening
with a hideous grin, the retreating brow and the
large, vacant, yet flashing eyes, that marked the
visage of the Executioner of Florence. A dress
made of coarsest serge, hung rather than fitted
around his deformed figure, while a long-bladed
knife, with handle of unshapen bone, glittered in
the belt of dark leather that girdled his body.

“Sir Doomsman, thou art merry”—growled Balvardo—“Choose
other scenes for thy merry humor—this
dark corridor, with shadows of gloom
in the distance, and the flickering light of yon
smoking cresset, making the old walls yet more

gloomy, around us, is no place for thy magpie
laugh. No more such sounds of grave yard merriment
or—we quarrel, mark ye.

“We quarrel, mark ye!” echoed the sinister-eyed
Hugo, gravely dropping the end of his pike
on the pavement.

“St. Judas! My brave men of mettle are wondrous
fiery, this quiet night! Ha—ha—pardon
Sir Balvardo, I meant not to anger ye! Yet dost
thou know that it makes my veins fill with new
blood! and my heart warm with a strange fire.”

“Thy veins fill with new blood! Ha—ha—ha!
—Did'st ever hear of a withered vine, blackened
by flame, bearing ripe grapes, or was ever a dead
toad perfumed by the south wind? Hugo, his
heart warms with a strange fire? Odor o' pitch
and brimstone, what a fancy! Ha—ha—”

“Nay, nay Balvardo. There is some life in the
Doomsman's veins. Don't doubt it? Just fancy
those taloons, which he calls fingers, clutched
round thy throat—W-h-e-w!”

“I say it makes my veins fill with new blood,
my heart warm with a strange fire—this matchless
picture! A gallant Lord, with the warm flush
of youth on his cheek, strength in his limbs and
fire in his heart, stretched out upon the wheel—
here a hand is corded to the wheel, and there another,
here a foot is bound to the spokes and there
another. He looks like the cross of Saint Andrew
—by St. Judas. A merry fancy—eh! Balvardo?
Stretched out upon the wheel, he looks with his
bloodshot eyes to the heavens. See's he any hope
there? Laid on his back, he casts his last long
glance aside over the multitude—the vile mob,
See's he a face of pity there! Hears he a voice of
mercy? None—none! Earth curses, heaven forsakes,
hell yawns! And he is of noble blood,
and on his brow there sits the frown of a lofty
line. While the mob hoot, the victim holds
his breath, and I—I the Doomsman approach!”

“God's death—he makes my blood chill!” muttered
Hugo, glancing askance at his comrade, who
stood silent biting his compressed lip.

“He writhes, for the hissing of the cauldron of
hot lead falls on his ear, he feels his flesh creep, for
the red hot glare of the blazing iron with its jagged
point blinds his eyes as he gazes! He utters
no moan—but he hears the beating of his
heart. He hears a step—a low and cat-like step
—tis mine, the Doomsman's step. The red hot
iron in one hand, the ladle filled with melted lead.
hot and seething lead in the other, nay start not
nor wince, good Balvardo—'tis no fancy picture.”

“The Fiend take thy words—they burn my
heart! Hold or by thy master, the devil, I'll strike
ye to the floor!

“Hark—hear you that hissing sound? His muscular
chest is bared to the light, these talon-hands
guide the red hot iron over the warm flesh, with
the blood blackening as it oozes from the veins.
He writhes—but utters no groan. Now lay down
the iron and the lead; seize the knotted club, aloft
it whirls, it descends! D'ye see the broken arm
bone, protruding from the flesh? Hurl it aloft
again, nor heed the sudden struggle and the quick
convulsive agony, never heed them—all writhe
and struggle so. It grows exciting, Balvardo, it
warms me, Hugo.”

Hugo muttered a half-forced syllable, but his
parted lips and absent manner, attested his unwilling
interest in the words of the Doomsman,
while Balvardo, clutching his pike, strode hurriedly
to and fro along the floor of stone.

“Again the Doomsman sweeps the club aloft!
Crash—crash—crash, and then a sound, not a
groan, not a groan, but a howl, a howl of agony!
Look, Balvardo, look Hugo, you can count the
bones as they stick out from each leg, from
each arm, from the wrist and from the shoulder,
from the ancle and the thigh, never mind the
blood—it streams in a torrent from each limb, be
sure, but the hot iron dries it up. Your melted
lead is good for cautery—it heals—ha, ha, ha, let
me laugh—it heals the wound, each blow the club
had made. The picture grows—it deepens.”

