Cruel as the grave
recalled it to my mind, and led me to believe that your knowledge of the
legend had so impressed your imagination as to make it conjure up the
heroine of the legend."
"What is the legend? Do tell me, Lyon."
"Not now, dearest. You must first have some coffee, which a faithful
friend has provided for us."
"Captain Pendleton?" eagerly inquired Sybil.
"No, dear, our servant Joe. I do not expect to see Captain Pendleton
until nightfall," added Lyon Berners, for he tried to anticipate and
prevent any troublesome questions that Sybil might ask, as he wished to
save her from needless additional pain as long as he possibly could.
"And Joe is here with us?" inquired Sybil, cheerfully.
"No, dear; he has returned home; but will come again to-night."
"But what news did he bring?"
"None. We will hear from Captain Pendleton to-night. Now you must have
some coffee; and then I will tell you the 'Legend of the Haunted
Chapel'; for that legend, Sybil, may well account for your vision,
whether we look on it from my point of view or from yours--as illusion
or reality," said Lyon Berners.
"Or, stay," he added, reflectively; "it is too cold for you to sup in
the open air. I will bring the things in here."
"Well, let me go with you, to help to bring them in, at least," pleaded
Sybil.
"What! are you really afraid to stay here alone?" inquired Lyon,
smiling, with an attempt at pleasantry.
"No, indeed; but all smells mouldy inside this old church. At least it
does since the sun set, and I would like to go out and get a breath of
fresh air," replied Sybil, quite seriously.
"Come, then," said Lyon.
They went out together.
The fire that had been built by Joe was now burnt down to embers; but
the coffee-pot sat upon these embers, and the coffee was hot.
Lyon Berners took it up, while Sybil loaded herself with crockery ware
and cutlery.
They had turned to go back to the church, when Sybil uttered a
half-suppressed cry, and nearly dropped her burden.
"What's the matter?" cried Mr. Berners.
"Look!" exclaimed Sybil.
"Where?"
"At the east window."
Mr. Berners raised his eyes just in time to see a weird young face, with
wild black hair, and a bright red mantle, flash downward from the
window, as if it had dropped to the floor.
There was no dream now; not even an optical illusion. The reality of the
vision was unquestionable.
"This is most strange," exclaimed Mr. Berners.
"It is the same face that bent over me, and woke me up," answered Sybil,
with a shudder.
"It is some one who is concealed in the church, and whom we shall be
sure to discover, for there is but one exit, by the front door; and if
she comes out of that, we shall see her; or if she remains in the
building, we shall be sure to find her there. Since I saw the face drop
from the window, I have carefully watched the door. Do you also watch
it, my dear Sybil; so that the creature, whatever it is, may not pass
us," said Mr. Berners, as he strode on rapidly towards the church,
followed by his wife.
They entered together, and looked eagerly around.
Though the sun had set some ten minutes before, yet the "after glow"
shone in through the six tall gothic window spaces, and revealed clearly
every nook and corner of the interior. Their strange inmate or visitor,
whichever she might be, was nowhere to be seen.
With an impatient gesture, Mr. Berners set down the coffee-pot, and
hurried towards the door of the vault, and looked through the iron
grating. But he could see nothing but the top of those stairs, the
bottom of which disappeared in the darkness.
He then shook the door; but it firmly resisted all his strength. The
bars appeared to be built into the solid masonry.
"This is really confounding to all one's intelligence," exclaimed Lyon
Berners, gazing around in perplexity.
"It is, indeed. But it is well that you have seen this mystery with your
own eyes, for if you had not done so, you never would have believed in
it," said Sybil, gravely shaking her head.
"Nor do I believe in it, now that I have seen it."
"Then you will not trust the united evidence of your own eyes and mine."
"No, Sybil; not for a prodigy so out of nature as that would be,"
replied Lyon Berners, firmly.
"Well, then, tell me the legend of the Haunted Chapel, for you hinted
that that legend must have some connection with this apparition."
"A seeming connection, at the very least; but I cannot tell it to you
now--not until you take something to eat and drink, for you have not
broken your fast since morning."
"Nor have I hungered since morning," replied Sybil, with a sigh.
Mr. Berners went up to the smouldering embers of the fire that he had
lighted in the morning on the stone floor of the church; and he drew
together the dying brands, put fresh fuel on them, and soon rekindled
the flame.
And the husband and wife sat down beside it; and while Sybil ate and
drank with what appetite she could bring to the repast, Lyon Berners, to
pass off the heavy time, related to her the legend of the Haunted
Chapel.
CHAPTER XXV.
THE FALL OF THE DUBARRYS.
But, soft! behold, lo, where it comes again!
I'll cross it, though it blast me.--Stay, illusion!
If thou hast any sound, or use of voice,
Speak to me!--SHAKESPEARE.
"The Dubarrys," he began, "were a French Roman Catholic family of
distinction. A cadet of that family came over to Virginia among the
earliest English settlers of the colony.
