They had been jogging along for half a mile, when, turning suddenly through an open gateway, they entered a private approach. Paul exclaimed in admiration, for the road was tunneled through such a dense growth of evergreens that the far-reaching limbs of the cedars and spruce pines brushed the cart as they pa.s.sed.

"Romantic!" Henley exclaimed, standing up in the vehicle to hold a branch above the girl's head as she drove under it. The little horse tossed the limbs right and left as he burrowed his way amongst them.

"Wait until you know us better," said Dorothy, dodging a hemlock bough; "you might even come to think that several other improvements could be made beside the tr.i.m.m.i.n.g out of this avenue; but Ah Ben would as soon cut off his head as disturb a single twig."

"Who?" inquired Paul.

"Ah Ben."

Mr. Henley concluded not to push his investigations any further for the present, taking refuge in the thought that all things come to him who waits. He had no doubt that Ah Ben would come along with the rest.

A sudden turn, and an old house stood before them. It was built of black stones, rough as when dug from the ground more than a century before. At the farther end was a tower with an open belfry, choked in a tangle of vines and bushes, within which the bell was dimly visible through a crust of spiders' webs and birds' nests. Patches of moss and vegetable mold relieved the blackness of the stones, and a venerable ivy plant clung like a rotten fish-net to the wall. It was a weird, yet fascinating picture; for the house, like a rocky cliff, looked as if it had grown where it stood. Parts of the building were crumbling, and decay had laid its hand more or less heavily upon the greater part of the structure. All this in the mellow light of the moon, and under the peculiar circ.u.mstances, made a scene which was deeply impressive.

"This is Guir House," said Dorothy, drawing up before the door. "Now don't tell me how you like it, because you don't know. You must wait until you have seen it by daylight."

She threw the reins to a stupid-looking servant, who took them as if not quite knowing why he did so. She then made a signal to him with her hands, and jumped lightly to the ground.

"Down, Beelzebub!" called Dorothy to a huge dog that had come out to meet them, while the next instant she was engaged in exchanging signals with the servant, who immediately led the horse away, followed by the dog.

"Why does the boy not speak?" inquired Paul, considerably puzzled by what he had seen.

"_Because he is dumb_," answered the girl, leading the way up to the door.

Paul carried his luggage into the porch where he saw that Dorothy's eyes were fixed upon him with that strange _quizzo-critical_ gaze, with lids half closed and head tilted, which he had observed once before, and which he could not help thinking gave her a very aristocratic bearing.

"You should carry one of those long-handled lorgnettes," he suggested, "when you look that way."

"And why?" she asked quite innocently.

"To look at me with," answered Henley, hoping to induce a smile, or a more cheery tone amid a gloom which was growing oppressive. But Miss Guir simply led the way to the great hall door, which was built of heavy timber, and studded with nail-heads without. As the c.u.mbersome old portal swung open, Paul could not help observing that it was at least two inches thick, braced diagonally, and that the locks and hinges were unusually crude and ma.s.sive. He followed Miss Guir into the hall, with a slight foreboding of evil which the memory of the stage driver's remark did not help to dispel.

2

There are few men who would not have felt uncomfortable in the peculiar situation in which Mr. Henley now found himself, although, perhaps, he was as little affected as any one would have been under the circ.u.mstances. It was impossible now to retreat from the part a.s.sumed, and he resolved to carry it out to the best of his ability, never doubting for an instant that the deception would be discovered sooner or later.

Following Miss Guir across the threshold of her mysterious home, Henley entered a hall which was by far the most extraordinary he had ever beheld, and he paused for a moment to take in the scene. The room was nearly square, with a singular staircase ascending from the left. Upon the side opposite the door was a huge chimney, where a fire of logs was burning in an enormous rough stone fireplace, doubly cheering after their long drive through the cool October evening. A bra.s.s lamp of antique design, with perforated shade of the same material, was suspended from the ceiling, and helped illumine this strange apartment. From each end of the mantelpiece an immense high-backed sofa projected into the room, cushioned and padded, and looking as if built into its present position with the house. The walls were covered with odd portraits, whose frames were crumbling in decay, and the window curtains adorned with fairy scenes and mythological figures. The ceiling was crossed with heavy beams of oak, black with the smoke of a century; and the stairway upon the left was also black, but ornamented with a series of rough panels, upon each of which was painted a human face, giving it a somewhat fantastic appearance. Paul could not help glancing above, toward the mysterious regions with which this eccentric stairway communicated.

