Produced by Eric Eldred, Thomas Berger, and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team.
THE DOLLIVER ROMANCE
FANSHAWE, AND SEPTIMIUS FELTON
With An Appendix Containing
THE ANCESTRAL FOOTSTEP
by
NATHANIEL HAWTHORNE
* * * * *
THE ANCESTRAL FOOTSTEP:
OUTLINES OF AN ENGLISH ROMANCE.
INTRODUCTORY NOTE.
"Septimius Felton" was the outgrowth of a project, formed by Hawthorne
during his residence in England, of writing a romance, the scene of which
should be laid in that country; but this project was afterwards
abandoned, giving place to a new conception in which the visionary search
for means to secure an earthly immortality was to form the principal
interest. The new conception took shape in the uncompleted "Dolliver
Romance." The two themes, of course, were distinct, but, by a curious
process of thought, one grew directly out of the other: the whole history
constitutes, in fact, a chapter in what may be called the genealogy of a
romance. There remained, after "Septimius Felton" had been published,
certain manuscripts connected with the scheme of an English story. One of
these manuscripts was written in the form of a journalized narrative; the
author merely noting the date of what he wrote, as he went along. The
other was a more extended sketch, of much greater bulk, and without date,
but probably produced several years later. It was not originally intended
by those who at the time had charge of Hawthorne's papers that either of
these incomplete writings should be laid before the public; because they
manifestly had not been left by him in a form which he would have
considered as warranting such a course. But since the second and larger
manuscript has been published under the title of "Dr. Grimshawe's
Secret," it has been thought best to issue the present sketch, so that
the two documents may be examined together. Their appearance places in
the hands of readers the entire process of development leading to the
"Septimius" and "The Dolliver Romance." They speak for themselves much
more efficiently than any commentator can expect to do; and little,
therefore, remains to be said beyond a few words of explanation in regard
to the following pages.
The Note-Books show that the plan of an English romance, turning upon the
fact that an emigrant to America had carried away a family secret which
should give his descendant the power to ruin the family in the mother
country, had occurred to Hawthorne as early as April, 1855. In August of
the same year he visited Smithell's Hall, in Bolton le Moors, concerning
which he had already heard its legend of "The Bloody Footstep," and from
that time on, the idea of this footprint on the threshold-stone of the
ancestral mansion seems to have associated itself inextricably with the
dreamy substance of his yet unshaped romance. Indeed, it leaves its mark
broadly upon Sibyl Dacy's wild legend in "Septimius Felton," and
reappears in the last paragraph of that story. But, so far as we can know
at this day, nothing definite was done until after his departure for
Italy. It was then, while staying in Rome, that he began to put upon
paper that plot which had first occupied his thoughts three years before,
in the scant leisure allowed him by his duties at the Liverpool
consulate. Of leisure there was not a great deal at Rome, either; for, as
the "French and Italian Note-Books" show, sight-seeing and social
intercourse took up a good deal of his time, and the daily record in his
journal likewise had to be kept up. But he set to work resolutely to
embody, so far as he might, his stray imaginings upon the haunting
English theme, and to give them connected form. April 1, 1858, he began;
and then nearly two weeks passed before he found an opportunity to
resume; April 13th being the date of the next passage. By May he gets
fully into swing, so that day after day, with but slight breaks, he
carries on the story, always increasing in interest for us who read as
for him who improvised. Thus it continues until May 19th, by which time
he has made a tolerably complete outline, filled in with a good deal of
detail here and there. Although the sketch is cast in the form of a
regular narrative, one or two gaps occur, indicating that the author had
thought out certain points which he then took for granted without making
note of them. Brief scenes, passages of conversation and of narration,
follow one another after the manner of a finished story, alternating with
synopses of the plot, and queries concerning particulars that needed
further study; confidences of the romancer to himself which form
certainly a valuable contribution to literary history. The manuscript
closes with a rapid sketch of the conclusion, and the way in which it is
to be executed. Succinctly, what we have here is a romance in embryo;
one, moreover, that never attained to a viable stature and constitution.
During his lifetime it naturally would not have been put forward as
demanding public attention; and, in consideration of that fact, it has
since been withheld from the press by the decision of his daughter, in
whom the title to it vests. Students of literary art, however, and many
more general readers will, I think, be likely to discover in it a charm
all the greater for its being in parts only indicated; since, as it
stands, it presents the precise condition of a work of fiction in its
first stage. The unfinished "Grimshawe" was another development of the
same theme, and the "Septimius" a later sketch, with a new element
introduced. But the present experimental fragment, to which it has been
decided to give the title of "The Ancestral Footstep," possesses a
freshness and spontaneity recalling the peculiar fascination of those
chalk or pencil outlines with which great masters in the graphic art have
been wont to arrest their fleeting glimpses of a composition still
unwrought.
