THE MAGIC MIRROR.
"I turned my eyes, and as I turned surveyed
An awful vision."
The sun was sinking in the far west as the little schooner Evening
Star went dancing over the bright waves towards Campbell's Isle.
Captain Guy Campbell stood leaning negligently over the taffrail,
solacing himself with a cigar, and conversing at intervals with a
slight, somewhat haughty-looking young man, who stood beside him,
watching the waves flashing, as they sped along. No two could be
more opposite, as far as looks went, than those two, yet both were
handsome and about the same age.
Like all his race, young Campbell was very tall, and dark as a
Spaniard. His short, black, curling hair shadowed a forehead high,
bold, and commanding. Dark, keen, proud eyes flashed from beneath
jetty eye-brows, and the firm, resolute mouth gave to his dark face a
look almost fierce. His figure was exquisitely proportioned and
there was a certain bold frankness, mingled with a reckless,
devil-may-care expression in his fine face, that atoned for his
swarthy complexion and stern brows.
His companion was a tall, elegant young man, with an air of proud
superiority about him, as though he were "somebody," and knew it.
His complexion was fair as a lady's, and would have been effeminate
but for the dark, bold eyes and his dashing air generally. There was
something particularly winning in his handsome face, especially when
he smiled, that lit up his whole countenance with new beauty. Yet,
with all, there was a certain faithless expression about the finely
formed mouth that would have led a close observer to hesitate before
trusting him too far. This, reader, was Mr. Willard Drummond, a
young half-American, half-Parisian, and heir to one of the finest
estates in the Old Dominion. The last five years he had passed in
Paris, and when he was thinking of returning home he had encountered
Campbell and his sister. Fond of luxury and ease as the young
patrician was, he gave up all, after that, for the attraction he
discovered on board the schooner Evening Star. And Captain Campbell,
pleased with his new friend, invited him to cross the ocean with him,
and spend a few weeks with him in his ancestral home, whither he was
obliged to stop while some repairs were being made in his vessel,
which invitation Willard Drummond, nothing loth, accepted.
"Well, Campbell, how is that patient of yours this evening?" inquired
Drummond, after a pause.
"Don't know," replied Captain Campbell, carelessly; "I haven't seen
him since morning. Sibyl is with him now."
"By the way, where did you pick him up? He was not one of your crew,
I understand."
"No; I met him in Liverpool. He came to me one day, and asked me to
take him home. I replied that I had no accommodations, and would
much rather not be troubled with passengers. However, he pleaded so
hard for me to accommodate him, and looked so like something from the
other world all the time, that I had not the heart to refuse the poor
fellow. Before we had been three days out at sea he was taken ill,
and has been raving and shrieking ever since, as you know."
"What do you suppose is the matter with him?"
"Well, I haven't much experience as nurse myself, but I think it's
brain fever, or something of that kind; Sibyl, however, thinks that
bitter remorse for something he has done is preying on his mind, and
girls always know best in these cases."
"He is, if I may judge by his looks, of humble station," said Mr.
Drummond, in an indifferent tone.
"Yes; there can be no doubt of _that_, though he appears to have
plenty of money."
"Has he given his name?"
"Yes; Richard Grove."
"Hum! Well, it would be unpleasant to have him die on board, of
course," said Drummond.
"Oh, I think he'll live to reach our destination; he does not appear
to be sinking very fast."
"We must now be quite near this island home of yours, Captain
Campbell; I grow impatient to see it."
"We shall reach it about moonrise to-night, if the wind holds as it
is now."
"And what, may I ask, do you intend doing with this--Richard Grove,
when you get there? Will you take him into your Robinson Crusoe
castle and nurse him until he gets well, as that enterprising
canoe-builder did Friday's father?
"No, I think not. There is an old lady on the island, who is never
so happy as when she has some one to nurse. I think we'll consign
him to her."
"Then there is another habitation on the island beside yours?" said
Drummond, looking up with more interest than he had yet manifested.
"Yes; old Mrs. Tom, a distant connection of our family, I believe.