“Now by the Heaven above, I see it all”—muttered
Balvardo with a dilating eye, as his manner
suddenly changed, and he leaned forward with unwilling
yet absorbing interest. “This is no man,
but a devil's body with a devil's soul!”

“His face is yet unscarred—unmoved save by
the wrinkling contortions of pain. The mob
hoot, and hiss, and yell—the play must deepen.
Hand me the iron—red hot—and hissing—give me
the bowl of melted lead, dipped from the boiling
cauldron. The Doomsman's step again! The victim's
body creeps, and writhes in every sinew, his
veins seem crawling thro' his carcass, his nerves,
turned to thongs of incarnate pain, are drawn
and stretched to the utmost. Look well upon the
blue heavens, Parricide, for the red hot iron is
pointed, and—ha ha, how he howls—it nears your
eyes, it glares before them in their last glance.
It must be done, why howl you so? Does it burn
your eyes, tho' it touches them not? Ha, ha—I
meant it thus.”

“Balvardo, strike him down. He is not human—see
his flashing eyes, his arms thrown wildly
aside, with the taloon-fingers, grasping the
air!”

“H-i-s-s—it touches the eyeball, the eye is dark
forever! H-i-s-s it licks up the blood, it turns
round and round in the socket. Now fill the hollow
socket with the lead, the hissing lead—and,
ha, ha, now bring me another iron pointed like
this, and heated to a white heat. Quick, quick,
the victim groans, howls, writhes, and yells! Quick!
Ah, ha, let the iron touch the skin of the eyeball,
it shrivels like a burnt leaf, deeper sink the hissing
point, turn it round and round, let it lap up
the gushing blood? now the lead, the thick and
boiling lead, pour it from the ladle, fill the socket,
it hardens, it grows cold—ha, ha, ha, behold the
eyes of lead!”

“I see them!” shrieked Hugo, trembling in his
iron armor.

“And I,” echoed Balvardo—“I see them, oh,
horrible, and ghastly, I—I—see the eyes of lead!”

“Quick, quick—why lag ye man? Quick—
quick, I say! The knife, the glittering knife. The
Parricide howls not nor groans, but his soul is
trampling on the fragments of clay. Quick, while
his carcase is all palpitation, all alive with torture,
all throe, all agony and pulsation, hand
me the knife. I would cut his beating
heart from the body. There, there—the flesh,
severed to the bone, parts on either side
—the ribs are bared—a blow with the jagged
club, and they are broken. This hand is thrust
within the aperture, I feel the hot blood, I feel his
heart. It beats, it throbs, it palpitates! Quick
—the knife again—I hold the heart, cut it from
the carcass, sever each nerve, snap each artery.
A deep, low trembling heave of the chest; a rattle
in the throat. I raise the heart, the beating heart
on high, it gleams in the light of day, and its
warm blood-drops fall pattering on the face of the
felon. The mob shout their curses and hoot their
oaths of scorn. Quick, the pincers, the red hot
pincers, but hold—that shaking of the chest, that
heave of the trunk, that quivering in every splintered
limb, with that quick tremor of the lip, ha,
ha, that blanching of the cheek, with the blood
oozing from every pore, that thick gurgling sound
in the throat, he dies, the Felon dies, the Doomsman
laughs, and from the shattered clod, creeps
the Spirit of the Parricide!”

Hugo turned his face to the wall, and covered
his eyes with his upraised hands. Balvardo stood
still as death, gazing on the vacant air, with a
wild glance, as tho' he saw the Spirit of the dead.
Neither spoke, nor said a word. The maniac
wildness of the Doomsman awed and chilled them
to the heart.

“This is the fate, to which ye have given him;
this proud Lord now sleeping in the Chamber of
the Doomed—to me, the Doomsman, to the wheel,
to the knotted club, to the knife, the hot iron and
the melted lead, to the dishonor ye have given him!
Ha—ha—ha—these hands itch for his blood. To-morrow's
rising sun will gleam on the scene, this
merry scene—The Doom of the Poisoner.”