It would not be safe to conclude, from the large amount of preliminary
writing done with a view to that romance, that Hawthorne always adopted
this laborious mode of making several drafts of a book. On the contrary,
it is understood that his habit was to mature a design so thoroughly in
his mind before attempting to give it actual existence on paper that but
little rewriting was needed. The circumstance that he was obliged to
write so much that did not satisfy him in this case may account partly
for his relinquishing the theme, as one which for him had lost its
seductiveness through too much recasting.
It need be added only that the original manuscript, from which the
following pages are printed through the medium of an exact copy, is
singularly clear and fluent. Not a single correction occurs throughout;
but here and there a word is omitted, obviously by mere accident, and
these omissions have been supplied. The correction in each case is marked
by brackets, in this printed reproduction. The sketch begins abruptly;
but there is no reason to suppose that anything preceded it except the
unrecorded musings in the author's mind, and one or two memoranda in the
"English Note-Books." We must therefore imagine the central figure,
Middleton, who is the American descendant of an old English family, as
having been properly introduced, and then pass at once to the opening
sentences. The rest will explain itself.
G. P. L.
* * * * *
THE ANCESTRAL FOOTSTEP.
OUTLINES OF AN ENGLISH ROMANCE.
I.
April 1, 1858. _Thursday_.--He had now been travelling long in those rich
portions of England where he would most have wished to find the object of
his pursuit; and many had been the scenes which he would willingly have
identified with that mentioned in the ancient, time-yellowed record which
he bore about with him. It is to be observed that, undertaken at first
half as the amusement, the unreal object, of a grown man's play-day, it
had become more and more real to him with every step of the way that he
followed it up; along those green English lanes it seemed as if
everything would bring him close to the mansion that he sought; every
morning he went on with renewed hopes, nor did the evening, though it
brought with it no success, bring with it the gloom and heaviness of a
real disappointment. In all his life, including its earliest and happiest
days, he had never known such a spring and zest as now filled his veins,
and gave lightsomeness to his limbs; this spirit gave to the beautiful
country which he trod a still richer beauty than it had ever borne, and
he sought his ancient home as if he had found his way into Paradise and
were there endeavoring to trace out the sight [site] of Eve's bridal
bower, the birthplace of the human race and its glorious possibilities of
happiness and high performance.
In these sweet and delightful moods of mind, varying from one dream to
another, he loved indeed the solitude of his way; but likewise he loved
the facility which his pursuit afforded him, of coming in contact with
many varieties of men, and he took advantage of this facility to an
extent which it was not usually his impulse to do. But now he came forth
from all reserves, and offered himself to whomever the chances of the way
offered to him, with a ready sensibility that made its way through every
barrier that even English exclusiveness, in whatever rank of life, could
set up. The plastic character of Middleton was perhaps a variety of
American nature only presenting itself under an individual form; he could
throw off the man of our day, and put on a ruder nature, but then it was
with a certain fineness, that made this only [a] distinction between it
and the central truth. He found less variety of form in the English
character than he had been accustomed to see at home; but perhaps this
was in consequence of the external nature of his acquaintance with it;
for the view of one well accustomed to a people, and of a stranger to
them, differs in this--that the latter sees the homogeneity, the one
universal character, the groundwork of the whole, while the former sees a
thousand little differences, which distinguish the individual men apart,
to such a degree that they seem hardly to have any resemblance among
themselves.
But just at the period of his journey when we take him up, Middleton had
been for two or three days the companion of an old man who interested him
more than most of his wayside companions; the more especially as he
seemed to be wandering without an object, or with such a dreamy object as
that which led Middleton's own steps onward. He was a plain old man
enough, but with a pale, strong-featured face and white hair, a certain
picturesqueness and venerableness, which Middleton fancied might have
befitted a richer garb than he now wore. In much of their conversation,
too, he was sensible that, though the stranger betrayed no acquaintance
with literature, nor seemed to have conversed with cultivated minds, yet
the results of such acquaintance and converse were here. Middleton was
inclined to think him, however, an old man, one of those itinerants, such
as Wordsworth represented in the "Excursion," who smooth themselves by
the attrition of the world and gain a knowledge equivalent to or better
than that of books from the actual intellect of man awake and active
around them.
Often, during the short period since their companionship originated,
Middleton had felt impelled to disclose to the old man the object of his
journey, and the wild tale by which, after two hundred years, he had been
blown as it were across the ocean, and drawn onward to commence this
search. The old man's ordinary conversation was of a nature to draw forth
such a confidence as this; frequently turning on the traditions of the
wayside; the reminiscences that lingered on the battle-fields of the
Roses, or of the Parliament, like flowers nurtured by the blood of the
slain, and prolonging their race through the centuries for the wayfarer
to pluck them; or the family histories of the castles, manor-houses, and
seats which, of various epochs, had their park-gates along the roadside
and would be seen with dark gray towers or ancient gables, or more modern
forms of architecture, rising up among clouds of ancient oaks. Middleton
watched earnestly to see if, in any of these tales, there were
circumstances resembling those striking and singular ones which he had
borne so long in his memory, and on which he was now acting in so strange
a manner; but [though] there was a good deal of variety of incident in
them, there never was any combination of incidents having the peculiarity
of this.
