Lord Braithwaite came into the principal door of the library as the
priest was speaking, and stood a moment just upon the threshold, looking
keenly out of the stronger light into this dull and darksome apartment,
as if unable to see perfectly what was within; or rather, as Redclyffe
fancied, trying to discover what was passing between those two. And,
indeed, as when a third person comes suddenly upon two who are talking
of him, the two generally evince in their manner some consciousness of
the fact; so it was in this case, with Redclyffe at least, although
the priest seemed perfectly undisturbed, either through practice of
concealment, or because he had nothing to conceal.
His Lordship, after a moment’s pause, came forward, presenting his hand
to Redclyffe, who shook it, and not without a certain cordiality; till
he perceived that it was the left hand, when he probably intimated some
surprise by a change of manner.
“I am an awkward person,” said his Lordship. “The left hand, however, is
nearest the heart; so be assured I mean no discourtesy.”
“The Signor Ambassador and myself,” observed the priest, “have had
a most interesting conversation (to me at least) about books and
bookworms, spiders, and other congruous matters; and I find his
Excellency has heretofore made acquaintance with a great spider bearing
strong resemblance to the hermit of our library.”
“Indeed,” said his Lordship. “I was not aware that America had yet
enough of age and old misfortune, crime, sordidness, that accumulate
with it, to have produced spiders like this. Had he sucked into himself
all the noisomeness of your heat?”
Redclyffe made some slight answer, that the spider was a sort of pet of
an old virtuoso to whom he owed many obligations in his boyhood; and the
conversation turned from this subject to others suggested by topics of
the day and place. His Lordship was affable, and Redclyffe could not,
it must be confessed, see anything to justify the prejudices of the
neighbors against him. Indeed, he was inclined to attribute them, in
great measure, to the narrowness of the English view,--to those insular
prejudices which have always prevented them from fully appreciating what
differs from their own habits. At lunch, which was soon announced, the
party of three became very pleasant and sociable, his Lordship drinking
a light Italian red wine, and recommending it to Redclyffe; who,
however, was English enough to prefer some bitter ale, while the priest
contented himself with pure water,--which is, in truth, a less agreeable
drink in chill, moist England than in any country we are acquainted
with.
“You must make yourself quite at home here,” said his Lordship, as
they rose from table. “I am not a good host, nor a very genial man, I
believe. I can do little to entertain you; but here is the house and
the grounds at your disposal,--horses in the stable,--guns in the
hall,--here is Father Angelo, good at chess. There is the library. Pray
make the most of them all; and if I can contribute in any way to your
pleasure, let me know.”
All this certainly seemed cordial, and the manner in which it was said
seemed in accordance with the spirit of the words; and yet, whether
the fault was in anything of morbid suspicion in Redclyffe’s nature, or
whatever it was, it did not have the effect of making him feel welcome,
which almost every Englishman has the natural faculty of producing on
a guest, when once he has admitted him beneath his roof. It might be in
great measure his face, so thin and refined, and intellectual without
feeling; his voice which had melody, but not heartiness; his manners,
which were not simple by nature, but by art;--whatever it was, Redclyffe
found that Lord Braithwaite did not call for his own naturalness and
simplicity, but his art, and felt that he was inevitably acting a part
in his intercourse with him, that he was on his guard, playing a
game; and yet he did not wish to do this. But there was a mobility, a
subtleness in his nature, an unconscious tact,--which the mode of life
and of mixing with men in America fosters and perfects,--that made this
sort of finesse inevitable to him, with any but a natural character;
with whom, on the other hand, Redclyffe could be as fresh and natural as
any Englishman of them all.
Redclyffe spent the time between lunch and dinner in wandering about the
grounds, from which he had hitherto felt himself debarred by motives of
delicacy. It was a most interesting ramble to him, coming to trees which
his ancestor, who went to America, might have climbed in his boyhood,
might have sat beneath, with his lady-love, in his youth; deer there
were, the descendants of those which he had seen; old stone stiles,
which his foot had trodden. The sombre, clouded light of the day fell
down upon this scene, which in its verdure, its luxuriance of vegetable
life, was purely English, cultivated to the last extent without losing
the nature out of a single thing. In the course of his walk he came to
the spot where he had been so mysteriously wounded on his first arrival
in this region; and, examining the spot, he was startled to see that
there was a path leading to the other side of a hedge, and this path,
which led to the house, had brought him here.
