Reginald of Lyndulfe was kneeling there beside the remains of his
murdered Mother.

His face was buried in his hands, and the red light which mocked the
crumbling skeleton, shone over the luxuriant chesnut curls of the young
Lord. Not a sound disturbed the stillness; the door which led into
Madeline's room was closed, and the candle fast burning to its socket,
flung its uncertain and flickering light into the shadows of the narrow
apartment.

Near Reginald stood Rolof Sener. Picture to yourself that form clad
in black, broad in the chest and shoulders, and rendered harsh in outline,
by the deformity of the spine, while the long pallid face seems to rest not
so much upon the neck as upon the chest. His large head stood out from
the gloom, and as the light flickered and fell, his features seemed to pass
through every change of expression, now scowling in sullen scorn, now
beaming with smiles and joy.

With his finger on his lip, he stood near the kneeling man, looking like
a stern spirit, sent from the Other World to judge between the Living and
the Dead.

While the light shines upon those blackened bones—which were once
a beautiful and living form—upon that skull—once it enthroned a Mother's

[figure description] Page 454.[end figure description]

soul—let us leave Reginald to the first strong outbreak of his agony. * *
* * * * *.

At last he rose and confronted Rolof Sener with a pallid face, and lustreless
eye. Every feature was steeped in dull apathy; this scene had
palsied him in every nerve.

“When did you make this discovery?” he said, in an almost inaudible
tone.

“An hour ago,” replied Rolof, “urged by motives which will be made
known in due time, I came toward this house, and found old Dorfner
sleeping in the arbor with the Negro's knife above his head. That blind
negro was the slave of your mother; at least he fought for her in her
dying hour.”

“Let me go to him at once,” said Reginald, starting to the door—“He
may tell us something of my mother's fate—”

“Not so fast. Listen before you act, my Lord. For my own reasons—
which will also be made known in due time,—I turned the negro's
hand aside, and left the old man to his slumbers. Entering the house, I
lighted this candle, and sought the room where you discovered me. I obtained
entrance to the closet by a false key, and did not hesitate in my
researches until I had discovered the secret door at the back of the closet.
Then, I stood confounded. The pirate's words were false. This was
my only thought. Urged onward, however, by an impulse, which I cannot
account for—save as an instinctive interest in the affairs of your
house—I searched this room, sounded the walls, and every board of the
floor. The result of my search is before you.”

He spoke in a calm and even voice, his gaze full of sympathy, every
lineament of his countenance steeped in sorrow.

“But there were papers with the corse? Some word to tell of my
mother's last hour? Some record of the manner of her fate?”

Reginald seized his hand, and trembled in suspense, as he awaited the
answer.

“With the skeleton, I discovered certain papers—” said Rolof.

“Where are they? Let me behold them!”

“I was engaged in the examination of these papers when you first appeared—”
Rolof began. “They are in the next room!”

“Ah, this indeed is the work of Heaven! The record of my mother's
wrongs—the manner of her death—the purpose of the murderers—it is all
written there; is it not?”

Once more he started to the door, quivering with impatience, but the
hand and voice of Rolof held him back.

“Not one word of your mother's fate!” was the reply, which crushed
every hope of the young Lord into nothingness. “There are letters from
your father to your mother, before their marriage, with some manuscripts
pertaining to the ancient history of your house, but that is all.”

[figure description] Page 455.[end figure description]

Reginald's countenance was clouded in apathetic gloom.

“It is indeed a mystery,” he said, and taking the light, gazed into the
cavity, which had for twenty years encoffined his mother's form. It was
a narrow place, between the huge planks, not more than eighteen inches
wide, and scarcely a foot in depth. The bottom which formed the ceiling
of the lower room, was strown with dust.[2] A feeling of freezing awe
came over Reginald as bending down he looked into the aperture.

“Ah! They must have crushed her body into this narrow space,” he
muttered—“It is too horrible for thought! Her blood yet warm, they
trampled her into this cavity, and nailed the board over her mangled face,
while the breath yet lingered on her lips.”