"I suppose," said he to the old man, "the settlers in my country may have
carried away with them traditions long since forgotten in this country,
but which might have an interest and connection, and might even piece out
the broken relics of family history, which have remained perhaps a
mystery for hundreds of years. I can conceive, even, that this might be
of importance in settling the heirships of estates; but which now, only
the two insulated parts of the story being known, remain a riddle,
although the solution of it is actually in the world, if only these two
parts could be united across the sea, like the wires of an electric
telegraph."
"It is an impressive idea," said the old man. "Do you know any such
tradition as you have hinted at?"
_April 13th_.--Middleton could not but wonder at the singular chance that
had established him in such a place, and in such society, so strangely
adapted to the purposes with which he had been wandering through England.
He had come hither, hoping as it were to find the past still alive and in
action; and here it was so in this one only spot, and these few persons
into the midst of whom he had suddenly been cast. With these reflections
he looked forth from his window into the old-fashioned garden, and at the
stone sundial, which had numbered all the hours--all the daylight and
serene ones, at least--since his mysterious ancestor left the country.
And [is] this, then, he thought to himself, the establishment of which
some rumor had been preserved? Was it here that the secret had its
hiding-place in the old coffer, in the cupboard, in the secret chamber,
or whatever was indicated by the apparently idle words of the document
which he had preserved? He still smiled at the idea, but it was with a
pleasant, mysterious sense that his life had at last got out of the dusty
real, and that strangeness had mixed itself up with his daily experience.
With such feelings he prepared himself to go down to dinner with his
host. He found him alone at table, which was placed in a dark old room
modernized with every English comfort and the pleasant spectacle of a
table set with the whitest of napery and the brightest of glass and
china. The friendly old gentleman, as he had found him from the first,
became doubly and trebly so in that position which brings out whatever
warmth of heart an Englishman has, and gives it to him if he has none.
The impressionable and sympathetic character of Middleton answered to the
kindness of his host; and by the time the meal was concluded, the two
were conversing with almost as much zest and friendship as if they were
similar in age, even fellow-countrymen, and had known one another all
their life-time. Middleton's secret, it may be supposed, came often to
the tip of his tongue; but still he kept it within, from a natural
repugnance to bring out the one romance of his life. The talk, however,
necessarily ran much upon topics among which this one would have come in
without any extra attempt to introduce it.
"This decay of old families," said the Master, "is much greater than
would appear on the surface of things. We have such a reluctance to part
with them, that we are content to see them continued by any fiction,
through any indirections, rather than to dispense with old names. In your
country, I suppose, there is no such reluctance; you are willing that one
generation should blot out all that preceded it, and be itself the newest
and only age of the world."
"Not quite so," answered Middleton; "at any rate, if there be such a
feeling in the people at large, I doubt whether, even in England, those
who fancy themselves possessed of claims to birth, cherish them more as a
treasure than we do. It is, of course, a thousand times more difficult
for us to keep alive a name amid a thousand difficulties sedulously
thrown around it by our institutions, than for you to do, where your
institutions are anxiously calculated to promote the contrary purpose. It
has occasionally struck me, however, that the ancient lineage might often
be found in America, for a family which has been compelled to prolong
itself here through the female line, and through alien stocks."
"Indeed, my young friend," said the Master, "if that be the case, I
should like to [speak?] further with you upon it; for, I can assure you,
there are sometimes vicissitudes in old families that make me grieve to
think that a man cannot be made for the occasion."
All this while, the young lady at table had remained almost silent; and
Middleton had only occasionally been reminded of her by the necessity of
performing some of those offices which put people at table under a
Christian necessity of recognizing one another. He was, to say the truth,
somewhat interested in her, yet not strongly attracted by the neutral
tint of her dress, and the neutral character of her manners. She did not
seem to be handsome, although, with her face full before him, he had not
quite made up his mind on this point.
_April 14th_.--So here was Middleton, now at length seeing indistinctly a
thread, to which the thread that he had so long held in his hand--the
hereditary thread that ancestor after ancestor had handed down--might
seem ready to join on. He felt as if they were the two points of an
electric chain, which being joined, an instantaneous effect must follow.
Earnestly, as he would have looked forward to this moment (had he in
sober reason ever put any real weight on the fantasy in pursuit of which
he had wandered so far) he now, that it actually appeared to be realizing
itself, paused with a vague sensation of alarm. The mystery was evidently
one of sorrow, if not of crime, and he felt as if that sorrow and crime
might not have been annihilated even by being buried out of human sight
and remembrance so long. He remembered to have heard or read, how that
once an old pit had been dug open, in which were found the remains of
persons that, as the shuddering by-standers traditionally remembered, had
died of an ancient pestilence; and out of that old grave had come a new
plague, that slew the far-off progeny of those who had first died by it.