And, by the way, Drummond, there is a pretty little girl in the case.
I suppose that will interest you more than the old woman."
"Pretty girls are an old story by this time," said Drummond, with a
yawn.
"Yes, with such a renowned lady-killer as you, no doubt."
"I never saw but one girl in the world worth the trouble of loving,"
said Drummond, looking thoughtfully into the water.
"Ah, what a paragon she must have been. May I ask what quarter of
the globe has the honor of containing so peerless a beauty?"
"I never said she was a beauty, _mon ami_. But never mind that.
When do you expect to be ready for sea again?"
"As soon as possible--in a few weeks, perhaps--for I fear that we'll
all soon get tired of the loneliness of the place."
"You ought to be pretty well accustomed to its loneliness by this
time."
"Not I, faith! It's now three years since I have been there."
"Is it possible? I thought you Campbells were too much attached to
your ancestral home to desert it so long as that."
"Well, it's a dreary place, and I have such an attachment for a wild,
exciting life that positively I could not endure it. I should die of
stagnation. As for Sibyl, my wild, impulsive sister, she would now
as soon think of entering a convent as passing her life there."
"Yet you said it was partly by her request you were going there now?"
"Yes, she expressed a wish to show you the place." A slight flush of
pleasure colored the clear face of Drummond. "I don't know what's
got into Sibyl lately," continued her brother. "I never saw a girl
so changed. She used to be the craziest leap-over-the-moon madcap
that ever existed; now she is growing as tame as--as little Christie."
Drummond's fine eyes were fixed keenly on the frank, open face of
Captain Campbell; but nothing was to be read there more than his
words contained. With a peculiar smile he turned away, and said,
carelessly:
"And who is this little Christie to whom you refer?"
"She's the _protege_ of the old lady on the island--fair as the dream
of an opium-eater, enchanting as a houri, and with the voice of an
angel."
"Whew! the bold Campbell, the daring descendant of old Guy the
Fearless, has lost his heart at last!" laughed Willard Drummond.
"Not I," answered Guy, carelessly. "I never yet saw the woman who
could touch my heart, and, please Heaven, never will."
"Well, here's a wonder--a young man of three-and-twenty, and never in
love! Do you expect me to believe such a fable, my good friend?"
"Believe or not, as you will, it is nevertheless true."
"What--do you mean to say you have never felt a touch of the _grande
passion_--the slightest symptom of that infectious disorder?"
"Pooh! boyish fancies go for nothing. I have now and then felt a
queer sensation about the region of my heart at the sight of sundry
faces at different times, but as for being fatally and incorrigibly
in love, never, on my honor!"
"Well, before you reach the age of thirty, you'll have a different
story to tell, or I'm mistaken."
"No; there is no danger, I fancy, unless indeed," he added, fixing
his eyes quizzically on Drummond's handsome face, "I should happen to
meet this little enchantress you spoke of awhile ago."
A cloud passed over the brow of his companion; but it cleared away in
a moment as a quick, light footstep was heard approaching, and the
next instant Sibyl Campbell, the haughty daughter of a haughty race,
stood bright, dazzling, and smiling before them.
No one ever looked once in the face of Sibyl Campbell without turning
to gaze again. Peerlessly beautiful as she was, it was not her
beauty that would startle you, but the look of wild power, of intense
daring, of fierce passions, of unyielding energy, of a will powerful
for love or hate, of a nature loving, passionate, fiery, impulsive,
and daring, yet gentle and winning.
She might have been seventeen years of age--certainly not more. In
stature she was tall, and with a form regally beautiful, splendidly
developed, with a haughty grace peculiarly her own. Her face was
perfectly oval: her complexion, naturally olive, had been tanned by
sun and wind to a rich, clear, gipsyish darkness. Her hair, that
hung in a profusion of long curls, was of jetty blackness, save where
the sun fell on it, bringing out red rings of fire. Her large Syrian
eyes, full of passion and power, were of the most intense blackness,
now flashing with sparks of light, and anon swimming in liquid
tenderness. Her high, bold brow might have become a crown--certainly
it was regal in its pride and scorn. Her mouth, which was the only
voluptuous feature in her face, was small, with full, ripe, red lips,
rivaling in bloom the deep crimson of her dark cheeks.