Reginald held the candle directly over the cavity, and thrust his hand
into the dust—or ashes—which overspread its lower boards. Fragments
of a dress, which crumbled like the cinders of burnt paper, the moment he
grasped them—the half-severed bones of a hand—a mass of hair, long and
waving, and yet covered with the mould of the tomb—these were the
fruits of his search. At last from among that dust, which had once been
Life, he drew a folded paper, dark and clammy, as with the taint and
stain of Death.

He opened it, and by the candle-light saw that it was covered with
writing, which was in many places, blotted by a dingy red stain; some of
the lines were altogether obliterated, and even the plainest words were
difficult to read.

He smoothed it out upon the floor, near the cavity, and bent down, his
breath coming in gasps, his eye fired with sudden light.

“The twenty-third of November!” he exclaimed, “Joy! Thank God!
Here at last we have some words, traced by my mother's hand!”

Rolof Sener heard this exclamation with a start; his face was changed
in every lineament; at once he sank by Reginald's side, and looked over
his shoulder, his large eyes dilating, and flashing with the intensity of
madness.

There was a dead silence, as kneeling together, they perused that blotted
record, which seemed, and was in truth, a voice from the Dead.

It is not for us to attempt to explain the full meaning, which that paper
was originally intended to convey, nor will we dare to erase its blots, and
read the words, buried beneath their dark red stain. But as the paper,
the Letter from the Dead, appeared to the eyes of these silent and breathless
men, who knelt upon the floor in the dimly lighted room, and followed
its every word with eye and soul, we now place it upon this page
of our history.

[figure description] Page 456.[end figure description]

Alice—

Should these lines, traced with a hand, fevered by disease ever
meet your eyes, you will learn something of the fate of your poor friend,
Cath............
the day when our ship was boarded by pirates, who threatened to dismantle
it, and consign every soul to the waves, unless `the person and property
of Lady Alice, wife of Right Hon. Clarence Albert Lyndulfe was surrendered
to them'..................
scene which ensued....
my poor husband, John Conwell, had died the week before,..
a poor lieutenant on half pay.. widow a beggar..
had received kindness at your husband's hands, while in the
West Indies, and....... I was alone in
the world; your life was valuable............
notwithstanding your entreaties, I assumed your
dress, ornaments, etc., and some personal resemblance aided my disguise...............
..............
..............
.
from the decks of the pirate vessel I saw the Artemesia on her.
way......................
concealed for a month or
more in the City of Philadelphia, and now am a prisoner in a house,
in the midst of a forest; how far from the city I know not.

To day my persecutors came; they had searched your chests, but without
finding the gold or the papers for which they sought. They assailed
me with threats, and demanded of me, either the gold plate, or papers, or
they said my life..........
from their broken hints, I imagine that yaur husband was in some measure,
connected with an attempt to destroy this terrible organizotion...............

papers containing matter sufficient to put, in peril the lives of many noble
and wealthy persons, not only in England, but in the Colonies, were contained
in the chest, entrusted by your husband to the Captain of the Artemesia..........
........
slave traffic and
pir..................

a hope of deliverance dawns upon me! A poor negro, whom I saw on
board of the pirate ship, and whom my husband, had rescued a year ago,
from a severe punishment, in Jamaica, has followed me, discovered the
place of my concealment, and it is to his hands that I entrust this let...........

[figure description] Page 457.[end figure description]

.............
and O! Alice! if the child that now throbs within me,
ever should see the light, to you and to yours I dedicate................
.....
be called, Madeline.....

Such was the letter, blotted with blood and tears, which Rolof and Reginald
perused by the uncertain light, as they knelt side by side on the
floor of that room, whose atmosphere breathed memories of crime and
death.

“What does it mean?” gasped Reginald, after a long pause—and the
letter shook in his quivering fingers. “It is a letter to my mother—written
by whom?”

Rolof was silent.

Resting his arm on his knee, he bent his head, low on his breast and
remained for many moments absorbed in profound thought.

Reginald gazing over his shoulder, at his motionless form, saw his lips
move, while his eyes grew spectral, glassy—as though the Soul of the
strange man was buried within its tortuous thoughts.

