TWO DYING BEQUESTS.
This midsummer night was sultry and still. The darkness was like the
darkness of Egypt, lighted every now and then by a vivid Hash of
lightning, from what quarter of the heavens no man knew. The inky sky
was invisible--no breath of air stirred the terrible calm. The
midsummer night was full of dark and deadly menace.
Hours ago a fierce and wrathful sunset had burned itself out on a
brassy sky. The sun, a lurid ball of fire, had sunk in billows of
blood-red cloud, and pitch blackness had fallen upon earth and sky and
sea. Everything above and below breathed of speedy tempest, but the
midnight was drawing near, and the storm had not yet burst.
And on this black June night Sir Jasper Kingsland lay on his stately
bed, dying.
The lofty chamber was but dimly lighted. It was a grand, vast room,
paneled in black oak, hung with somber draperies, and carpeted in rich
dark Brussels.
Three wax candles made white spots of light in the solemn gloom; a
wood-fire burned or rather smoldered, in the wide hearth, for the vast
rooms were chilly even in midsummer; but neither fire-light nor
candle-light could illumine the ghostly depths of the chamber. Shadows
crouched like evil things in the dusky corners, and round the bed, only
darker shadows among the rest, knelt the dying man's family--wife and
daughter and son. And hovering aloof, with pale, anxious faces, stood
the rector, the Reverend Cyrus Green, and Doctor Parker Godroy.
The last hope was over, the last prayer had been said, the last faint
breaths uttered between the dying lips. With the tide going out on the
shore below, the baronet's life was ebbing.
"Olivia!"
Lady Kingsland, kneeling in tearless grief by her husband's side, bent
over him to catch the faint whisper.
"My dearest, I am here. What is it?"
"Where is Everard?"
Everard Kingsland, a fair-haired, blue-eyed, handsome boy, lifted his
head from the opposite side. It was a handsome, high-bred face--the
ancestral face of all the Kingslands--that of this twelve-year-old boy.
"Here, papa!"
"My boy! my boy! whom I have loved so well--whom I have shielded so
tenderly. My precious, only son, I must leave you at last!"
The boy stifled a sob as he bent and kissed the ice-cold face. Young
as he was, he had the gravity and self-repression of manhood already.
"I have loved you better than my own life," the faint, whispering voice
went on. "I would have died to save you an hour of pain. I have kept
the one secret of my life well--a secret that has blighted it before
its time--but I can not face the dread unknown and bear my secret with
me. On my death-bed I must tell all, and my darling boy must bear the
blow."
Everard Kingsland listened to his father's huskily murmured words in
boyish wonderment. What secret was he talking of? He glanced across
at his mother, and saw her pale cheeks suddenly flushed and her calm
eyes kindling.
"No living soul has ever heard from me what I must tell you to-night,
my Everard--not even your mother. Do not leave me, Olivia. You, too,
must know all that you may guard your son--that you may pity and
forgive me. Perhaps I have erred in keeping any secret from you, but
the truth was too horrible to tell. There have been times when the
thought of it nearly drove me mad. How, then, could I tell the wife I
loved--the son I idolized--this cruel and shameful thing?"
The youthful Everard looked simply bewildered--Lady Kingsland excited,
expectant, flushed.
She gently wiped the clammy brow and held a reviving cordial to the
livid lips.
"My dearest, do not agitate yourself," she said. "We will listen to
all you have to say, and love you none the less, let it be what it
will."
"My own dear wife! half the secret you know already. You remember the
astrologer--the prediction?"
"Surely. You have never been the same man since that fatal night. It
is of the prediction you would speak?"
"It is. I must tell my son. I must warn him of the unutterable horror
to come. Oh, my boy! my boy! what will become of you when you learn
your horrible doom?"
"Papa," the lad said, softly, but growing very white, "I don't
understand--what horror? what doom? Tell me, and see how I will bear
it. I am a Kingsland, you know, and the son of a daring race."
"That is my brave boy! Send them out of the room, Olivia--priest,
doctor, Mildred, and all--then come close to me, close, close, for my
voice is failing--and listen."