Her dress was like herself--odd and picturesque, consisting of a
short skirt of black silk, a bodice of crimson velvet, with gilt
buttons. She held in one hand a black velvet hat, with a long,
sweeping plume, swinging it gayly by the strings as she came toward
them.
She was a strange, wild-looking creature, altogether; yet what would
first strike an observer was her queenly air of pride, her lofty
hauteur, her almost unendurable arrogance. For her unbending pride,
as well as her surprising beauty, the haughty little lady had
obtained, even in childhood, the title of "Queen of the Isle." And
queenly she looked, with her noble brow, her flashing, glorious eyes,
her dainty, curving lips, her graceful, statuesque form--in every
sense of the word "a queen of noble Nature's crowning."
And Willard Drummond, passionate admirer of beauty as he was, what
thought he of this dazzling creature? He leaned negligently still
against the taffrail, with his eyes fixed on her sparkling, sunbright
face, noting every look and gesture as one might gaze on some
strange, beautiful creation, half in fear, half in love, but wholly
in admiration. Yes, he loved her, or thought he did; and gazing with
him on the moonlit waves, when the solemn stars shone serenely above
him, he had told her so, and she had believed him. And she, wild,
untutored child of nature, who can tell the deep devotion, the
intense passion, the fiery, all-absorbing love for him that filled
her impulsive young heart?
"Love was to her impassioned soul
Not, as to others, a mere part
Of her existence; but the whole--
The very life-breath of her heart."
As she advanced, Willard Drummond started up, saying, gayly:
"Welcome back, Miss Sibyl. I thought the sunlight had deserted us
altogether; but you have brought it back in your eyes."
"How's your patient, Sibyl?" said Captain Campbell, who, not being in
love, found Mr. Drummond's high-flown compliments very tiresome
sometimes.
"Much worse, I am afraid," she answered in a peculiarly musical
voice. "I do not think he will live to see the morrow's sun. His
ravings are frightful to hear--some terrible crime seems to be
weighing him down as much as disease."
"After all, the human soul is an awful possession for a guilty man,"
said Captain Campbell, thoughtfully. "Things can be smoothed over
during life, but when one comes to die--"
"They feel what retributive justice is, I suppose," said Drummond, in
his customary careless tone; "and apropos of that, somebody will
suffer terrible remorse after I die. I am to be murdered, if there
is any truth in fortune-telling."
He spoke lightly, with a half smile; but Sibyl's face paled
involuntarily as she exclaimed:
"Murdered, did you say? Who could have predicted anything so
dreadful?"
"An old astrologer, or enchanter, or wizard of some kind, in Germany,
when I was there. The affair seems so improbable, so utterly absurd,
in short, that I never like to allude to it."
"You are not fool enough to believe such nonsense, I hope," said
Captain Campbell.
"I don't know as it is nonsense. 'There are more things in heaven
and earth than are dreamed of in philosophy,' you know."
"Yes--I was sure you would quote that; everyone does that when he
advances some absurd doctrine; but it's all the greatest stuff,
nevertheless."
"But did he tell you who you were to be--"
Sibyl stopped short; even in jest she could not pronounce the word.
"Murdered by?" said Willard, quietly finishing the sentence for her.
"No, he told me nothing. I saw it all."
"Saw it! How? I do not understand."
"Oh, the story is hardly worth relating, and ought not to be told in
the presence of such a skeptic as Captain Guy Campbell," said
Drummond, running his fingers lightly through his dark, glossy locks.
"Heaven forbid I should wait to be inflicted by it!" said Captain
Campbell, starting up. "I will relieve you of my presence, and allow
you to entertain my superstitious sister here with your awful
destiny, of which she will doubtless believe every word."
