Cruel as the grave
names are really appropriate. The stupendous height and dark iron-gray
hue of the rocks that overshadow and darken the valley and the river,
and also the situation of the village at the entrance of the dark
valley, justify these names. And even if they did not, still we are not
so irreverent as to interfere with the arrangements of those who have
gone before us," laughed Lyon Berners.
And as he spoke the stage-coach reached the banks of the river, and drew
up before the little ferry-house. Here the travellers alighted, and had
their baggage taken off. And the coach, waiting only long enough to
change horses and to pick up passengers, all of whom, both man and
beast, had been brought over from the village by the ferry-boat, went on
its way, which lay along the east bank of the river.
Mr. Berners had his luggage and that of his party put upon the
ferry-boat, and then he led the ladies on board. He saw them comfortably
seated, and the nurse and child in a safe place, and then he turned to
the aged ferry-man with hearty good will, and inquired:
"Well, old Charon! all right with you?"
"Yes, sir, thank Heaven!" replied the old man, whose occupation,
combined with his great age and flowing gray locks, yet stalworth form
and unbroken strength, had conferred upon him the name of his infernal
predecessor--the navigator of the River Styx.
"All right in the village, and in the valley?" further inquired Mr.
Berners.
"All right in the willage, sir. And Joe, who has just arrove at the
tavern, do report all right in the walley," was the satisfactory answer
of the ferry-man.
"Oh! then our carriage is waiting for us there?"
"Yes, sir, which it arrove just about twenty minutes ago, punk-too-well
to time!" replied the old man.
The passage across the Black River is very short, and just as the
ferry-man spoke, the boat touched the wharf immediately under the
lighted windows of the hotel, before the doors of which they saw the
Black Hall carriage and horses standing.
Mr. Berners assisted the ladies of his party to land, and proposed that
they should stop at the hotel and take supper before going on to Black
Hall.
"Oh, no! please don't, on any account! I feel sure that Miss Tabby has
laid out all her talent on the supper that is awaiting us at home. And
she would weep with disappointment and mortification if we should stop
to supper here," eagerly objected Sybil.
"Miss Tabby is our housekeeper; the best creature, but the greatest
whimperer in existence. She is, in turn, Sybil's tyrant and Sybil's
slave; for she is both despotic and devoted, and scolds and pets her
alternately and unreasonably as a foolish mother does an only child,"
explained Mr. Berners, turning to Mrs. Blondelle.
"And her lady?" inquired Rosa, with an admiring glance toward Mrs.
Berners.
"Oh! Sybil turns the tables, you may be sure, and indulges or rebukes
her housekeeper as the occasion may demand," laughed Lyon.
"Come here, Joe!" called Mrs. Berners to her coachman, who was seen
coming out of the tap-room.
"Bress my two eyes, Miss Sybil! how glad dey is to see you, and you too,
Marse Lyon!" exclaimed a very black, short, squarely built, good-humored
looking negro coachman, as he came and bowed to his master and mistress.
"Joe! you have been at your old tricks again. Joe! why can't you let
bar-rooms alone? Joe! where _do_ you expect to go when you die?"
solemnly inquired Sybil, shaking her finger at the delinquent.
"I do 'spect to go straight to de debbil, miss, for sure! Dat's de
reason why I wants to take a drap of comfort in dis worl', 'cause I
nebber shall get none dere. But bress my two eyes, miss, how glad dey is
to look on your putty face again."
"My 'putty' face? I want to know if _that's_ a compliment? But, Joe,
what has Miss Tabby got for supper?"
"Lor bress your putty little mouf, Miss Sybil; it's easier to tell you
what she hasn't got," exclaimed Joe, stretching his eyes. "Why, Miss
Sybil, there an't a man nor a maid about the house, what ha'n't been on
their feet all dis day a getting up of that there supper," he added.
"There! I told you so!" said Sybil, turning to her husband.
"Then let's go on and eat it, my love. We can leave our two servants
here to follow in the wagon with the baggage," said Lyon Berners,
leading his wife and his guest to the carriage, and placing them inside,
with the child and nurse, while he himself mounted to the box beside the
coachman.
"Oh! I am very sorry Mr. Berners has been crowded out," regretfully
exclaimed Rosa Blondelle, looking after him in surprise as he climbed to
his roost.
"Oh, he has not been crowded out! He has gone up there to drive; for the
road is not very safe at night, and our coachman is rather too much
exhilarated to be trusted," answered Sybil, touching very tenderly upon
the weakness of her old servant.
Their road lay along the bank of the river up the valley, between the
two high mountain ridges; but it was so dark that nothing but these
grander features of the landscape could be discerned.
As the carriage rolled slowly and carefully along this rough road, the
music of distant waters fell upon the listening ear, and from the
faintest hum that could hardly be heard, it gradually swelled into a
deafening roar that filled the valley.
"What is that?" fearfully inquired Rosa.
"What is what?" echoed Sybil.
"That horrid noise!"
"Oh! that is the Black Torrent, the head of our Black River," answered
Sybil in a low, pleased tone; for the sound of her native waters,
however dreadful it might be to strange ears, was delightful to hers.
"Oh! more blackness!" shivered Rosa.
"But it is a beautiful cascade! All beautiful things are not necessarily
light, you know."