The Sentinels heard a hurried footstep, followed
by a closing door, the Doomsman had disappeared.
They turned with looks of horror, of remorse,
mingled with all the fear and torture that the human
soul can feel, stamped in their faces, while
from one to the other broke the whisper—

He sleeps within you cell—the Doomsman's
cell, till the first glimpse of the morrow morn
shall rouse him to this work—this work of horror
and of—Doom.”

THE DOOMED.

The wierd and mystic spirit that rules this
chronicle, throws open to your view the cell of the
Doomed.

It is a sad and gloomy place, where every dark
stone has its tale of blood, every name, rudely
scratched on the damp wall, its legend of despair.
All is silent, not a whisper, not a sob, not a sound.
The silence is so utter that you fear the spirits of
the condemned, who passed from this chamber to
the Wheel and the Block, might start into life—
at the sound of a whisper—from the dark corners
of the room, and appal your eye with their shapes
of horror.

The cresset of iron fixed to the rough wall threw
a dim light over the form of the Doomed, as seated
upon a rough bench, with his head drooped
between his clenched hands, his elbows resting on
his knees, his golden hair faded to a dingy brown,
falling over his shoulders and hiding his countenance,
he mused with the secrets of his heart, and
called up before his soul the mighty panorama of
despair—the wheel, the block, the doomsman, and
the multitude.

Adrian the Doomed raised his form from the
oaken bench, and paced the dungeon floor. He
was not shackled by manacles or clogged by chains

It was the last night of his existence; escape came
not within his thoughts, the walls were built of
rack, hundreds of armed sentinels paced the long
galleries of the prison, and a guard of two men-at-arms
watched without the triple-locked and triple-bolted
door of the Doomed chamber.

Suffering and pain, anxiety of mind and torture
of soul, had wrought fearful changes in the late
well knit and muscular form of the Lord of Albarone.
His countenance was pale and thin; his
lips whitened, his cheeks hollow and his eyes
sunken, while his faded locks of gold fell in
tangled masses over his face and shoulders. His
blue eye was sunken, yet it gleamed brighter than
ever, and there was meaning in its quick, fiery
glance.

“To die on the gibbet, with the taunt and the
sneer of the idiot crowd ringing in my ears, my
last look met with the vulgar grimaces and unmeaning
laughter of ten thousand clownish faces;
to die on the rack, each bone splintered by the instruments
of ignominious torture, my scarred and
mangled carcase mocking the face of day,—oh,
God—is this the fate of Adrian, heir to the fame,
the glory, and the fortunes of the house of Albarone?

Pausing in his hurried walk, he stood for a moment
still and motionless as the sculptured marble,
and then eagerly stretching forth his hands,
cried—

“Father—father! noble father! I believe thy
holy shade is now hovering unseen over the form
of thy doomed son—by all the hopes men hold of
bliss in an unknown state of being; by the faith
which teaches the belief of a future world, I implore
thee, appear and speak to me. Tell me of
that eternity which I am about to face! Tell me
of that awful world which is beyond the present!
Father, I implore thee, speak!”

His imagination, almost excited to phrenzy by
long and solitary thought, with glaring eyes, arms
outstretched, and trembling hands, the agitated
boy gazed at a dark corner of the cell, every instant
expecting to behold the dim and ghostly
form of his murdered sire slowly arise and become
visible through the misty darkness. No answer
came—no form arose. Adrian drew a dagger
from his vest.

“Father, by the mysterious tie that binds the
parent to the son, which neither time nor space
can sever—death or eternity annihilate—I implore
thee—appear!”

The tone in which he spoke was dread and
solemn. Again he waited for a response to his
adjuration, but no response came.

“This, then,” cried Adrian, raising the dagger;
“this, then, is the only resource left to me. Thus
do I cheat the mob of their show; thus do I rescue
the name of Albarone from foul dishonor!”

Tighter he clutched the dagger; his arm was
thrown back and his breast was bared; and, as he
thus nerved himself for the final blow, all the
scenes of his life—the hopes of his boyhood—the
dreams of his love, rose up before him like a picture.
And, like a vast unbounded ocean, overhung
with mists, and dark with clouds, was the
idea of the Dread Unknown to his mind.—
Amid all the memories of the past; the agonies of
the present, or the anticipations of the future, did
the calm, lovely face of the Ladye Annabel appear,
and the smile upon her lip was like the smile of
a guardian spirit, beaming with hope and love.

“Oh, God—receive my soul!—Annabel, fare-thee-well!”