"I should be sorry to believe anything so dreadful," said Sibyl,
gravely; "but I do think there are some gifted ones to whom the
future has been revealed. I wish I could meet them, and find out
what it has in store for me."
"Let me be your prophet," said Drummond, softly. "Beautiful Sibyl,
there can be nothing but bliss for an angel like you."
Her radiant face flushed with pride, love, and triumph at his words.
"Do you believe in omens?" she said, laughingly. "See how brightly
and beautifully yonder moon is rising! Now, if it reaches the arch
of heaven unclouded, I shall believe your prediction."
Even as she spoke, a dense cloud passed athwart the sky, and the moon
was obscured in darkness.
The dark, bright face of Sibyl paled at the dread omen.
Involuntarily her eyes sought Drummond's who also had been gazing at
the sky.
"Heaven avert the omen!" she cried, with a shudder. "Oh, Willard,
the unclouded moon grew dark even while I spoke."
"And now the cloud is past, and it sails on brighter than ever," he
said, with a smile. "See, fairest Sibyl, all is calm and peaceful
once more. My prediction will be verified, after all."
She drew a deep breath, and looked so intensely relieved that he
laughed. Sibyl blushed vividly, as she said:
"I know you must think me weak and childish; but I am superstitious
by nature. Dreams, inspirations, and presentiments, that no one else
thinks of, are all vivid realities to me. But you promised to tell
me the German wizard's prediction concerning your future, so, pray,
go on."
"Well, let me see," said Willard Drummond, leaning his head on his
hand. "It is now three years ago that a celebrated Egyptian
fortune-teller visited the town in Germany where I resided. His fame
soon spread far and wide, and crowds of the incredulous came from
every part to visit him. He could not speak a word of any language
but his own; but he had an interpreter who did all the talking
necessary, which was very little.
"I was then at a celebrated university; and, with two or three of my
fellow-students, resolved, one day, to visit the wizard. Arrived at
his house, we were shown into a large room, and called up one by one
in the presence of the Egyptian.
"Our object in going was more for sport than anything else; but when
we saw the first who was called--a wild, reckless young fellow, who
feared nothing earthly--return pale and serious, our mirth was at an
end. One by one the others were called, and all came back grave and
thoughtful. By some chance, I was the last.
"I am not, like you, bright Sibyl, naturally superstitious; but I
confess, when the interpreter ushered me into the presence of this
wizard, I felt a sort of chilly awe creeping over me. He was the
most singular-looking being I ever beheld. His face was exactly like
that of one who has been for some days dead--a sort of dark-greenish
white, with pale-blue lips, and sharp, Asiatic features. His eyes,
black and piercingly sharp, looked forth from two deep caverns of
sockets, and seemed the only living feature in his ghastly face.
There were caldrons, and lizards, and cross-bones, and tame serpents,
and curious devices carved on the walls, ceiling and floor, and the
white, grinning skulls that were scattered about formed a hideously
revolting sight in that darkened room.
"The Egyptian stood before a smoking caldron, and, drawn up to his
full height, his size appeared almost colossal. His dress was a
long, black robe, all woven over with scorpions, and snakes, and
other equally pleasing objects, that seemed starting out dazzlingly
white from this dark background. Altogether, the room looked so like
a charnel-house, and the wizard so like a supernatural being, that I
am not ashamed to own I felt myself growing nervous as I looked
around.
"The interpreter, who stood behind, opened the scene by asking me my
name, age, birthplace, and divers other questions of a like nature,
which he wrote down in some sort of hieroglyphics and handed to the
Egyptian. Then bidding me advance and keep my eyes fixed on the
caldron and not speak a word, the interpreter left the room.
"My heart beat faster than was its wont as I approached this strange
being, and found myself completely alone with him in this ghostly,
weird place. He took a handful of what I imagined to be incense of
some kind, and threw it on the red, living coals, muttering some
strange sounds in an unknown tongue as he did so. Presently a cloud
of smoke arose, dense, black, and suffocating, filling the whole room
with the gloom of Tartarus. Slowly, as if endowed with instinct, it
lifted itself up and spread out before me. And, looking up, I
beheld--"
Willard Drummond paused, as if irresolute whether to reveal the rest
or not; but Sibyl grasped his arm, and in a voice that was fairly
hoarse with intense excitement, said:
"Go on."