"No, indeed," answered Rosa, "for the most beautiful woman I have ever
seen in my life is very dark." And she raised and pressed the hand of
her hostess, to give point to her words.
Sybil did not like the implied flattery, delicately as it was conveyed.
She drew her hand away; and then, to heal the little hurt she might have
made in doing so, she opened the window and said, pleasantly:
"Look, Mrs. Blondelle! You see the lights of our home now."
Rosa leaned across Sybil to look in the direction indicated, and she saw
scattered lights that seemed to be set in the side of the mountain. She
saw no house, and she said so.
"That is because the house is built of the very same dark iron-gray
rocks that form the mountain; and being immediately at the foot of the
mountain, and closely surrounded with trees, can not at night be
distinguished from the mountain itself."
Here the carriage road curved around an expansion of the river that
might have been taken either for a very small lake, or a very large
pond. And about midway of this curve, or semi-circle, the carriage drew
up.
On the left-hand was dimly seen the lake; on the right-hand the gate
letting into the elm-tree avenue that led straight up to the house.
"That is the Black Pond, and there is Black Hall. More 'blackness,' Mrs.
Blondelle," smiled Sybil, who was so delighted to get home that she
forgot her jealousy.
The carriage waited only until the gates could be opened by the slow old
porter, whom Sybil laughingly greeted as "Cerberus," although the name
given him in baptism was that of the keeper of the keys of heaven, and
not that of the guardian of the entrance to the other place.
"Cerberus," or rather Peter, warmly welcomed his young mistress back,
and widely stretched the gates for her carriage to pass.
As the carriage rolled easily along the avenue, now thickly carpeted
with forest leaves, and as it approached the house, the fine old
building, with its many gable ends and curiously twisted chimneys, its
steep roofs and latticed windows--all monuments of the old colonial
days--came more and more distinctly into view from its background of
mountains. Lights were gleaming from upper and lower and all sorts of
windows, and the whole aspect of the grand old hospitable mansion
proclaimed, "WELCOME."
CHAPTER IX.
THE GUEST-CHAMBERS.
Deserted rooms of luxury and state,
Which old magnificence had rudely furnished
With pictures, cabinets of ancient date,
And carvings, gilt and burnished,--HOOD.
The carriage drew up at the foot of a flight of stone steps, leading to
the front entrance of the house. The double oak doors stood wide open,
showing the lighted hall and a group of people waiting.
Sybil looked eagerly from the carriage window.
"I do declare," she exclaimed, "if there is not, not only Miss Tabby,
but Miss Libby and Mrs. Winterose besides; Mrs. Winterose," she
explained, turning to her guest, "is the widow of our late land steward.
She is also my foster-mother, and the mother of the two maiden ladies,
Miss Tabby, who is our housekeeper, and Miss Libby, who lives with the
widowed parent at home. They have come to welcome us back. Heaven bless
them!"
As Sybil spoke, Mr. Berners dropped down from his perch on the
coachman's box, and opened the carriage door.
He assisted first his wife, and then their guest, to alight. And then he
took the sleeping child from the nurse's arms, while she herself got
out.
"You know the way, dearest Sybil! Run on before, and I will take charge
of our fair friend," said Mr. Berners, as he gave his arm to Mrs.
Blondelle to lead her up the steps.
But Sybil had not waited for this permission. Too eager to meet the dear
old friends of her childhood to care for any one else just then, or even
to feel a twinge of jealousy at the words and actions of her husband,
she flew past him up the stairs and into the arms of her foster-mother,
who folded the beautiful, impetuous creature to her bosom, and welcomed
her home with heartfelt emotion.
Miss Tabby and Miss Libby next took their turns to be embraced and
kissed.
And then the old servants crowded around to welcome their beloved young
mistress; to every one of them she gave a cordial grasp of her hand, and
loving words.
"It is very delightful," she said, with tears of joy in her eyes, "it is
very, very delightful to be so warmly welcomed home."
"Everything as well as everybody welcomes you home, Miss Sybil! Even the
Black Torrent! I never heard the cascade sing so loud and merry as it
does to-night!" said Old Abe, or Father Abraham, as he was called, for
being a full centenarian, and the oldest negro, by twenty years, of any
on the estate.
"Thank you, dear old Uncle Abe! I _know_ you all welcome me home! And I
love to think that my torrent does too! And now, Miss Tabby, you got the
letter I wrote from Underhill, asking you to have the spare rooms
prepared for the visitors we were to bring with us?" inquired Sybil,
turning to her housekeeper.
"Yes, ma'am, and your orders is obeyed, and the rooms is all ready, as
well as yourn and Mr. Berners', even to the kindling of the fires, which
has been burning in the chimneys to air them rooms all this blessed
day," answered Miss Tabby.
"That is right, and I thank you; and now here comes our visitor," said
Sybil, as her guest approached leaning on her husband's arm. They had
certainly lingered a little on the way; but Sybil was too happy to
notice that circumstance now. The jealous wife was for the time subdued
within her, and all the hospitable hostess was in the ascendant.
"You are welcome to Black Hall, my dear Mrs. Blondelle," she said,
advancing to receive her guest. "And now, will you walk into our sitting
parlor and rest awhile before taking off your wraps; or shall I show
you at once to your rooms, which are quite ready for you?"
"At once to my rooms, if you please, Mrs. Berners; for, you see, my poor