The dagger descended, driven home with all
the strength of his arm.

“Hold!” exclaimed a hollow voice, and a strange
hand thrown before the breast of the doomed felon
struck his wrist, the instant the dagger's point had
touched the flesh. The weapon flew from the
hand of Adrian and fell on the other side of the
cell.

He turned and beheld the muffled form of a
monk, who had entered through the massive door,
which had been unbolted without Adrian's heeding
the noise of locks and chains, so deep was his
abstraction. The ruddy glare of torches streamed
into the cell, and the sentinels who held them,
in their endeavours to shake off their late terror
and remorse, gave utterance to unfeeling and ribald
jests.

“I say, Balvardo,” cried the sinister-eyed soldier,
“does not the springald bear himself right
boldly? And yet at break o' day he dies!”

“Marry, Hugo,” returned the other, “he had
better thought of making all these fine speeches
ere he gave the—ha—ha—ha!—the physic to the
old man.”

Reproving the sentinels for their insolence, the

muffled monk closed the door, and approaching
Adrian, exclaimed—

“My son, prepare thee for thy fate! The shades
of night behold thee erect in the pride of manhood;
the light of morn shall see thee prostrate,
bleeding, dead! Thy soul shall stand before the
bar of eternity. Art thou prepared for death, my
son?”

“Father,” Adrian answered; “I have been ever
a faithful son of the Holy Church, but its offices
will avail me naught at this hour. Once, for all,
I tell thee I will die without human prayers or
human consolation. On the solemn thought of
Him who gave me being, I alone rely for support
in the hour of a fearful death. Thy errand is a
vain one, Sir Priest, if thou dost hope to gain
shrift or confession from me. I would be alone!”

“Thou art but young to die,” said the monk, in
a quiet tone.

Adrian made no reply.

“Tell me, young sir,” cried the monk, seizing
Adrian by the wrist, “wouldst thou accept life,
though it were passed within the walls of a convent?”

“The cowl of the monk was never worn by a
descendant of Albarone. I would pass my days
as my fathers have done before me—at the head
of armies and in the din of battle!”

The monk threw back his cowl and discovered
a striking and impressive face; bearing marks of
premature age, induced by blighted hopes and
fearful wrongs. His hair, as black as jet, gathered
in short curls around a high and pallid forehead;
his eyebrows arched over dark, sparkling
eyes; his nose was short and Grecian; his lips
thin and expressive, and his chin well rounded
and prominent. And as the cowl fell back, Adrian
with a start beheld the monk of the ante-chamber!

“Count Adrian Di Albarone, this morning thou
wert tried before the Duke of Florence, and his
peers, for the murder of thy sire. Thou, a descendant
of Albarone, connected with the royal blood of
Florence, wert condemned on the testimony of two
of thy father's vassals, for this most accursed act.
I ask thee, canst thou tell who it is that hath spirited
up these perjured witnesses; and why it is that
the Duke of Florence countenances the accusations?”

“In the name of God, kind priest, I thank thee
for thy belief in my innocence. The stirrer up of
this foul wrong, is, I shame to say it, my uncle,
Aldaren, the Scholar. The reason why it is countenanced
by the duke, is —” Adrian paused as if
the words stuck in his throat; “is because he would
wed my own fair cousin, the Ladye Annabel.”

“Ha!” shouted the monk, “my suspicions were
not false. Let Aldarin look to his fate; and, as for
the duke—” thrusting his hand into his bosom, he
drew from his gown a miniature—it was the miniature
of a fair and lovely maiden.

“Behold!” cried the monk, “Adrian Di Albarone,
behold this fair and lovely countenance, where
youth, and health, and love, beaming from every
feature, mingle with the deep expression of a mind
rich in the treasure of thoughts, pure and virginal
in their beauty. Mark well the forehead, calm and
thoughtful; the ruby lips, parting with a smile; the
full cheek blooming with the rose-buds of youth—
mark the tracery of the arching neck; the half-revealed
beauty of the virgin bosom. Adrian, this
was the maiden of my heart, the one beloved of my
very soul. I was the private secretary of the duke,
he won my confidence—he betrayed it. Guilietta
was the victim, and I sought peace and oblivion
within the walls of a convent. I am now in his
favor—he loads me with honors; I accept his gifts—
aye, aye, Albertine, the Monk, takes the gold of the
proud duke, that he may effect the great object of
his existence—”

“And that—” cried Adrian—“that is—”

The monk spoke not; a smile wreathed his compressed
lips, and a glance sparkled in his eye.
Adrian was answered.

