II.

"Harold," said Weir, the next morning after breakfast, as the door

closed behind Sir Iltyd, "I shall entertain you until luncheon by

showing you the castle."

"My dear girl," said Harold, smiling, "let your role of hostess sit

lightly upon you. I do not want to be entertained. I am perfectly

happy."

"Of that I have no doubt. Nevertheless I want you to see the castle,

particularly the picture-gallery, where all my ancestors be."

"Then, by my troth, will I go, fair Mistress Penrhyn, for a goodly

show your ancestors be, I make no doubt;" and Dartmouth plunged his

hands into his pockets and looked down at her with a broad smile.

Weir lifted her head. "My English is quite as pure as yours," she

said. "And you certainly cannot accuse me of using what the London

girls call 'slang.'"

This time Dartmouth laughed aloud. "No, my dear," he said, "not even

Shakespearean slang. But let us investigate the mysteries of the castle

by all means. Lead, and I will follow."

"There are no mysteries," said Weir; "we have not even a ghost. Nor

have we a murder, or crime of any sort, to make us blush for our

family tree."

"Happy tree! Mine has a blush for every twig, and a drop curtain for

every branch. Thank God for the Penrhyn graft! Let us hope that

it will do as much good as its fairest flower has already done the

degenerate scion of all the Dartmouths. But, to the castle! I would

get through--I mean, I would gaze upon its antiquities as soon as

possible."

"This castle is very interesting, Mr. Dartmouth," replied Weir,

elevating her chin; "you have nothing so old in England."

"True, nor yet in Jerusalem, O haughtiest of Welsh maidens! I esteem

it a favor that I am not put below the salt."

Weir laughed. "What a tease you are! But you know that in your heart

your pride of family is as great as mine. Only it is the 'fad' of

the day to affect to despise birth and lineage. We of Wales are more

honest."

"Yes, it is your sign and seal, and it sits well upon you. I don't

affect to despise birth and lineage, my dear. If I could not trace

my ancestry back to the first tadpole who loafed his life away in the

tropical forests of old, I should be miserable."

He spoke jestingly, but he drew himself up as he spoke, his lip was

supercilious, and there was an intolerant light in his eye. At that

moment he did not look a promising subject for the Liberal side of the

House, avowedly as were his sympathies in that quarter. Weir, however,

gave him an approving smile, and then commanded him to follow her.

She took him over the castle, from the dungeons below to the cell-like

rooms in the topmost towers. She led him through state bedrooms,

in which had slept many a warlike Welsh prince, whose bones could

scarcely be in worse order than the magnificence which once had

sheltered them. She piloted him down long galleries with arcades on

one side, like a cloister, and a row of rooms on the other wherein the

retainers of ancient princes of the house of Penrhyn had been wont to

rest their thews after a hard day's fight. She slid back panels and

conducted him up by secret ways to gloomy rooms, thick with cobwebs,

where treasure had been hid, and heads too loyal to a fallen king had

alone felt secure on their trunks. She led him to chambers hung with

tapestries wrought by fair, forgotten grandmothers, who over their

work had dreamed their eventless lives away. She showed him the

chapel, impressive in its ancient Norman simplicity and in its ruin,

and the great smoke-begrimed banqueting-hall, where wassails had been

held, and beauty had thought her lord a beast.

"Well," she demanded, as they paused at length on the threshold of the

picture-gallery, "what do you think of my father's castle?"

"Your father's castle is the most consistent thing I have seen for

a long time: it is an artistically correct setting for your father's

daughter. The chain of evolution is without a missing link. And

what is better, the last link is uncorroded with the rust of modern

conventions. Seriously, your castle is the most romantic I have ever

seen. The nineteenth century is forgotten, and I am a belted Knight of

Merrie England who has stormed your castle and won you by his prowess.

You stood in your window, high up in your tower, and threw me a rose,

while your father stalked about the ramparts and swore that my bones

should whiten on the beach. I raised the rose to my lips, dashed

across the drawbridge, and hurled my lance at the gates. About my head

a shower of barbs and bullets fell, but I heeded them not. Behind me

thundered my retainers, and under their onslaught the mighty gates

gave way with a crash, and the castle was ours! We trampled into

the great hall, making it ring with our shouts and the clash of our

shields. Your father's men fled before us, but he calmly descended the

staircase and confronted us with his best Welsh stare. 'I fear ye not,

villains,' he cried. 'Barbarians, English dogs! I defy ye. Do your

worst. My daughter and I for death care not. The mighty house of

Istyn-ap-Dafyd-ap-Owain-ap-Caradoc-ap-Iltyd-ap-Penrhyn knoweth not

fear of living man, nor yet of death's mysterious charnel-house.'

