University of Virginia Library

10. CHAPTER X.

[Explanatory Note.—Many scenes we might
introduce from the life of the “Midnight Queen,”
but from that dark and troubled history we will
select but a single incident, the most important
of her life.

To understand this incident, the position of her
father, Colonel Tarleton, otherwise known as Charles
Van Huyden, must be clearly understood.

For nearly twenty-one years from the infancy of
Frances, he had lived with but one object—to remove
from public view one of the children of a deceased
brother, to obtain control of the other, and
thus achieve possession of that brother's immense
wealth. For this he planned and plotted; for this
he committed the forgery which consigned him to
the State Prison; for this he had even become a
silent party to the degradation of his daughter. One
heir of his brother's fortune removed, the other in
his power, he began to see, over all the crimes of
his life, the great motive of all his crimes ripen into
success—he began to see Frank, the Midnight Queen,
his daughter, in possession of almost boundless
wealth. The day came at last. Frank, in his presence,
had administered poison to one of the heirs.
This was in the morning. Tarleton left her house,
to complete his other scheme, to obtain possession
of the remaining heir. And evening drew near—
the evening which was to find all his schemes triumphant,
and Frank the heiress of incredible wealth.
Let us look into her sad home, in this evening
hour.]

It was toward evening when, amid the
crowd of Broadway—that crowd of mad
and impetuous life—there glided like a
spectre through the mazes of a voluptuous
dance, a man of sober habit, pallid
face and downcast eyes. Beautiful women,
wrapped in soft attire, passed him
every moment, brushed him with their
perfumed garments, but he heeded them
not. There was the free laugh, the buzz
of voices, and the tramp of footsteps all
about him, but he did not raise his eyes
nor bend his ear. Gliding along in his
dark habit, he was as much alone on that
thronged pathway as though he walked
the sands of an Arabian desert. A man
of hollow cheeks, features boldly marked,
and eyes large and dark, and shining with
the fire of disease, or with the restlessness
of a soul that had turned upon itself,
and was gnawing ever and ever at
its own life-strings.

His habit—a long black coat, single
breasted, and with a plain white band
about the neck—indicated that he was a
Catholic priest.

He was a priest. Struck down in his
early manhood by an irreparable calamity,
he had looked all around the horizon
of his life for—peace. Repose, a quiet
life, an obscure grave, became the objects
of his soul's desire, instead of the ambitions
which his young manhood had cherished.

As there was not peace within him, so
he searched the world for it, and in vain.

He sought it in a money-bound Protestant
church, behind whose pulpit bible,
like a toad upon an altar, (too often,)
Mammon, holy Mammon squats in bank-note
grandeur. And there he found
money and much cant, and abundance of
sect, but no peace.

To the Catholic church he turned.
Won by the poetry of that church—we
use the word in its awful and intense
sense—for poetry and religion are one—
he sought repose in its bosom. Did he
find peace?

Yes, when veiling his eyes from * * *
he opened the gospels, and from their
pages saw kindle into life and love, the
face of him whom creeds may ministerpret
or defame, but whose name forever,
to suffering humanity, is—“Consolation.”

As he passed thus along Broadway,
buried in his thoughts, and utterly unconscious
of the scene around him, he
felt a hand press his own. He awoke
from his thoughts, stopped and looked

around. The crowd was hurrying by,
but the person who pressed his hand had
disappeared. Was that pressure of the
hand a mere freak of the imagination?
No; for the hand of the unknown had
left within the hand of the priest, a
neatly folded letter, upon which, in a fair
and delicate hand, was written his own
name.

Stepping aside from the crowd, he
opened and read the letter. It was very
brief, but its contents called a glow to
the pale cheek of the priest.

He at once retraced his steps, and
passed down Broadway, with a rapid and
eager step. Hurrying through the gay
crowd, he turned in a few moments into
a street leading to the North river. The
sun was setting, and cast the shadow of
his slender form, long and black, over
the pavement, as he paused in front of a
stately mansion. He once more examined
the letter, and then surveyed the
mansion.

“It is the same,” he said, and ascended
the lofty steps and rang the bell.
“Truly, the office of a priest is a painful
one,” the thought crossed his mind, “he
sees so much misery that he has not the
power to relieve—misery under the rags
of the hovel, and despair under the velvet
of the palace.”

A male servant in livery answered the
bell, and glanced somewhat superciliously
at the faded attire of the priest. But
he inclined his head in involuntary respect
as the priest said simply—

“I am Father Luke.”

“This way, sir. You are expected,”
answered the servant, and he led Father
Luke along a lofty hall, and into a parlor,
over whose rich furniture shone dimly
the light of the setting sun. “Remain
here, sir, and I will announce your coming.”

He left the priest alone. Father Luke
placed his hat upon a table, and seated
himself in a chair. In a moment, resting
his cheek upon his hand, and turning his
eyes to the light (which shone through
the curtained windows) he was buried
in thought again. His singular and remarkable
face stood forth from the background
of shadow, like a portrait from
another age. His crown was bald, but
his forehead was encircled by dark hair,
streaked with silver. As the light shone
over that broad brow, and upon the great
eyes, dilating in their sunken sockets,
he seemed not like a practical man of the
nineteenth century, but like one of those
penitents or enthusiasts, who, in a dark
age, shut up the fires of their agony, of
tempted hope or undying remorse, within
the shadows of a cloister.

“This way, sir,”—it was the voice of
the servant, who touched him respect
fully on the shoulder as he spoke.

Father Luke arose and followed him
from the room, and up a broad stairway,
and along a corridor. “At the end of
this passage you will find a door. Open
it and enter. You are expected there.”