Again he repeated his question—

“By whom was it written? It is like a dream! Thoughts as vague
and frightful as the visions of a night-mare crowd upon me. Speak! You
that seem to know the history of my race, as though you were its Destiny—
speak!”

Rolof raised his face, and while his gaze was fixed upon the pallid face
of Reginald—looking at him and yet seeming not to see him—he spoke,
in those measured and musical tones, which at once enchained the listener's
ear.

This appears to me, to be the truth of the matter. The ship Artemesia,
bound from Jamaica to England, at the close of the summer of
1756, in the second week of her passage, was boarded by pirates. Their
chief threatened to destroy the vessel and murder the passengers—in fact,
sacrifice every soul—unless the person and property of Alice, wife of the
Right Honorable Clarence Albert Lyndulfe, were surrendered to him—”

“His object,” interrupted Reginald—“Wherefore demand—my mother?”

“The widow of a poor officer—named John Conwell, who had died
the first week of the voyage—assumed the dress and ornaments of the
Lady Alice, and was transferred to the deck of the pirate vessel in her
place. It seems she bore a striking personal resemblance to your mother,
at least she reasoned thus, `You Lady Alice are rich and noble; a husband,
a child are yours. I am poor and alone in the world. I will

[figure description] Page 458.[end figure description]

assume your place, and leave the rest to Heaven!'—It was a silly and yet a
noble thought, especially for a poor woman.”

“But the Captain of the vessel was base—cowardly!” cried Reginald—
“To permit the sacrifice! Better have gone down with his ship, or blown
her into the air. Better, much better—”

“From the deck of the pirate ship, Catherine Conwell, saw the good
ship Artemesia pursue her way,” continued Rolof, without seeming to
regard the presence of Reginald—“Possibly saw the beautiful Lady Alice,
waving her 'kerchief to the breeze. That was the last that ever was seen
of the good ship Artemesia; foundered in a gale perchance; or destroyed
by fire, it may be; she never reached her destination. Of course all on
board perished with her.”

Reginald uttered a groan.

“As for the widow of the poor officer, on half-pay, we find her next in
Philadelphia, whither she has been taken by the pirates and their confederates.
How she was taken there, or where concealed it is not for me to
say. After a month or more, she was removed to the house of Peter
Dorfner, on the Wissahikon, and with her the chests and so forth, containing
the property of Clarence Albert Lyndulfe—your father. The good
Peter—and may be some virtuous merchants of Philadelphia—searched
the chests, stamped with your father's initials, but searched in vain.”

“For what did they search?” again interrupted Reginald.

“Perhaps for gold plate,—it may be for doubloons—I cannot tell. But
Clarence Albert, had become a very rich man, in the course of three years.
It has been said that he was largely interested in the slave traffic—nay, I
have heard it stated that he was connected with a wide-spread organization,
whose object was the most comprehensive system of stealing and
selling, human flesh and blood.”

“A base calumny!”

“Let us for the sake of argument admit that he was connected with this
organization. That having made money enough, by its members, he was
determined to confide their darker secrets, to the ears of the Royal Ministry,
and thus reap a rich harvest of reputation for loyalty and other valuable
qualities—”

“This is too much!” cried Reginald—“You slander my father—I will
hear no more!”

“Therefore he conceals in a certain chest—confided to the care of the
Captain of the Artemesia—” continued Rolof, without regarding the angry
tone of the young Lord—” A series of papers, which embody secrets,
very dangerous to the lives of more than one, rich and titled personage,
not only in England, but also in his Majesty's colonies. These papers
reveal the existence of a wide-spread organization, whose banner bears
but two words, Man-Stealing... Piracy. In a word, these papers, strike
at reputation, fortunes, lives, and the members of the aforesaid

[figure description] Page 459.[end figure description]

organization, gaining intelligence of Clarence-Albert's loyalty—or treachery—determine
to seize his wife and property, at one swoop.'

“But this is a dream,” exclaimed Reginald—“A fancy thin as air!”