"I saw," he continued, looking beyond her, as if describing something
then passing before him, "the interior of a church thronged with
people. Flowers were strewn along the aisles, and I seemed to hear
faintly the grand cadences of a triumphal hymn. A clergyman, book in
hand, stood before a bridal pair, performing the marriage ceremony.
The features of the man of God are indelibly impressed on my memory,
but the two who stood before him had their backs toward me. For
about five seconds they remained thus stationary, then it began to
grow more indistinct; the forms grew shadowy and undefined, and began
to disappear. Just before they vanished altogether, the faces of the
wedded pair turned for an instant toward me, and in the bridegroom,
Sibyl, I beheld myself. The vapor lifted and lifted, until all was
gone, and nothing was to be seen but the black walls of the room and
the glowing, fiery coals in the caldron.
"Again the Egyptian threw the incense on the fire, and again mumbled
his unintelligible jargon. Again the thick, black smoke arose,
filling the room; and again became stationary, forming a shadowy
panorama before me. This time I saw a prison-cell--dark, dismal, and
noisome. A rough straw pallet stood on one side, and on the other a
pitcher of water and a loaf--orthodox prison fare from time
immemorial. On the ground, chained to the wall, groveled a woman, in
shining bridal robes, her long midnight tresses trailing on the foul
floor. No words can describe to you the utter despair and mortal
anguish depicted in her crouching attitude. I stood spell-bound to
the spot, unable to move, in breathless interest. Then the scene
began to fade away; the prostrate figure lifted its head, and I
beheld the face of her whom a moment before seemed to stand beside me
at the altar. But no words of mine can describe to you the mortal
woe, the unutterable despair, in that haggard but beautiful face.
Sibyl! Sibyl! it will haunt me to my dying day. I put out my hand,
as if to retain her, but in that instant all disappeared."
Once more Willard Drummond paused; this time he was deadly pale, and
his eyes were wild and excited. Sibyl stood near him, her great
black, mystic eyes dilated, every trace of color fading from her
face, leaving even her lips as pale as death.
"The third time this strange enchanter went through the same ceremony
as before," continued he; "and, as in the previous cases, a new scene
appeared before me. Now, the time appeared to be night; and the
place, a dark, lonesome wood. A furious storm of lightning, and
thunder, and rain, was raging, and the trees creaked and bent in the
fierce wind. On the ground lay the dead body of a man weltering in
blood. A dark, crimson stream flowed from a great, frightful gash in
his head, from which the life seemed just to have gone. As the white
face of the murdered man was upturned to the light--cut, bloody, and
disfigured as it was--Sibyl, I recognized _myself_ once more, As
Heaven hears me, I saw it as plainly as I see yonder pale, fair moon
now. A white, ghostly form, whether of woman or spirit I know not,
seemed hovering near, darting, as it were, in and out amid the trees.
Even as I gazed, it grew thin and shadowy, until all was gone again.
"For the fourth and last time, the Egyptian threw a strange incense
on the fire, and 'spoke the words of power," and a new vision met my
horrified gaze. I seemed to behold an immense concourse of people, a
vast mob, swaying to and fro in the wildest excitement. A low,
hoarse growl, as of distant thunder, passed at intervals through the
vast crowd, and every eye was raised to an object above them. I
looked up, too, and beheld a sight that seemed freezing the very
blood in my veins. It was a _scaffold_; and standing on it, with the
ignominious halter round her white, beautiful neck, was she who had
stood beside me at the altar, whom I had seen chained in her
prison-cell, doomed to die by the hand of the public hangman now.