Passing from the corridor, lighted by
the window in its extremity, the priest
entered a narrow passage, where all was
dark, and pursued his way, until his progress
was terminated by a door. He
opened the door and crossed the threshhold,
but upon the very threshold stood
spell-bound in surprise.

It was a large apartment, with lofty
walls, and instead of the cheerful rays of
the declining sun, it was illuminated by
a lamp with a clouded shade, which, suspended
from the centre of the ceiling, shed
around a soft and mysterious light.

The walls were not papered nor panelled,
but covered with hangings of a dark
color. One part of the spacious chamber
was occupied by a couch, with a high canopy,
and curtains whose snowy whiteness
stood out distinctly from the dark background.
A wood fire was burning under
the arch of the old-fashioned fireplace;
and a mirror, in a frame of dark walnut,
reflected the couch with its white canopy,
and a table covered with a white cloth,
which stood directly underneath the
hanging lamp. Upon the white cloth
was placed a crucifix, a book, a wreath of
flowers.

The place was perfectly still, and the
soft rays of the lamp, investing all its details
with mingled light and shadow, gave
an atmosphere of mystery to the scene.

Father Luke stood on the threshold,
hesitating whether to advance or retreat,
when a low voice broke the stillness:

“Come in, sir; I have waited for you.”

And, for the first time, Father Luke
took notice of the presence of the speaker.
It was a woman, who, attired in black, sat
in a rocking chair near the table, her
hands folded over her breast. Her head
and face were covered by a thick veil of

white lace, which fell to her shoulders,
contrasting strongly with her sombre attire.

Father Luke entered and seated himself
in a vacant chair which stood near
the table. Resting his arm on the table,
(he sat directly beneath the lamp, in a
circle of shadow,) and shading his eyes
with his hand, he silently surveyed the
woman, over whom the light fell in full
radiance. There was dark hair, there
were bright eyes beneath that veil of
lace, a young, richly moulded form,
beneath that garb of sable—but in vain
he endeavored to trace the features of
the unknown.

“You received a letter?” said the lady
in a low voice.

“As I was passing up Broadway, a
few moments since, a letter was placed
in my hand, bidding my presence at this
house, on an errand of life and death.”

She started at the sound of that sonorous
and hollow voice, and, through her
veil seemed to survey him earnestly.

I am glad that you have come. I
thank you with all my soul. Although
not a member of your church, I have
heard of you for a long time, and heard
of you as one who, having suffered much
himself, was especially fitted to render
consolation to the heart-broken and despair-stricken.
Now, I am heart-broken
and despairing;” she paused; “I am dying”—

“Dying?” he echoed.

“And I have sent for you, believing
you to be an honest man, not to hear
confession of my sins, for they are too
dark to be told or be forgiven; but to
ask you a simple question, which I implore
you to answer not as a priest but
as a man—to answer not with the set
phrases of your vocation, but frankly and
fully, even as you wish to have peace
yourself in the hour of death”—

“And that question”—the priest's
head bent low upon his breast, and he
surveyed her earnestly with his eyes hidden
beneath his down-drawn brows.

“Do you believe in any hereafter? Do
you believe in another world? Does the
death of the body end the story? Or,
after the death of the body, does the soul
rise and live again, in a new, a diviner
life?”

“My sister,” said the priest, with much
emotion, “I know that there is a hereaf
ter—I know that the death of the body
is not the end of all, but simply the first
step in an eternal pilgrimage”—

“This you say as a man, and not as a
priest—this is your true thought, as you
wish to have peace in the hour of your
death?”

“Even so,” said Father Luke.

“Thank you, O, bless you with all my
soul. One question more—O, answer
me with the same frankness—in the next
world shall we meet and know the friends
whom we have loved in this?”

“We shall meet, we shall know, we
shall love them in the next world, as certainly
as we ever met, knew and loved
them in this,” was the answer of Father
Luke, given with all the force and earnestness
of undeniable sincerity. Do you
think we gather affections to our heart,
only to bury them in the grave?”

The lady rose from her chair.

“I thank you once more, and with all
my soul. Your words come from your
heart. They confirm the intuitions of
my own heart. For the consolation
which those words afford, accept the
gratitude of a dying woman. And now,”
she extended her hand, “and now, farewell!”

The priest, who, through this entire
interview, had never ceased to regard her,
with his eyes almost hidden by his down-drawn
brows—struggling all the while to
repress an agitation which increased
every moment, and well-nigh mastered
him—the priest also rose with these
words on his lips:

“You dying, sister? You seem young
and full of life, and with the prospect of
long years before you.”

It was either the impulse of madness,
or the force of a calm conviction, which
induced her to reply—

“In one hour I will be dead!”

The priest silently took her offered
hand, and at the same instant emerged
from the circle of shadow into the full
glow of the light. There was something
like magic in the pressure of their
hands.

And the woman lifted her veil, disclosing
a beautiful face, which, already
touched with the pallor of death, was
lighted by dark eyes, whose brightness
was almost supernatural.

Lifting her gaze heavenward, she said,
as though thinking aloud—

“In another world, Ernest, I will meet,
I will know, I will love you!”

But ere the words had passed her lips
—yes, as the slowly lifted veil disclosed
her face—the priest sank back, as though
stricken by a blow from an iron hand,
uttering a wild and incoherent cry—
sunk back as though the grave had
yielded up its dead, and confronted him
with a form, linked with holy, and yet
accursed memories.

“O, Frank, is it thus we meet!” he
cried, and fell on his knees, and buried
his face in his hands.