Musing upon this mysterious circumstance, and how it should have
happened in so orderly a country as England, so tamed and subjected to
civilization,--an incident to happen in an English park which seemed
better suited to the Indian-haunted forests of the wilder parts of his
own land,--and how no researches which the Warden had instituted had
served in the smallest degree to develop the mystery,--he clambered over
the hedge, and followed the footpath. It plunged into dells, and emerged
from them, led through scenes which seemed those of old romances, and
at last, by these devious ways, began to approach the old house, which,
with its many gray gables, put on a new aspect from this point of view.
Redclyffe admired its venerableness anew; the ivy that overran parts of
it; the marks of age; and wondered at the firmness of the institutions
which, through all the changes that come to man, could have kept this
house the home of one lineal race for so many centuries; so many, that
the absence of his own branch from it seemed but a temporary visit to
foreign parts, from which he was now returned, to be again at home, by
the old hearthstone.
“But what do I mean to do?” said he to himself, stopping short, and
still looking at the old house. “Am I ready to give up all the actual
life before me for the sake of taking up with what I feel to be a less
developed state of human life? Would it not be better for me to depart
now, to turn my back on this flattering prospect? I am not fit to be
here,--I, so strongly susceptible of a newer, more stirring life than
these men lead; I, who feel that, whatever the thought and cultivation
of England may be, my own countrymen have gone forward a long, long
march beyond them, not intellectually, but in a way that gives them a
further start. If I come back hither, with the purpose to make myself
an Englishman, especially an Englishman of rank and hereditary
estate,--then for me America has been discovered in vain, and the great
spirit that has been breathed into us is in vain; and I am false to it
all!”
But again came silently swelling over him like a flood all that ancient
peace, and quietude, and dignity, which looked so stately and beautiful
as brooding round the old house; all that blessed order of ranks, that
sweet superiority, and yet with no disclaimer of common brotherhood,
that existed between the English gentleman and his inferiors; all that
delightful intercourse, so sure of pleasure, so safe from rudeness,
lowness, unpleasant rubs, that exists between gentleman and gentleman,
where, in public affairs, all are essentially of one mind, or seem so
to an American politician, accustomed to the fierce conflicts of our
embittered parties; where life was made so enticing, so refined, and yet
with a sort of homeliness that seemed to show that all its strength was
left behind; that seeming taking in of all that was desirable in life,
and all its grace and beauty, yet never giving life a hard enamel of
over-refinement. What could there be in the wild, harsh, ill-conducted
American approach to civilization, which could compare with this? What
to compare with this juiciness and richness? What other men had ever got
so much out of life as the polished and wealthy Englishmen of to-day?
What higher part was to be acted, than seemed to lie before him, if he
willed to accept it?
He resumed his walk, and, drawing near the manor-house, found that he
was approaching another entrance than that which had at first admitted
him; a very pleasant entrance it was, beneath a porch, of antique form,
and ivy-clad, hospitable and inviting; and it being the approach from
the grounds, it seemed to be more appropriate to the residents of the
house than the other one. Drawing near, Redclyffe saw that a flight of
steps ascended within the porch, old-looking, much worn; and nothing is
more suggestive of long time than a flight of worn steps; it must have
taken so many soles, through so many years, to make an impression.
Judging from the make of the outside of the edifice, Redclyffe thought
that he could make out the way from the porch to the hall and library;
so he determined to enter this way.
There had been, as was not unusual, a little shower of rain during
the afternoon; and as Redclyffe came close to the steps, they were
glistening with the wet. The stones were whitish, like marble, and one
of them bore on it a token that made him pause, while a thrill like
terror ran through his system. For it was the mark of a footstep, very
decidedly made out, and red, like blood,--the Bloody Footstep,--the mark
of a foot, which seemed to have been slightly impressed into the rock,
as if it had been a soft substance, at the same time sliding a little,
and gushing with blood. The glistening moisture of which we have
spoken made it appear as if it were just freshly stamped there; and it
suggested to Redclyffe’s fancy the idea, that, impressed more than two
centuries ago, there was some charm connected with the mark which kept
it still fresh, and would continue to do so to the end of time. It was
well that there was no spectator there,--for the American would have
blushed to have it known how much this old traditionary wonder had
affected his imagination. But, indeed, it was as old as any bugbear of
his mind--as any of those bugbears and private terrors which grow up
with people, and make the dreams and nightmares of childhood, and the
fever-images of mature years, till they haunt the deliriums of the dying
bed, and after that possibly, are either realized or known no more.