In the breast of the man to whom God has given
a soul, there also dwells at times a demon; and
that demon arises from the ruins of betrayed confidence.
The monk whispered something in the
ear of the condemned noble, and then, waving his
hand, retired.

7. CHAPTER THE SEVENTH.
THE FELON AND THE DUKE.

In a few minutes the door again opened, and
the stately form of the Countess of Albarone entered
the traitor's cell.

Why need I tell of the warm embrace with
which she enclosed her son? Why tell of her
tears that came from her very soul—her deep expressions
of detestation when the name of Aldarin,
the scholar, was mentioned? Need I say

that she was firmly assured of her son's innocence;
that she saw through the mummery of his trial,
and the trickery of his foes? Leaving all this to
the fancy of the reader of this chronicle, I pass
on with my history.

The kind discourse of mother and son was broken
off by the clanging of chains and the drawing
of locks. The light of many torches streamed
through the opened door into the cell, and the
gaily-bedizened form of the Duke was discovered.

With a last farewell, the Countess of Albarone
retired; the door was closed, and Adrian was left
alone with the Duke.

“Well, sir,” exclaimed he, “I have condescended
to visit you. Albertine, my confessor, told me
it was due to a branch of the royal blood of Florence.
It were best that you make a short story
of what you have to say. My train wait without,
and I am somewhat hurried.” Here he opened
his sleepy eyes, and, curling his bearded lip, tried
to assume a look of dignity.

Adrian bowed down to the earth.

“The son of Count Di Albarone,” said he,
“feels highly honoured by your condescension.”

“Well, now, sir, what have you to say?” exclaimed
the Duke. “Speak, ignoble son of an
honored sire—inglorious descendant of a noble
line. Speak! What would you say?”

“Merely this, most gracious Duke,” answered
Adrian, as he gazed sternly into the very eyes of
the haughty prince, “merely this, that I have been
doomed to death by thee and thy minions, in a
manner that never was noble doomed before.
Without form; on the proof of perjured caitiffs;
without defence, have I been condemned for a
crime, at the name of which hell itself would
shudder!”

The Duke sneered, as he spoke:

“Surely, I cannot help it, an' a brainless boy
takes it into his head to poison his sire.”

“Pardon me, gracious Duke,” said Adrian, as
by a sudden movement he grasped him by the
throat, and at the same time seizing his cloak of
scarlet and gold, he thrust it into his gaping
mouth. Closer and yet more close he would his
grasp, and, scarce able to breathe, much less to
speak, the Duke of Florence stood without power
or motion. Adrian coolly tripped up his heels,
and then placing his knee upon his breast by a
dexterous movement, he tore away the scarlet
cloak, and then cautiously placing one hand over
the mouth of the prince, he gathered some straw
with the other, and forced it down his throat.
Then unbuckling his own belt of rough doe skin,
he wound it around the neck and over the mouth
of the Duke, and having fastened it as tightly as
might be, he proceeded to tie his hands behind his
back; the cord he used being nothing less than
the chain of knighthood suspended from the neck
of his grace.

You may be sure this was not accomplished
without a struggle. The Duke writhed and shifted,
but to no purpose. He could not speak, and
the knee of Adrian placed on his breast, laid him
silent and motionless.

And now behold Adrian, arrayed in the blazing
cloak of the Duke, which descending to his knees,
sweeps the tops of the fine boots of doe-skin, ornamented
with spurs of gold. On his head is placed
the slouching hat of the prince, surmounted by a
group of nodding plumes, and beneath the folds
of the cloak shines the richly embossed sheath of
his sword.

Adrian surveyed his figure with a smile—that
smile which arises from the recklessness of desperation—and
then, without heeding the malignant
glances of the Duke, he fixed him against
the rough bench upon his knees, with his face to
the wall, in an attitude of prayer and devotion.—
He threw his own sombre cloak over the back
of his captive; and then, having slouched the hat
over his face, after the manner of the Duke, he
gathered up the cloak of crimson along his chin,
and stood ready to depart.