'Wrong me not, gentle sir,' I cried, snatching off my helmet

and trailing its plumes upon the floor; 'I come in love, not

in destruction. Give me but thy daughter, O

Dafyd-ap-Owain-ap-Istyn-ap-Caradoc-ap-Iltyd-ap-Penrhyn, and thy castle

and thy lands, thy rocks and thy sea, are thine again, even as were

they before the beauty of the Lady Weir turned my blood to lava and

my heart to a seething volcano. Give me but thy daughter's hand, and

wealth shall flow into thy coffers, and the multitude of thy retainers

shall carry terror to the heart of thy foe. What say ye, my Lord

Caradoc-ap-Owain-ap-etcetera?' Whereupon the lord of Rhyd-Alwyn unbent

his haughty brows, and placing one narrow, white, and shapely hand

upon my blood-stained baldric, spoke as follows: 'Well said, young

Briton. Spoken like a brave knight and an honorable gentleman. My

daughter thou shalt have, my son thou shalt be, thy friends shall be

my friends, and thou and all of them shall be baptized Welshmen.' And

then he himself re-ascended the staircase and sought you in your tower

and led you down and placed your hand in mine. And the drums beat, and

the shields clashed, and once more the mighty storm shook the rooks

from the roof. But we heard it not, for on your finger I had placed

the betrothal ring, then thrown my brawny arms about you and forgot

that earth existed. Excuse my eloquence," he cried, as he lifted her

up and kissed her, "but your castle and yourself are inspiring."

"That was all very charming, however," she said, "if you only had

not such a reprehensible way of jumping from the sublime to the

ridiculous, like a meteor from world to world."

"Prettily said, sweetheart. But, trust me, if I ever reach the sublime

I will stay there. Now, to your ancestors! Great heaven! what an

array!"

They had entered a long, narrow room, against whose dark background

stood out darker canvasses of an army of now celestial Penrhyns; an

army whose numbers would have been a morning's task to count. The

ancient Penrhyns had been princes, like most of their ilk; and the

titles which Weir glibly recited, and the traditions of valor and

achievement which she had at her tongue's end, finally wrung from

Dartmouth a cry for mercy.

"My dear girl!" he exclaimed, "keep the rest for another day. Those

'aps' are buzzing in my ears like an army of infuriated gnats, and

those mighty deeds are so much alike--who is that?"

He left her side abruptly and strode down the gallery to a picture

at the end, and facing the room. It was the full-length, life-size

portrait of a woman with gown and head-dress in the style of the First

Empire. One tiny, pointed foot was slightly extended from beneath

the white gown, and--so perfect had been the skill of the artist--she

looked as if about to step from the canvas to greet her guests.

"That is my grandmother, Sionèd, wife of Dafyd-ap-Penrhyn, who, I

would have you know, was one of the most famous diplomatists of his

day," said Weir, who had followed, and stood beside him. "She was the

daughter of the proudest earl in Wales--but I spare you his titles. I

am exactly like her, am I not? It is the most remarkable resemblance

which has ever occurred in the family."

"Yes," said Dartmouth, "you are like her." He plunged his hands into

his pockets and stared at the floor, drawing his brows together. Then

he turned suddenly to Weir. "I have seen that woman before," he said.

"That is the reason why I thought it was your face which was familiar.

I must have seen your grandmother when I was a very young child. I

have forgotten the event, but I could never forget such a face."

"But Harold," said Weir, elevating her brows "It is quite impossible

you could ever have seen my grandmother. She died when papa was a

little boy."

"Are you sure?"

"Quite sure. I have often heard him say he had no memory whatever of

his mother. And grandpapa would never talk with him about her. He was

a terribly severe old man, they say--he died long years before I was

born--but he must have loved my grandmother very much, for he could

not bear to hear her name, and he never came to the castle after her

death."

"It is strange," said Harold, musingly, "but I have surely seen that

face before."

He looked long at the beautiful, life-like picture before him. It

was marvellously like Weir in form and feature and coloring. But the

expression was sad, the eyes were wistful, and the whole face was

that, not of a woman who had lived, but of a woman who knew that out

of her life had passed the power to live did she bow her knee to the

Social Decalogue. As Weir stood, with her bright, eager, girlish face

upheld to the woman out of whose face the girlish light had forever

gone, the resemblance and the contrast were painfully striking.

"I love her!" exclaimed Weir, "and whenever I come in here I always

kiss her hand." She went forward and pressed her lips lightly to the

canvas, while Dartmouth stood with his eyes fastened upon the face

whose gaze seemed to meet his own and--soften--and invite--

He stepped forward suddenly as Weir drew back. "She fascinates me,

also," he said, with a half laugh. "I, too, will kiss her hand."