Might not some fatal treasure like this, in a moral view, be brought to
light by the secret into which he had so strangely been drawn? Such were
the fantasies with which he awaited the return of Alice, whose light
footsteps sounded afar along the passages of the old mansion; and then
all was silent.
At length he heard the sound, a great way off, as he concluded, of her
returning footstep, approaching from chamber to chamber, and along the
staircases, closing the doors behind her. At first, he paid no great
attention to the character of these sounds, but as they drew nearer, he
became aware that the footstep was unlike those of Alice; indeed, as
unlike as could be, very regular, slow, yet not firm, so that it seemed
to be that of an aged person, sauntering listlessly through the rooms. We
have often alluded to Middleton's sensitiveness, and the quick vibrations
of his sympathies; and there was something in this slow approach that
produced a strange feeling within him; so that he stood breathlessly,
looking towards the door by which these slow footsteps were to enter. At
last, there appeared in the doorway a venerable figure, clad in a rich,
faded dressing-gown, and standing on the threshold looked fixedly at
Middleton, at the same time holding up a light in his left hand. In his
right was some object that Middleton did not distinctly see. But he knew
the figure, and recognized the face. It was the old man, his long since
companion on the journey hitherward.
"So," said the old man, smiling gravely, "you have thought fit, at last,
to accept the hospitality which I offered you so long ago. It might have
been better for both of us--for all parties--if you had accepted it
then!"
"You here!" exclaimed Middleton. "And what can be your connection with
all the error and trouble, and involuntary wrong, through which I have
wandered since our last meeting? And is it possible that you even then
held the clue which I was seeking?"
"No,--no," replied Rothermel. "I was not conscious, at least, of so
doing. And yet had we two sat down there by the wayside, or on that
English stile, which attracted your attention so much; had we sat down
there and thrown forth each his own dream, each his own knowledge, it
would have saved much that we must now forever regret. Are you even now
ready to confide wholly in me?"
"Alas," said Middleton, with a darkening brow, "there are many reasons,
at this moment, which did not exist then, to incline me to hold my peace.
And why has not Alice returned?--and what is your connection with her?"
"Let her answer for herself," said Rothermel; and he called her, shouting
through the silent house as if she were at the furthest chamber, and he
were in instant need: "Alice!--Alice!--Alice!--here is one who would know
what is the link between a maiden and her father!"
Amid the strange uproar which he made Alice came flying back, not in
alarm but only in haste, and put her hand within his own. "Hush, father,"
said she. "It is not time."
Here is an abstract of the plot of this story. The Middleton who
emigrated to America, more than two hundred years ago, had been a dark
and moody man; he came with a beautiful though not young woman for his
wife, and left a family behind him. In this family a certain heirloom had
been preserved, and with it a tradition that grew wilder and stranger
with the passing generations. The tradition had lost, if it ever had,
some of its connecting links; but it referred to a murder, to the
expulsion of a brother from the hereditary house, in some strange way,
and to a Bloody Footstep which he had left impressed into the threshold,
as he turned about to make a last remonstrance. It was rumored, however,
or vaguely understood, that the expelled brother was not altogether an
innocent man; but that there had been wrong done, as well as crime
committed, insomuch that his reasons were strong that led him,
subsequently, to imbibe the most gloomy religious views, and to bury
himself in the Western wilderness. These reasons he had never fully
imparted to his family; but had necessarily made allusions to them, which
had been treasured up and doubtless enlarged upon. At last, one
descendant of the family determines to go to England, with the purpose of
searching out whatever ground there may be for these traditions, carrying
with him certain ancient documents, and other relics; and goes about the
country, half in earnest, and half in sport of fancy, in quest of the old
family mansion. He makes singular discoveries, all of which bring the
book to an end unexpected by everybody, and not satisfactory to the
natural yearnings of novel readers. In the traditions that he brought
over, there was a key to some family secrets that were still unsolved,
and that controlled the descent of estates and titles. His influence upon
these matters involves [him] in divers strange and perilous adventures;
and at last it turns out that he himself is the rightful heir to the
titles and estate, that had passed into another name within the last
half-century. But he respects both, feeling that it is better to make a
virgin soil than to try to make the old name grow in a soil that had been
darkened with so much blood and misfortune as this.
_April 27th. Tuesday_.--It was with a delightful feeling of release from
ordinary rules, that Middleton found himself brought into this connection
with Alice; and he only hoped that this play-day of his life might last
long enough to rest him from all that he had suffered. In the enjoyment
of his position he almost forgot the pursuit that occupied him, nor might
he have remembered for a long space if, one evening, Alice herself had
not alluded to it. "You are wasting precious days," she suddenly said.