Lady Kingsland arose--fair and stately still as twelve years before,
and eminently self-sustained in this trying hour. In half a minute she
had turned out rector, physician, and daughter, and knelt again by that
bed of death.
"The first part of my story, Olivia," began the dying man, "belongs to
you. Years before I knew you, when I was a young, hot-headed, rashly
impulsive boy, traveling in Spain, I fell in with a gang of wandering
gypsies. I had been robbed and wounded by mountain brigands; those
gypsies found me, took me to their tents, cared for me, cured me. But
long after I was well I lingered with them, for the fairest thing the
sun shone on was my black-eyed nurse, Zenith. We were both so young
and so fiery-blooded, so--Ah! what need to go over the old, old
grounds? There was one hour of mad, brief bliss, parting and
forgetfulness. I forgot. Life was a long, idle summer holiday to me.
But she never forgot--never forgave! You remember the woman, Olivia,
who burst into the church on the day of our boy's christening--the
woman who died in the sexton's house? That woman was Zenith--old and
withered, and maddened by her wrongs--that woman who died cursing me
and mine. A girl, dark and fierce, and terrible as herself, stood by
her to the last, lingered at her grave to vow deathless revenge--her
daughter and mine!"
The faint voice ceased an instant. The fluttering spirit rallied, and
resumed:
"I have reason to know that daughter was married. I have reason to
know she had a child--whether boy or girl I can not tell. To that
child the inheritance of hatred and revenge will fall; that child, some
inward prescience tells me, will wreak deep and awful vengeance for the
past. Beware of the grandchild of Zenith, the gypsy--beware, Olivia,
for yourself and your son!"
"Is this all?" Olivia said, in a constrained, hard voice.
"All I have to say to you--the rest is for Everard. My son, on the
night of your birth an Eastern astrologer came to this house and cast
your horoscope. He gave that horoscope to me at day-dawn and departed,
and from that hour to this I have neither seen nor heard of him.
Before reading your future in the stars he looked into my palm and told
me the past--told me the story of Zenith and her wrongs--told me what
no one under heaven but myself knew. My boy, the revelation of that
night has blighted my life--broken my heart! The unutterable horror of
your future has brought my gray hairs to the grave. Oh, my son! what
will become of you when I am gone?"
"What was it, papa?" the lad asked. "What has the future in store for
me?"
A convulsive spasm distorted the livid face; the eye-balls rolled, the
death-rattle sounded. With a smothered cry of terror Lady Kingsland
lifted the agonized head in her arms.
"Quick, Jasper--the horoscope! Where?"
"My safe--study--secret spring--at back! Oh, God, have mercy--"
The clock struck sharply--twelve. A vivid blaze of lambent lightning
lighted the room; the awful death-rattle sounded once more.
"Beware of Zenith's grandchild!"
He spoke the words aloud, clear and distinct, and never spoke again.
* * * * * *
Many miles away from Kingsland Court, that same sultry, oppressive
midsummer night a little third-rate theater on the Surrey side of
London was crowded to overflowing. There was a grand spectacular
drama, full of transformation scenes, fairies, demons, spirits of air,
fire, and water; a brazen orchestra blowing forth, and steam, and
orange-peel, and suffocation generally.
Foremost among all the fairies and nymphs, noted for the shortness of
her filmy skirts, the supple beauty of her shapely limbs, her
incomparable dancing, and her dark, bright beauty, flashed La Sylphine
before the foot-lights.
The best _danseuse_ in the kingdom, and the prettiest, and invested
with a magic halo of romance, La Sylphine shone like a meteor among
lesser stars, and brought down thunders of applause every time she
appeared.
The little feet twinkled and flashed; the long, dark waves of hair
floated in a shining banner behind her to the tiny waist; the pale,
upraised face--the eyes ablaze like black stars! Oh, surely La
Sylphine was the loveliest thing, that hot June night, the gas-light
shone on!
The fairy spectacle was over--the green drop-curtain fell. La Sylphine
had smiled and dipped and kissed hands to thundering bravos for the
last time that night, and now, behind the scenes, was rapidly
exchanging the spangles and gossamer of fairydom for the shabby and
faded merino shawl and dingy straw hat of every-day life.