“They have the chest in their possession, and with it, Catherine Conwell,
the silly woman who personated the Lady Alice. They search the
chest, but do not find the object of their search. They threaten the poor
woman with death, unless she tells them, in what part of Clarence-Albert's
plantations, the secret is concealed. She cannot tell them, for the
rather forcible reason, that she does not know herself. And on he 23rd
of November—a fatal, fatal day for the house of Lyndulfe! the poor woman
beholds the face of a negro slave, who having seen her, on board the
pirate ship, is determined to rescue her or die.”

“The same who now lives with Dorfner?”

“The husband, it seems saved the black from a severe punishment, the
year before. He is grateful; a proof of his incapacity for civilization.
And on the fatal Twenty-third, the poor widow—with her unborn child
beating in her bosom—writes the letter, which you hold, determining to
send it by the hands of the negro to your mother, or to your father. How
the miserable African was to find them, is another question. Catherine
Corwell seems to have had faith in the fellow—he was grateful. Well—
I hope you are listening to my story. I would not weary you for the
world.”

“You mock me. Go on—go on. Curses upon this scoundrel,
Dorfner!”

“Well, to continue my story,” resumed Rolof, still fixing his glassy
eye upon the floor. “She has written her letter, or rather, she is in the
act of signing her name, when her `persecutors' appear. They question;
she cannot answer. They proceed to violence; crush her with blows, or
maybe, only frighten her into premature labor. The negro appears, fights
for her,—in vain—they blind him with their knives. She dies in the
throes of a mother's agony, and they huddle her corse, still warm, into a
cavity made by removing a board from the floor. They bury her there,
and with her bury the letter, whose last word is the name of her child—
of Madeline.”

He paused. His voice was soft and musical no longer. It was harsh,
husky with emotion, and his glassy eyes, gazing so vacantly upon the
floor, were wet with tears.

“Such is the history which I gather from this letter, blotted with the
blood and tears of a poor woman. Well—well! What matter's it?
These poor creatures are only born for the service of the rich and titled.
She died in the path of her duty.”

Vain were the attempt to paint the mingled emotions which contended
for the mastery on Reginald's face. Kneeling still—the cavity which had

[figure description] Page 460.[end figure description]

been the coffin of the poor woman, yawning before him—he found no
utterance for the thoughts struggling within his breast.

“Madeline—Madeline—” he gasped, as the fast-crowding emotions
swelled in his throat, and filled the ball of each eye with injected blood—
“Madeline was not my—Sister!”

His soul was tossing in a fiery whirlpool of joy; a mad delighted
boundless intoxication pervaded his whole being.

Starting to his feet, he placed the light upon the table, and saw the
skeleton once more, but without a shudder

“And my mother—the Lady Alice—died not—died not—” he wrung
his hands in the very madness of delight—“She died not by the hand of
violence!”

Meanwhile, Rolof Sener, folding his arms upon his breast, watched his
raptures with a calm smile

“Madeline was a poor girl, after all,” whispered Rolof, “The medal
which you found upon her breast, was taken by Catherine Conwell, from
your mother. The aristocratic interest which poor Madeline first inspired,
seems now to disappear in a measured pity? Does it not, my
Lord?”

“She was very beautiful!” answered Reginald, gazing absently toward
the light, with his head slightly dropped, and something like a tender
memory in his deep blue eye—“Very—very beautiful! And yet—
and yet—”

“She was poor!” interrupted Rolof.

“True, sir, true. Beauty by the side of a forest spring, with a milk-pail
in her hand, is very touching,—no doubt—but something there is, in
high birth and ancestral associations, which gives a nameless charm to a
lovely woman, and bathes her whole form in a dim and yet luxurious
splendor. I could never touch a woman's hand with so much pleasure,
as when I felt, that the blood which bounded at my touch, had coursed
through the veins of women, as fair and noble, a thousand years before!”

The handsome face of the young Lord was warm and glowing once
more; every feature indicated that his soul—freed from the pressure of
almost supernatural terror—was wrapping itself in luxurious dreams.