"Why do not you renew your quest?"
"To what do you allude?" said Middleton, in surprise. "What object do you
suppose me to have?"
Alice smiled; nay, laughed outright. "You suppose yourself to be a
perfect mystery, no doubt," she replied. "But do not I know you--have not
I known you long--as the holder of the talisman, the owner of the
mysterious cabinet that contains the blood-stained secret?"
"Nay, Alice, this is certainly a strange coincidence, that you should
know even thus much of a foolish secret that makes me employ this little
holiday time, which I have stolen out of a weary life, in a wild-goose
chase. But, believe me, you allude to matters that are more a mystery to
me than my affairs appear to be to you. Will you explain what you would
suggest by this badinage?"
Alice shook her head. "You have no claim to know what I know, even if it
would be any addition to your own knowledge. I shall not, and must not
enlighten you. You must burrow for the secret with your own tools, in
your own manner, and in a place of your own choosing. I am bound not to
assist you."
"Alice, this is wilful, wayward, unjust," cried Middleton, with a flushed
cheek. "I have not told you--yet you know well--the deep and real
importance which this subject has for me. We have been together as
friends, yet, the instant when there comes up an occasion when the
slightest friendly feeling would induce you to do me a good office, you
assume this altered tone."
"My tone is not in the least altered in respect to you," said Alice. "All
along, as you know, I have reserved myself on this very point; it being,
I candidly tell you, impossible for me to act in your interest in the
matter alluded to. If you choose to consider this unfriendly, as being
less than the terms on which you conceive us to have stood give you a
right to demand of me--you must resent it as you please. I shall not the
less retain for you the regard due to one who has certainly befriended me
in very untoward circumstances."
This conversation confirmed the previous idea of Middleton, that some
mystery of a peculiarly dark and evil character was connected with the
family secret with which he was himself entangled; but it perplexed him
to imagine in what way this, after the lapse of so many years, should
continue to be a matter of real importance at the present day. All the
actors in the original guilt--if guilt it were--must have been long ago
in their graves; some in the churchyard of the village, with those
moss-grown letters embossing their names; some in the church itself, with
mural tablets recording their names over the family-pew, and one, it
might be, far over the sea, where his grave was first made under the
forest leaves, though now a city had grown up around it. Yet here was he,
the remote descendant of that family, setting his foot at last in the
country, and as secretly as might be; and all at once his mere presence
seemed to revive the buried secret, almost to awake the dead who partook
of that secret and had acted it. There was a vibration from the other
world, continued and prolonged into this, the instant that he stepped
upon the mysterious and haunted ground.
He knew not in what way to proceed. He could not but feel that there was
something not exactly within the limits of propriety in being here,
disguised--at least, not known in his true character--prying into the
secrets of a proud and secluded Englishman. But then, as he said to
himself on his own side of the question, the secret belonged to himself
by exactly as ancient a tenure and by precisely as strong a claim, as to
the Englishman. His rights here were just as powerful and well-founded as
those of his ancestor had been, nearly three centuries ago; and here the
same feeling came over him that he was that very personage, returned
after all these ages, to see if his foot would fit this bloody footstep
left of old upon the threshold. The result of all his cogitation was, as
the reader will have foreseen, that he decided to continue his
researches, and, his proceedings being pretty defensible, let the result
take care of itself.
For this purpose he went next day to the hospital, and ringing at the
Master's door, was ushered into the old-fashioned, comfortable library,
where he had spent that well-remembered evening which threw the first ray
of light on the pursuit that now seemed developing into such strange and
unexpected consequences. Being admitted, he was desired by the domestic
to wait, as his Reverence was at that moment engaged with a gentleman on
business. Glancing through the ivy that mantled over the window,
Middleton saw that this interview was taking place in the garden, where
the Master and his visitor were walking to and fro in the avenue of box,
discussing some matter, as it seemed to him, with considerable
earnestness on both sides. He observed, too, that there was warmth,
passion, a disturbed feeling on the stranger's part; while, on that of
the Master, it was a calm, serious, earnest representation of whatever
view he was endeavoring to impress on the other. At last, the interview
appeared to come toward a climax, the Master addressing some words to his
guest, still with undisturbed calmness, to which the latter replied by a
violent and even fierce gesture, as it should seem of menace, not towards
the Master, but some unknown party; and then hastily turning, he left the
garden and was soon heard riding away. The Master looked after him
awhile, and then, shaking his white head, returned into the house and
soon entered the parlor.
He looked somewhat surprised, and, as it struck Middleton, a little
startled, at finding him there; yet he welcomed him with all his former
cordiality--indeed, with a friendship that thoroughly warmed Middleton's
heart even to its coldest corner.