"As in the case of the more important among his anglican comrades, he
obtained a very large tract of land by Royal patent. He built his hut
and fixed his abode here, not a hundred yards from the spot where this
church now stands.
"He took an Indian girl for a wife, and continued to live a wild
huntsman sort of life in the wilderness; only breaking it sometimes by
going down to Jamestown, twice a year, to buy such necessaries of
civilized life as the wilderness could not furnish, and to hear news
from any ship that might have come in from the old country; and above
all, to take a holiday among civilized pleasure-seekers--for such
existed even in the primitive settlement of Jamestown.
"In due course of time, a family of half-breed sons and daughters grew
up around him, and the little primitive hut gave place to a substantial
stone lodge.
"And the country around was becoming settled. The Berners had got a
grant of the Black Valley, and had built the first part of Black Hall,
which has since been added to in every generation, until it has grown to
its present dimensions.
"About this time also, Charles Dubarry was inspired with a certain
ambition for his eldest son, a densely ignorant, half-Indian youth of
nineteen; and hearing that the two young sons of Richard Berners of
Black Hall were to be sent to England to be educated, he proposed that
his own 'black boy,' as he called his handsome dark-eyed heir, should go
with them. And as the three lads had been forest companions for some
years, the proposal of old Dubarry was gladly accepted, and the three
young men sailed in company for England.
"They spent ten years in the old world, and returned, as as they had set
out, together. It was after their return that the close friendship of a
young lifetime was turned to the deadliest enmity. It happened in this
manner:
"The country, during their absence, had grown a great deal in
population. Every rich valley among these mountains had its white
proprietor. In the Valley of the Roses--so named, because at the time it
was taken possession of by its first proprietor, it was fairly carpeted
and festooned all around and about with the wild-rose vine--dwelt one
Gabriel Mayo, a gentleman of fortune, taste, and culture. He had a
family of fair daughters, of whom old Charles Dubarry, with his national
gallantry and proneness to exaggeration, had said, that 'they were all
the most beautiful girls in the world, and each one more beautiful than
all the others.'
"Be that as it may, it is certain that there were five lovely maidens,
ranging from fifteen years to twenty-one, to choose from. Yet who can
account for human caprice, especially in such matters? The three young
men--Louis Dubarry, and John and William Berners--all fixed their
affections upon Florette Mayo, the youngest beauty.
"Fierce and bitter was the rivalry between the lovers. But the young
girl returned the love of John Berners, and married him, and became your
ancestress, as you know, Sybil.
"And from that time to the time of the extinction of the American branch
of the Dubarry family, a feud, as fierce and bitter, if not as warlike,
as any that ever raged between rival barons of the middle ages,
prevailed between the Berners and the Dubarrys.
"I come now to the period just before the breaking out of the Old French
War, when the first rude stone lodges in these valleys had given place
to handsome and spacious manor houses, and when the then proprietor of
the Dubarry estate had erected a magnificent dwelling on the site of his
first rough cottage. He called the mansion the Chateau Dubarry, a name
which the country people quickly changed into Shut-up Dubarry.
"The last name was not inappropriate, for a more morose, solitary, and
misanthropical man never lived than Henry Dubarry, the builder of that
house. He neither visited nor received visits, but remained selfishly
'shut-up' in the paradise of art and letters that he had created within
his dwelling.
"He had a wife, a son, and two daughters, all of whom suffered more or
less from this isolation from their fellow-beings. So it was a great
relief to the son when he was sent, first to the William and Mary
College of Williamsburg for five years, and afterwards to Oxford for
five more.
"After the departure of the son and brother, the mother and sisters
suffered more and more seriously from the gloom and horror of their
isolation, and in the course of years utterly succumbed to it. First the
mother died, then the elder sister; and then the younger sister, left
alone with her recluse father in that awful house, became a maniac.
"Under these circumstances, the father wrote to his son to come home.
But selfishness, not love, ruled that young man, as it had ruled his
fathers. He had graduated with honors, and won a 'fellowship' at the
University, and he was about to start for the fashionable European tour.
He wrote home to this effect, and went on his farther way.
"He remained abroad until summoned home by two events--the deaths of his
father and sister, and the necessity of raising money for himself.
"He came home, but not alone. He brought with him a gipsy girl of
singular beauty, who seemed to be passionately attached to him, and whom
he loved as much as it was in his selfish nature to love anything.
"He placed her at the head of his household, and his simple servants
obeyed her as their mistress; and his sociable neighbors, willing to
forgive old rebuffs, called upon the young pair.
"But their visits were not kindly received, and not in any case
returned. And the report went around the neighborhood, that Philip
Dubarry was as morose and selfish as his father had been before him. And
so the house was abandoned, as it had been in the days of the old man
and the idiot girl.
"But by and by other rumors, darker and more dishonorable to the master
and mistress of Shut-up Dubarry, crept out among the people. These
rumors were started by the Dubarry servants, in their gossipping with
other family servants in the chance meeting in church or village. They
were to the effect that Philip Dubarry often quarrelled fiercely with
his gipsy wife, and even threatened to send her back to her native