“Your remarks indicate a cultivated mind—yes, the delicacy of taste
which is born with true gentlemen, and which the vulgar herd can never—
never attain:” as he spoke, in his usual tone, so calm and penetrating,
Rolof Sener folded his arms and regarded the young Lord with a fixed
and tranquil gaze. “Search the history of England's aristocracy, and
what do we see? The men all gallant and chivalric; no brutal murders,
no dastardly assassinations; not a single perjury from an English nobleman
in the course of six hundred years. Can the world furnish a picture
so commanding, so astounding in all its details? Behold the Lord of all
noblemen, the British King! From Henry the Eighth, who reformed

[figure description] Page 461.[end figure description]

Religion in the arms of his courtezans, down to Charles the Second, who
made Lust a God, and Chastity a crime—how grand, how heroic the British
King! Their noble blood, transmitted without taint, through the course
of six centuries; ah, it is touching, it is sublime; this pure stream of
aristocracy, flowing on so serenely, through the veins of men, noble above
all—honor; and women, too pure for—such slight things as marriage vows!
The untainted blood it is that touches us into tears, as if no base born
lacquey ever trailed his livery over the velvet of a Ducal marriage bed, or
as though the loftiest Dukedoms that England reveres, did not date their
origin from the moment, when some new `court beauty' grew loving with
`Faith,' in the person of its Defender, a British King!

“A Royal Race, beginning with William, a robber, and ending in our
day with George, an idiot. Between this Alpha and Omega, what an
alphabet of chivalrous virtue, colored with the hues of every crime, from
murder done openly on the scaffold, murder done sublimely on the battle-field,
down to the solemn bestialities of James the First, a Solomon, whose
life was one incessant Song in praise of filth, whose noblest thought was
a Proverb of blasphemy against all things holy to God and man. Range
these noblemen side by side, adorn their spotless ranks with the wives of
Henry, or the concubines of Charles; let Elizabeth, the Virgin, stand at
one end, with her platonic lovers at her feet, and Mary the Butcher at the
other, with odors from Smithfield curling like incense to her very nostrils,
and then, contrast with these, the embodied forms of Royal virtue and
Gentle blood, that rugged Clown,—that base born Peasant—that image of
the rugged People—Oliver Cromwell.—You will excuse my warmth,
when you remember, that I am an enthusiast on the score of noblemen;
and British nobility, its lineage and virtues, was always my passion.'

Reginald burst into a laugh.

“Ha, ha, you are disposed to be severe, my good Rolof,” he said,
“There is a sort of pungent malice in your remarks, which gives your
conversation the flavor of old wine!”

“Your own family, young Lord, the race of Lyndulfe, present a striking
embodiment of the stern, heroic virtues of the British aristocracy—” Rolof's
face was perfectly pale and passionless, his tone low and emphatic—
“Did you ever chance to unclose the pages of your family history?”

“Never,” cried Reginald, smiling—“The very idea smacks of black
letter and cobwebs.”

“Yes: you are right, that history is stamped in black letters—the
black letters of madness and murder! It is hung with cobwebs—cobwebs
which cover the records of Parricide!”

“You take strange liberties, sir. It is not for me to hear language such
as this—”

“Ah, and is it so? Your delicate ear revolts at my uncourtly speech!
Let me have your hand—soh—this is the hand of a brave man, a Lord.

[figure description] Page 462.[end figure description]

It can wield a sword or pen a love ditty, or mingle poison in the wine-cup
of some beautiful Italian damsel—a noble hand, by my faith!”

Reginald felt the blood rush to his cheek, but the large eyes of Rolof
held him motionless. He stood there, helpless as a culprit in the hangman's
hands.

“And yet this hand, within twelve hours, may be stained with the blood
of a Father! Pah! I see the loathsome dye upon it, even now—'tis a
brave hand!”

He flung the hand from him, as though it had been an adder.

“Your deformity protects you,” sneered Reginald, choaking with anger.

At that word a change, as sudden as frightful, came over the face of
Rolof Sener—the black vein swelled out upon his massive forehead—his
eyes, sunken beneath the downdrawn brows, glared with deadly lustre.
He spoke again, his voice lower and yet more distinct, every measured
syllable falling on Reginald's ear, like a separate torture.

eaf253.n2

[2] The reader will bear in mind, that the floor of this room was separated from the
ceiling of the lower room by a range of rafters, while that ceiling—formed of boards—
was in its turn supported by another range of rafters, which were uncovered.