"This is strange!" said the old gentleman. "Do you remember our
conversation on that evening when I first had the unlooked-for pleasure
of receiving you as a guest into my house? At that time I spoke to you of
a strange family story, of which there was no denouement, such as a
novel-writer would desire, and which had remained in that unfinished
posture for more than two hundred years! Well; perhaps it will gratify
you to know that there seems a prospect of that wanting termination being
supplied!"
"Indeed!" said Middleton.
"Yes," replied the Master. "A gentleman has just parted with me who was
indeed the representative of the family concerned in the story. He is the
descendant of a younger son of that family, to whom the estate devolved
about a century ago, although at that time there was search for the heirs
of the elder son, who had disappeared after the bloody incident which I
related to you. Now, singular as it may appear, at this late day, a
person claiming to be the descendant and heir of that eldest son has
appeared, and if I may credit my friend's account, is disposed not only
to claim the estate, but the dormant title which Eldredge himself has
been so long preparing to claim for himself. Singularly enough, too, the
heir is an American."
_May 2d, Sunday._--"I believe," said Middleton, "that many English
secrets might find their solution in America, if the two threads of a
story could be brought together, disjoined as they have been by time and
the ocean. But are you at liberty to tell me the nature of the incidents
to which you allude?"
"I do not see any reason to the contrary," answered the Master; "for the
story has already come in an imperfect way before the public, and the
full and authentic particulars are likely soon to follow. It seems that
the younger brother was ejected from the house on account of a love
affair; the elder having married a young woman with whom the younger was
in love, and, it is said, the wife disappeared on the bridal night, and
was never heard of more. The elder brother remained single during the
rest of his life; and dying childless, and there being still no news of
the second brother, the inheritance and representation of the family
devolved upon the third brother and his posterity. This branch of the
family has ever since remained in possession; and latterly the
representation has become of more importance, on account of a claim to an
old title, which, by the failure of another branch of this ancient
family, has devolved upon the branch here settled. Now, just at this
juncture, comes another heir from America, pretending that he is the
descendant of a marriage between the second son, supposed to have been
murdered on the threshold of the manor-house, and the missing bride! Is
it not a singular story?"
"It would seem to require very strong evidence to prove it," said
Middleton. "And methinks a Republican should care little for the title,
however he might value the estate."
"Both--both," said the Master, smiling, "would be equally attractive to
your countryman. But there are further curious particulars in connection
with this claim. You must know, they are a family of singular
characteristics, humorists, sometimes developing their queer traits into
something like insanity; though oftener, I must say, spending stupid
hereditary lives here on their estates, rusting out and dying without
leaving any biography whatever about them. And yet there has always been
one very queer thing about this generally very commonplace family. It is
that each father, on his death-bed, has had an interview with his son, at
which he has imparted some secret that has evidently had an influence on
the character and after life of the son, making him ever after a
discontented man, aspiring for something he has never been able to find.
Now the American, I am told, pretends that he has the clue which has
always been needed to make the secret available; the key whereby the lock
may be opened; the something that the lost son of the family carried away
with him, and by which through these centuries he has impeded the
progress of the race. And, wild as the story seems, he does certainly
seem to bring something that looks very like the proof of what he says."
"And what are those proofs?" inquired Middleton, wonder-stricken at the
strange reduplication of his own position and pursuits.
"In the first place," said the Master, "the English marriage-certificate
by a clergyman of that day in London, after publication of the banns,
with a reference to the register of the parish church where the marriage
is recorded. Then, a certified genealogy of the family in New England,
where such matters can be ascertained from town and church records, with
at least as much certainty, it would appear, as in this country. He has
likewise a manuscript in his ancestor's autograph, containing a brief
account of the events which banished him from his own country; the
circumstances which favored the idea that he had been slain, and which he
himself was willing should be received as a belief; the fortune that led
him to America, where he wished to found a new race wholly disconnected
with the past; and this manuscript he sealed up, with directions that it
should not be opened till two hundred years after his death, by which
time, as it was probable to conjecture, it would matter little to any
mortal whether the story was told or not. A whole generation has passed
since the time when the paper was at last unsealed and read, so long it
had no operation; yet now, at last, here comes the American, to disturb
the succession of an ancient family!"
"There is something very strange in all this," said Middleton.