He opened the door of the traitor's cell with a
beating heart, and in an instant, found himself
standing in the gallery where the muffled priest
waited for the Duke. The soldiers bowed low to
the wearer of the scarlet cloak, and the word was
passed along the galleries—“make way for the
Duke—make way for his grace of Florence.”

The monk now advanced, and locking the door
of the doomed cell, he affixed to its panel a parchment
signed by the Duke of Florence, and sealed
with the seal of state. It declared that the prisoner,
Adrian Di Albarone, was to be seen by no
one until the morrow, when he was to suffer the
doom of the law, by the terrors of the wheel.

This done, the monk fell meekly in the rear of
Albarone, who paced along the gallery, saluted at
the door of every cell by the lowered spears of the
sentinels.

The gallery terminated in a staircase. This
Adrian and the monk ascended, and at the top

they found a company of gay cavaliers, who waited
for his grace of Florence. The wearer of the
scarlet cloak and slouching hat was greeted with
a low bow. Adrian then traversed another gallery,
and yet another; being all the while followed
by the band of gallant courtiers.

“Urban,” whispered one of these gallants to
another, “methinks our lord is wondrous silent
to-night.”

“Why, Cesarini,” replied his companion, “it
may be that he is weeping for this young springald,
Adrian. Marry, 'tis enough to make an older
man than I am weep.”

“Hist!” whispered the monk, “our lord would
have you observe strict silence.”

They had arrived at the lofty arching door of
the castle leading into the court-yard, when Adrian
was alarmed by a noise and shouting in the galleries
which he had just traversed.

“All is lost!” thought Adrian, as his hand
caught the hilt of his sword.

“Fear not,” whispered the monk, but push
boldly onward.

They now descended into the court-yard, where
a richly-attired page held a steed ready for his
grace. Springing with one bound into the saddle,
Aldarin passed under the raised portcullis, with
the monk riding at his side, and the bridle reins
of the courtiers ringing in the rear.

Thus far all was well. The monk leaned from
his saddle, and whispered to Adrian:

“One effort more, brave boy. Nerve thyself
for the trial at the palace gate.”

Traversing one of the most spacious streets of
the city of Florence, they soon arrived before the
lofty gate of the palace of the Duke.

Here a crowd of men-at-arms, blazing in armor
of gold, saluted the supposed Duke with every
mark of respect.

And finally, innumerable dangers past, behold
Adrian enter the palace, traverse innumerable
chambers, hung with gorgeous tapestry, lighted
by lamps of silver and of gold, and thronged with
nobles and courtiers, who much wondered to behold
their lord pass them by, without one mark of
recognition or sign of respect.

At last Adrian arrived before folding doors ornamented
with exquisite carving, and having the
arms of the Duke emblazoned in glowing colours
upon the panels.

“Push open the doors, and boldly enter,” whispered
the monk to Adrian, who immediately
obeyed his directions.

The monk then turned to the gallant throng of
courtiers, and said:

“My lords, his grace is unwell. He would dispense
with your further attendance.” The monk
retired.

Never arose such a mingled crowd of exclamations
of wonder as then burst from the lips of the
cavaliers. One whispered their lord must certainly
be woad; another that he must have been repulsed
in some illicit amour; and a third seriously
gave it as his opinion, that some devil or other
had taken possession of the Duke of Florence.
However, being well aware of the high regard in
which the Duke held the monk Albertine, they all
slowly trooped out of the ante-chamber, leaving it
to the guards of the palace, who watched within
its confines, as was their wont.

8. CHAPTER THE EIGHTH.
THE SECRET PASSAGE.

In a lofty chamber, hung with tapestry of purple,
embroidered with rare and pleasant designs,
and lighted by lamps of gold, depending from the
ceiling, Adrian and the Monk rested themselves
after their arduous exploit.

In one corner of the apartment stood a gorgeous
bed, with a canopy of silver and gold hangings, surmounted
by a Ducal coronet. Around were strewn
couches of the most inviting softness, and every
thing in the chamber wore an appearance of luxury
and ease.

Adrian reposed on a couch of velvet, and by his
side was seated the monk. Before them was placed
a small table, on which stood several flasks of rich
wine, together with more substantial refreshments.

“Truly, sir monk,” said Adrian, filling a goblet
of wine, “I have heard of many unmannerly acts,
but this deed of mine does seem to me to be the
most nnmannerly of all. I not only tied the brave
duke, lashed him in the Cell of the Doomed, used
his gallant steed, and worshipful name, but, forsooth!
I must also repose me upon his couches,
and refresh me with his wine!” And Adrian
laughed.