Her beautiful hands were stretched out wildly, imploringly, to the
crowd below, who only hooted her in her agony and despair. The
executioner led her to the fatal drop, a great shout arose from the
crowd, then all faded away; and looking up, as if from an appalling
dream, I saw the interpreter beckoning me from the door. How I
reeled from the room, with throbbing brow and feverish pulse, I know
not. Everything seemed swimming around me; and, in a state of the
wildest excitement, I was hurried home by my companions.
"The next day the Egyptian left the city, and where he went after, I
never heard.
"Such was the glimpse of the future I beheld. It was many months
after before I completely recovered from the shock I received. How
to account for it I do not know. Certain I am that I beheld it,
truly, as I have told it in every particular, for the impression it
made upon me at the time was so powerful that everything connected
with it is indelibly engraven on my memory. It may seem strange,
absurd, impossible; but that I have nothing to do with; I only know I
_saw_ it, incredible as it seems. But, good heaven! Sibyl, dearest,
are you ill--fainting!"
Pale, trembling, and excited, the once fearless Sibyl Campbell clung
to his arm, white with vague, sickening horror. Superstitious to an
unusual degree, an awful presentiment had clutched her heart; and,
for a moment she seemed dying in his arms.
"Sibyl! Sibyl! my dearest love!" he said, in alarm, "what is it?"
"Nothing--nothing," she answered, in a tremulous voice; "but, oh,
Willard! do you believe the prediction?"
"Strange, wild girl that you are! has this idle talk frightened you
so?" he said, smiling at her wild, dilated eyes.
"If it should prove true," she said, covering her face with a
shudder. "Willard, tell me--_do_ you believe it?"
"My dark-eyed darling, how can I tell whether to believe it or not?
It has not come true, and there seems no likelihood of its ever doing
so. Do not think of it any more; if I had thought it would have
unnerved you so, I would never have told you."
"But, Willard, did any of his other predictions prove true?"
"I would rather not answer that question, Sibyl," he said, while a
cloud darkened for a moment his fine face.
"You _must_ tell me," she cried, starting up, and looking at him with
her large, lustrous eyes.
"Well, then--yes," said Drummond, reluctantly. "Young Vaughn, one of
those who accompanied me, saw a funeral procession, and himself robed
for the grave lying in the coffin. Five weeks after, he was
accidentally shot."
She put up her arm in a vague, wild sort of way, as if to ward off
some approaching danger.
"Oh, Willard! this is dreadful--dreadful! What if all he predicted
should come to pass!"
"Well, I should be obliged to do the best I could. What will be,
will be--you know. But I have no such fear. Nonsense, Sibyl! a
Campbell of the Isle trembling thus at imaginary danger!--the ghost
of Guy the Fearless will start from his grave, if he discovers it!"
The color came proudly back to her cheek at his bantering words, as
she said, more coldly and calmly:
"For myself, I could never tremble; but for----"
She paused, and her beautiful lip quivered.
"For me, then, dear love, those fears are," he said tenderly. "A
thousand thanks for this proof of your love: but, believe me, the
cause is only imaginary. Why, Sibyl, I had nearly forgotten all
about the matter, until your brother's remark to-night recalled it to
my memory. Promise me, now, you will never think of it more--much
less speak of it."
"Tell me one thing more, Willard, and I promise--only one," said
Sibyl, laying her hand on his shoulder, and looking up in his face
earnestly, while her voice trembled in spite of all her efforts.
"Well," he said, anxiously.
"Did you recognize the face of the person whom you saw beside you at
the altar, and who afterward died on I the scaffold?"
He was silent, and looked with a troubled eye out over the shining
waters.
"Willard, dearest Willard! tell me, have you, ever yet seen her?"
"Why will you question me thus, dearest Sibyl?"
"Answer me truly, Willard, on your honor."
"Well, then, dearest, I have."
Sibyl drew her breath quick and short, and held his arm with a
convulsive grasp.
"Who is she?" she asked.
Willard turned, and looking steadily into her wild, searching eyes,
replied, in a thrilling whisper:
"_You_, Sibyl--_you!_"