And indeed there was something stranger in his view of the matter than he
had yet communicated to the Master. For, taking into consideration the
relation in which he found himself with the present recognized
representative of the family, the thought struck him that his coming
hither had dug up, as it were, a buried secret that immediately assumed
life and activity the moment that it was above ground again. For seven
generations the family had vegetated in the quietude of English country
gentility, doing nothing to make itself known, passing from the cradle to
the tomb amid the same old woods that had waved over it before his
ancestor had impressed the bloody footstep; and yet the instant that he
came back, an influence seemed to be at work that was likely to renew the
old history of the family. He questioned with himself whether it were not
better to leave all as it was; to withdraw himself into the secrecy from
which he had but half emerged, and leave the family to keep on, to the
end of time perhaps, in its rusty innocence, rather than to interfere
with his wild American character to disturb it. The smell of that dark
crime--that brotherly hatred and attempted murder--seemed to breathe out
of the ground as he dug it up. Was it not better that it should remain
forever buried, for what to him was this old English title--what this
estate, so far from his own native land, located amidst feelings and
manners which would never be his own? It was late, to be sure--yet not
too late for him to turn back: the vibration, the fear, which his
footsteps had caused, would subside into peace! Meditating in this way,
he took a hasty leave of the kind old Master, promising to see him again
at an early opportunity. By chance, or however it was, his footsteps
turned to the woods of ---- Chace, and there he wandered through its
glades, deep in thought, yet always with a strange sense that he was
treading on the soil where his ancestors had trodden, and where he
himself had best right of all men to be. It was just in this state of
feeling that he found his course arrested by a hand upon his shoulder.
"What business have you here?" was the question sounded in his ear; and,
starting, he found himself in the grasp, as his blood tingled to know, of
a gentleman in a shooting-dress, who looked at him with a wrathful brow.
"Are you a poacher, or what?"
Be the case what it might, Middleton's blood boiled at the grasp of that
hand, as it never before had done in the course of his impulsive life. He
shook himself free, and stood fiercely before his antagonist, confronting
him with his uplifted stick, while the other, likewise, appeared to be
shaken by a strange wrath.
"Fellow," muttered he--"Yankee blackguard!--impostor--take yourself oil
these grounds. Quick, or it will be the worse for you!"
Middleton restrained himself. "Mr. Eldredge," said he, "for I believe I
speak to the man who calls himself owner of this land on which we
stand,--Mr. Eldredge, you are acting under a strange misapprehension of
my character. I have come hither with no sinister purpose, and am
entitled, at the hands of a gentleman, to the consideration of an
honorable antagonist, even if you deem me one at all. And perhaps, if you
think upon the blue chamber and the ebony cabinet, and the secret
connected with it,"--
"Villain, no more!" said Eldredge; and utterly mad with rage, he
presented his gun at Middleton; but even at the moment of doing so, he
partly restrained himself, so far as, instead of shooting him, to raise
the butt of his gun, and strike a blow at him. It came down heavily on
Middleton's shoulder, though aimed at his head; and the blow was terribly
avenged, even by itself, for the jar caused the hammer to come down; the
gun went off, sending the bullet downwards through the heart of the
unfortunate man, who fell dead upon the ground. Eldredge[1] stood
stupefied, looking at the catastrophe which had so suddenly occurred.
[1] Evidently a slip of the pen; Middleton being intended.
_May 3d, Monday._--So here was the secret suddenly made safe in this so
terrible way; its keepers reduced from two parties to one interest; the
other who alone knew of this age-long mystery and trouble now carrying it
into eternity, where a long line of those who partook of the knowledge,
in each successive generation, might now be waiting to inquire of him how
he had held his trust. He had kept it well, there was no doubt of it; for
there he lay dead upon the ground, having betrayed it to no one, though
by a method which none could have foreseen, the whole had come into the
possession of him who had brought hither but half of it. Middleton looked
down in horror upon the form that had just been so full of life and
wrathful vigor--and now lay so quietly. Being wholly unconscious of any
purpose to bring about the catastrophe, it had not at first struck him
that his own position was in any manner affected by the violent death,
under such circumstances, of the unfortunate man. But now it suddenly
occurred to him, that there had been a train of incidents all calculated
to make him the object of suspicion; and he felt that he could not, under
the English administration of law, be suffered to go at large without
rendering a strict account of himself and his relations with the
deceased. He might, indeed, fly; he might still remain in the vicinity,
and possibly escape notice. But was not the risk too great? Was it just
even to be aware of this event, and not relate fully the manner of it,
lest a suspicion of blood-guiltiness should rest upon some innocent head?
But while he was thus cogitating, he heard footsteps approaching along
the wood-path; and half-impulsively, half on purpose, he stept aside into
the shrubbery, but still where he could see the dead body, and what
passed near it.
The footsteps came on, and at the turning of the path, just where
Middleton had met Eldredge, the new-comer appeared in sight. It was
Hoper, in his usual dress of velveteen, looking now seedy,
poverty-stricken, and altogether in ill-case, trudging moodily along,
with his hat pulled over his brows, so that he did not see the ghastly
object before him till his foot absolutely trod upon the dead man's hand.