“Thou art merry, young sir. But an hour
since —”

The monk was interrupted by a slight knocking
under the tapestry. Adrian started up, and drew
his sword, taking the precaution, however, to resume
the scarlet cloak, and slouching hat. The

knocking grew louder. The monk removed the
tapestry in the part from whence the sound proceeded,
and having pressed a spring, a secret door
in the wainscotting flew open, and a woman of
beautiful countenance, and rich attire, was discovered.

“Thou here, stern priest!” said the damsel, in a
sweet voice, “I would speak with my lord.”

“Marianne, thou canst not see him to-night; he
hath no time to trifle with such as thou.”

The monk closed the door, and, turning to
Adrian, said,

“Another of this miscreant's victims, Adrian. It
was fortunate she did not see thee closely, for her
eye would have detected where hundreds might
look without suspicion. And now let us away;
every moment increases thy danger; the duke may
even now have freed himself, and set his minions
in chase.”

“To fly, I am willing, sir monk; but whither?”

“Follow me,” said the monk, as he lighted a
small lamp of silver. He then removed the tapestry,
and discovered a secret door opposite the one
afore-mentioned. This the monk entered, followed
by Adrian, and a stairway of stone, some two feet
in width, was revealed; it was cut into the wall
and over-arched, and the distance between the steps,
and the arch not more than four feet.

With great care the monk led the way down the
steps of stone, until they numbered thirty, when
they terminated in a narrow platform, which, indeed,
was nothing more than a step somewhat
longer than the others. Here our adventurers descended
another stairway, likewise ending in a
platform, and then yet another stairway was terminated
by another platform; and thus they descended
stairway after stairway, and crossed platform
after platform, until the increasing coldness
and dampness of the atmosphere, warned them that
they had penetrated far below the surface of the
earth.

Suddenly the stairway ended in a large and
gloomy vault, with walls and floor of the unhewn
rock. On the side nearest the stairway, a gate of
iron was erected between the points of two large
and irregular rocks. Through a large crevice which
time had worn into this gate, the monk and Adrain
passed into a vault like the former, except that the
dim light of the taper discovered the rough floor
strewn with grinning skulls, and whitened bones.
Along this dreary place strode the monk, lighting
the way, while, at his back followed Adrain Di
Albarone. In about a quarter of an hour the vault
narrowed into a confined passage, along which
they crawled on hands and knees. This terminated
in another vault, sloping upwards with a
gradual ascent, which having traversed, our adventurers
found themselves again between two
narrowing walls, and finally, all further progress
was stopped by a large stone thrown directly across
the path. Adrian spoke for the first time in half
n hour—

“And are we to be baulked after all the adventures
of this night?”

The monk answered by pointing to the stone, to
which he and his companion presently laid their
shoulders, but their united strength was insufficient
to remove it. Again they tried, and again were
they unsuccessful; they made a third attempt, and
the stone was precipitated before them. Seizing
the light, Adrian threw himself into the breach,
and discovered an extensive vault, hedged in by
walls built of hewn stone, while the floor was covered
by rows of coffins, with here and there a
monument of marble. Throwing themselves into
this place, they picked their way through the
dreary line of coffins, when they came to a wide
sraircase, which they ascended, until they found it
suddenly terminated by the archway above.

The monk raised his hand, and drawing a bolt
which Adrian had not perceived, he pushed with
all his strength against the archway, and a trapdoor
rose above the heads of our adventurers.—
Through this passage the monk ascended, followed
by Adrian, who looked around with a gaze of wonder,
and found himself standing in the aisle of the
Grand Cathedral of Florence.

The moonbeams streaming through the lofty
arched windows of stained glass, threw a dim light
upon the high altar with its cross of gold, and
faintly revealed the line of towering pillars which
arose to the dome of the cathedral, as vast and
magnificent it extended far above.

“My son,” cried the monk, “give thanks to God
for thy deliverance.”

And there, in that lone aisle, as the deep toned
bell of the cathedral tolled the third hour of the
morning, did Adrian and the monk fall lowly on
the marble pavement, and, prostrating themselves
before the sublime symbol of our most holy faith,
give thanks to God, the Virgin, and the Saints, for
their most wonderful escape.