"You danced better than ever to-night, Miss Monti," a tall demon in
tail and horns said, sauntering up to her. "Them there pretty feet of
your'n will make your fortune yet, and beat Fanny Ellsler!"
"Not to mention her pretty face," said a brother fiend, removing his
mask. "Her fortune's made already, if she's a mind to take it.
There's a gay young city swell a-waiting at the wings to see you home,
Miss Monti."
"Is it Maynard, the banker's son?" she asked.
The second demon nodded.
"Then I must escape by the side entrance. When he gets tired waiting,
Mr. Smithers, give him La Sylphine's compliments, and let him go."
She glided past the demons down a dark and winding staircase, and out
into the noisy, lighted street.
The girl paused an instant under a street-lamp--she was only a
girl--fifteen or sixteen at most, though very tall, with a bright,
fearless look--then drawing her shawl closely round her, she flitted
rapidly away.
The innumerable city clocks tolled heavily--eleven. The night was
pitch-dark; the sheet-lightning blazed across the blackness, and now
and then a big drop fell. Still the girl sped on until she reached her
destination.
It was the poorest and vilest quarter of the great city--among reeking
smells, and horrible sounds, and disgusting sights. The house she
entered was tottering to decay--a dreadful den by day and by night,
thronged with the very scum of the London streets. Up and up a long
stair-way she flew, paused at a door on the third landing, opened it,
and went in.
It was a miserable room--all one could have expected from the street
and the house. There was a black grate, one or two broken chairs, a
battered table, and a wretched bed in the corner. On the bed a
woman--the ghastly skeleton of a woman--lay dying.
The entrance of La Sylphine aroused the woman from the stupor into
which she had fallen. She opened her spectral eyes and looked eagerly
around.
"My Sunbeam! is it thou?"
"It is I, mother--at last. I could come no sooner. The ballet was
very long to-night."
"And my Sunbeam was bravoed, and encored, and crowned with flowers, was
she not?"
"Yes, mother; but never mind that. How are you tonight?"
"Dying, my own."
The _danseuse_ fell on her knees with a shrill, sharp cry.
"No, mother--no, no! Not dying! Very ill, very weak, very low, but
not dying. Oh, not dying!"
"Dying, my daughter!" the sick woman said. "I count my life by minutes
now; I heard the city clocks strike eleven; I counted the strokes, for,
my Sunbeam, it is the last hour thy mother will ever hear on earth."
The ballet-dancer covered her face, with a low, despairing cry. The
dying mother, with a painful effort, lifted her own skeleton hand and
removed those of the girl.
"Weep not, but listen, _carissima_. I have much to say to thee before
I go; I feared to die before you came; and even in my grave I could not
rest with the words I must say unsaid. I have a legacy to leave thee,
my daughter."
"A legacy?"
The girl opened her great black eyes in wide surprise.
"Even so. Not of lands, or houses, or gold, or honors, but something a
thousand-fold greater--an inheritance of hatred and revenge!"
"My mother!"
"Listen to me, my daughter, and my dying malediction be upon thee if
thou fulfillest not the trust. Thou hast heard the name of Kingsland?"
"Ay, often; from my father ere he died--from thee, since. Was it not
his last command to me--this hatred of their evil race? Did I not
promise him on his death-bed, four years ago? Does my mother think I
forget?"
"That is my brave daughter. You know the cruel story of treachery and
wrong done thy grandmother, Zenith--you know the prediction your father
made to my father, Sir Jasper Kingsland, on the night of his son's
birth. Be it thine, my brave daughter, to see that prediction
fulfilled."
"You ask a terrible thing, my mother," she said, slowly; but I can
refuse you nothing, and I abhor them all. I promise--the prediction
shall be fulfilled!"
"My own! my own! That son is a boy of twelve now--be it yours to find
him, and work the retribution of the gods. Your grandmother, your
father, your mother, look to you from their graves for vengeance. Woe
to you if you fail!"