Being thus made aware of the proximity of the corpse, he started back a
little, yet evincing such small emotion as did credit to his English
reserve; then uttering a low exclamation,--cautiously low, indeed,--he
stood looking at the corpse a moment or two, apparently in deep
meditation. He then drew near, bent down, and without evincing any horror
at the touch of death in this horrid shape, he opened the dead man's
vest, inspected the wound, satisfied himself that life was extinct, and
then nodded his head and smiled gravely. He next proceeded to examine
seriatim the dead man's pockets, turning each of them inside out and
taking the contents, where they appeared adapted to his needs: for
instance, a silken purse, through the interstices of which some gold was
visible; a watch, which however had been injured by the explosion, and
had stopt just at the moment--twenty-one minutes past five--when the
catastrophe took place. Hoper ascertained, by putting the watch to his
ear, that this was the case; then pocketing it, he continued his
researches. He likewise secured a note-book, on examining which he found
several bank-notes, and some other papers. And having done this, the
thief stood considering what to do next; nothing better occurring to him,
he thrust the pockets back, gave the corpse as nearly as he could the
same appearance that it had worn before he found it, and hastened away,
leaving the horror there on the wood-path.
He had been gone only a few minutes when another step, a light woman's
step, [was heard] coming along the pathway, and Alice appeared, having on
her usual white mantle, straying along with that fearlessness which
characterized her so strangely, and made her seem like one of the
denizens of nature. She was singing in a low tone some one of those airs
which have become so popular in England, as negro melodies; when
suddenly, looking before her, she saw the blood-stained body on the
grass, the face looking ghastly upward. Alice pressed her hand upon her
heart; it was not her habit to scream, not the habit of that strong,
wild, self-dependent nature; and the exclamation which broke from her was
not for help, but the voice of her heart crying out to herself. For an
instant she hesitated, as [if] not knowing what to do; then approached,
and with her white, maiden hand felt the brow of the dead man,
tremblingly, but yet firm, and satisfied herself that life had wholly
departed. She pressed her hand, that had just touched the dead man's, on
her forehead, and gave a moment to thought.
What her decision might have been, we cannot say, for while she stood in
this attitude, Middleton stept from his seclusion, and at the noise of
his approach she turned suddenly round, looking more frightened and
agitated than at the moment when she had first seen the dead body. She
faced Middleton, however, and looked him quietly in the eye. "You see
this!" said she, gazing fixedly at him. "It is not at this moment that
you first discover it."
"No," said Middleton, frankly. "It is not. I was present at the
catastrophe. In one sense, indeed, I was the cause of it; but, Alice, I
need not tell you that I am no murderer."
"A murderer?--no," said Alice, still looking at him with the same fixed
gaze. "But you and this man were at deadly variance. He would have
rejoiced at any chance that would have laid you cold and bloody on the
earth, as he is now; nay, he would most eagerly have seized on any
fair-looking pretext that would have given him a chance to stretch you
there. The world will scarcely believe, when it knows all about your
relations with him, that his blood is not on your hand. Indeed," said
she, with a strange smile, "I see some of it there now!"
And, in very truth, so there was; a broad blood-stain that had dried on
Middleton's hand. He shuddered at it, but essayed vainly to rub it off.
"You see," said she. "It was foreordained that you should shed this man's
blood; foreordained that, by digging into that old pit of pestilence, you
should set the contagion loose again. You should have left it buried
forever. But now what do you mean to do?"
"To proclaim this catastrophe," replied Middleton. "It is the only honest
and manly way. What else can I do?"
"You can and ought to leave him on the wood-path, where he has fallen,"
said Alice, "and go yourself to take advantage of the state of things
which Providence has brought about. Enter the old house, the hereditary
house, where--now, at least--you alone have a right to tread. Now is the
hour. All is within your grasp. Let the wrong of three hundred years be
righted, and come back thus to your own, to these hereditary fields, this
quiet, long-descended home; to title, to honor."
Yet as the wild maiden spoke thus, there was a sort of mockery in her
eyes; on her brow; gleaming through all her face, as if she scorned what
she thus pressed upon him, the spoils of the dead man who lay at their
feet. Middleton, with his susceptibility, could not [but] be sensible of
a wild and strange charm, as well as horror, in the situation; it seemed
such a wonder that here, in formal, orderly, well-governed England, so
wild a scene as this should have occurred; that they too [two?] should
stand here, deciding on the descent of an estate, and the inheritance of
a title, holding a court of their own.
"Come, then," said he, at length. "Let us leave this poor fallen
antagonist in his blood, and go whither you will lead me. I will judge
for myself. At all events, I will not leave my hereditary home without
knowing what my power is."
"Come," responded Alice; and she turned back; but then returned and threw
a handkerchief over the dead man's face, which while they spoke had
assumed that quiet, ecstatic expression of joy which often is observed to
overspread the faces of those who die of gunshot wounds, however fierce
the passion in which the spirits took their flight. With this strange,
grand, awful joy did the dead man gaze upward into the very eyes and
hearts, as it were, of the two that now bent over him. They looked at one
another.
"Whence comes this expression?" said Middleton, thoughtfully. "Alice,
methinks he is reconciled to us now; and that we are members of one
reconciled family, all of whom are in heaven but me."