The Doctor’s strange story vividly recurred to him, and all the horrors
which he had since associated with this trace; and it seemed to him as
if he had now struck upon a bloody track, and as if there were other
tracks of this supernatural foot which he was bound to search out;
removing the dust of ages that had settled on them, the moss and deep
grass that had grown over them, the forest leaves that might have fallen
on them in America--marking out the pathway, till the pedestrian lay
down in his grave.
The foot was issuing from, not entering into, the house. Whoever had
impressed it, or on whatever occasion, he had gone forth, and doubtless
to return no more. Redclyffe was impelled to place his own foot on the
track; and the action, as it were, suggested in itself strange ideas of
what had been the state of mind of the man who planted it there; and he
felt a strange, vague, yet strong surmise of some agony, some terror and
horror, that had passed here, and would not fade out of the spot. While
he was in these musings, he saw Lord Braithwaite looking at him through
the glass of the porch, with fixed, curious eyes, and a smile on his
face. On perceiving that Redclyffe was aware of his presence, he came
forth without appearing in the least disturbed.
“What think you of the Bloody Footstep?” asked he.
“It seems to me, undoubtedly,” said Redclyffe, stooping to examine it
more closely, “a good thing to make a legend out of; and, like most
legendary lore, not capable of bearing close examination. I should
decidedly say that the Bloody Footstep is a natural reddish stain in the
stone.”
“Do you think so, indeed?” rejoined his Lordship. “It may be; but in
that case, if not the record of an actual deed,--of a foot stamped down
there in guilt and agony, and oozing out with unwipeupable blood,--we
may consider it as prophetic;--as foreboding, from the time when the
stone was squared and smoothed, and laid at this threshold, that a fatal
footstep was really to be impressed here.”
“It is an ingenious supposition,” said Redclyffe. “But is there any sure
knowledge that the prophecy you suppose has yet been fulfilled?”
“If not, it might yet be in the future,” said Lord Braithwaite. “But I
think there are enough in the records of this family to prove that there
did one cross this threshold in a bloody agony, who has since returned
no more. Great seekings, I have understood, have been had throughout the
world for him, or for any sign of him, but nothing satisfactory has been
heard.”
“And it is now too late to expect it,” observed the American.
“Perhaps not,” replied the nobleman, with a glance that Redclyffe
thought had peculiar meaning in it. “Ah! it is very curious to see
what turnings up there are in this world of old circumstances that seem
buried forever; how things come back, like echoes that have rolled away
among the hills and been seemingly hushed forever. We cannot tell when
a thing is really dead; it comes to life, perhaps in its old shape,
perhaps in a new and unexpected one; so that nothing really vanishes out
of the world. I wish it did.”
The conversation now ceased, and Redclyffe entered the house, where he
amused himself for some time in looking at the ancient hall, with its
gallery, its armor, and its antique fireplace, on the hearth of
which burned a genial fire. He wondered whether in that fire was the
continuance of that custom which the Doctor’s legend spoke of, and that
the flame had been kept up there two hundred years, in expectation of
the wanderer’s return. It might be so, although the climate of England
made it a natural custom enough, in a large and damp old room, into
which many doors opened, both from the exterior and interior of the
mansion; but it was pleasant to think the custom a traditionary one, and
to fancy that a booted figure, enveloped in a cloak, might still
arrive, and fling open the veiling cloak, throw off the sombre and
drooping-brimmed hat, and show features that were similar to those seen
in pictured faces on the walls. Was he himself--in another guise, as
Lord Braithwaite had been saying--that long-expected one? Was his the
echoing tread that had been heard so long through the ages--so far
through the wide world--approaching the blood-stained threshold?
With such thoughts, or dreams (for they were hardly sincerely enough
entertained to be called thoughts), Redclyffe spent the day; a strange,
delicious day, in spite of the sombre shadows that enveloped it. He
fancied himself strangely wonted, already, to the house; as if his every
part and peculiarity had at once fitted into its nooks, and corners,
and crannies; but, indeed, his mobile nature and active fancy were not
entirely to be trusted in this matter; it was, perhaps, his American
faculty of making himself at home anywhere, that he mistook for the
feeling of being peculiarly at home here.