"I shall not fail!" the girl said, solemnly. "I can die, but I can not
break a promise. Vengeance shall fall, fierce and terrible, upon the
heir of Kingsland, and mine shall be the hand to inflict it. I swear
it by your death-bed, mother, and I will keep my oath!"
The mother pressed her hand. The film of death was in her eyes. She
strove to speak; there was a quick, dreadful convulsion, then an awful
calm.
Within the same hour, with miles between them, Sir Jasper Kingsland and
Zara, his outcast daughter, died.
* * * * * *
The dawn of another day crept silently over the Devon hill-tops as Lady
Kingsland arose from her husband's deathbed.
White, and stark, and rigid, the late lord of Kingsland Court lay in
the awful majesty of death.
The doctor, the rector, the nurse, sat, pale and somber watchers, in
the death-room. More than an hour before the youthful baronet had been
sent to his room, worn out with his night's watching.
It was the Reverend Cyrus Green who urged my lady now to follow him.
"You look utterly exhausted, my dear Lady Kingsland," he said. "Pray
retire and endeavor to sleep. You are not able to endure such fatigue."
"I am worn out," she said. "I believe I will lie down, but I feel as
though I should never sleep again."
She quitted the room, but not to seek her own. Outside the
death-chamber she paused an instant, and her face lighted suddenly.
"Now is my time," she said, under her breath. "A few hours more and it
may be too late. His safe, he said--the secret spring!"
She flitted away, pallid and guilty looking, into Sir Jasper's study.
It was deserted, of course, and there in the corner stood the grim iron
safe.
"Now for the secrets of the dead! No fortune-telling jugglery shall
blight my darling boy's life while I can help it. He is as
superstitious as his father."
With considerable difficulty she opened the safe, pulled forth drawer
after drawer, until the grim iron back was exposed.
"The secret spring is here," she muttered. "Surely, surely, I can find
it."
For many minutes she searched in vain; then her glance fell on a tiny
steel knob inserted in a corner. She pressed this with all her might,
confident of success.
Nor was she deceived; the knob moved, the iron slid slowly back,
disclosing a tiny hidden drawer.
Lady Kingsland barely repressed a cry as she saw the paper, and by its
side something wrapped in silver tissue. Greedily she snatched both
out, pressed back the knob, locked the safe, stole out of the study and
up to her own room.
Panting with her haste, my lady sunk into a seat, with her treasures
eagerly clutched. A moment recovered her; then she took up the little
parcel wrapped in the silver paper.
"He said nothing of this," she thought. "What can it be?"
She tore off the wrapping. As it fell to the floor, a long tress of
silky black hair fell with it, and she held in her hand a miniature
painted on ivory. A girlish face of exquisite beauty, dusky as the
face of an Indian queen, looked up at her, fresh and bright as thirty
years before. No need to look at the words on the reverse--"My
peerless Zenith"--to know who it was; the wife's jealousy told her at
the first glance.
"And all these years he has kept this," she said, between her set
teeth, "while he pretended he loved only me! 'My peerless Zenith!'
Yes, she is beautiful as the fabled houris of the Mussulman's paradise.
Well, I will keep it in my turn. Who knows what end it may serve yet?"
She picked up the tress of hair, and enveloped all in the silver paper
once more. Then she lifted the folded document, and looked darkly at
the superscription:
"Horoscope of the Heir of Kingsland."
"Which the heir of Kingsland shall never see," she said, grimly
unfolding it. "Now for this mighty secret."
She just glanced at the mystic symbols, the cabalistic signs and
figures, and turned to the other side. There, beautifully written, in
long, clear letters, she saw her son's fate.
The morning wore on--noon came; the house was as still as a tomb.
Rosine, my lady's maid, with a cup of tea, ventured to tap at her
ladyship's door. There was no response.
"She sleeps," thought Rosine, and turned the handle.
But at the threshold she paused in wild alarm. No, my lady did not
sleep. She sat in her chair, upright and ghastly as a galvanized
corpse, a written paper closely clutched in her hand, and a look of
white horror frozen on her face.