An antique sofa, studded with bra.s.s nails, exhibited upon its towering back a picture of Tsong Kapa reclining under the tree of a thousand images at the Llamasary of Koomboom. There were scenes which were evidently intended to be historical, but there were others which were wild and inexplicable. The quaintness of the room was intensified by the flickering fire and the shafts of yellow light emitted through the perforations of the lamp.

A faint aromatic odor hung upon the air, possibly due to a pile of balsam logs in a corner near the chimney. Over all was the unmistakable evidence of age, and of a nature at once barbaric, eccentric, and artistic. Who had conceived and executed this extraordinary apartment? And what were the people like who called the place their home? Paul stood aghast and wondered as he inwardly propounded these questions.

The girl led the way to the fire, and, seating herself upon one of the sofas described, invited Paul to the opposite place. His bewilderment was intense, and with a lingering gaze at the oddities surrounding him, he accepted the invitation. Not another soul had been seen since he entered. Did the girl live alone? It seemed incredible; and yet where were her people?

Dorothy pulled off her gloves and warmed her fingers before the cheerful blaze, and then stood eying with evident satisfaction the costly gems with which they were loaded. The light seemed to shine directly through her delicate palms, and to fall upon her face and hair and quaint old-fashioned costume with singular effect. There was something so bizarre and yet so spirituelle in her appearance that Henley could not help observing in what perfect harmony she seemed with her environment. It was some minutes before either of them spoke--Paul loth to express his surprise for fear of betraying a lack of knowledge he might possibly be expected to possess, while Dorothy, in an apparent fit of abstraction, had evidently forgotten her guest and all else, save the cheerful fire before her. Presently she withdrew her eyes from their fixed stare at the flames, and, looking at Paul, said:

"You must be hungry."

There was something so incongruous with his surroundings and recent train of thought in the girl's sudden remark that Henley could not help laughing.

"One would scarcely expect to eat in such a remarkable home as yours, Miss Guir," he replied, looking into her earnest eyes, and wondering if she ordinarily dined alone.

"Nevertheless, we will in an hour," she answered, "and I shall expect you to have an excellent appet.i.te after our long drive."

Paul wanted to ask about the members of her family, but thought it wisest to say nothing for the present. Surely they would appear in due season, for it was impossible the girl could live alone in so large a house, and without natural protection; and so he simply made a further allusion to the apparent age and great picturesqueness of the building.

"Yes," said Dorothy, again gazing into the fire, "it is old--considerably more than a hundred years. It was built in the Colonial days, when things were rougher and good work more difficult to obtain."

"But surely these portraits and historical scenes were the work of an artist," Henley ventured to observe, looking at a strange head of Medusa.

"Yes," she answered, "the one you are looking at was done by Ah Ben."

He had been led to believe that Ah Ben was a living member of the household, who would shortly appear, but this now seemed impossible, for these extraordinary pictures were as old as the house itself.

What did the girl mean? Had this Ah Ben done them all? Should he ask her and expose his ignorance? Paul thought he would venture upon a compromise.

"And are these pictures as old as they appear?"

"Quite," answered the girl. "As you can see for yourself, the house and all that is in it date from quite a remote time, and many of the portraits were painted before the house was ever begun."

That seemed to settle the question. Ah Ben was evidently a deceased ancestor; possibly a friend of the family in the distant past, and Henley concluded that he had misunderstood the girl in her former allusion to the man.

Dorothy had not taken off her hat, nor did she seem to have the slightest intention of doing so; meanwhile Paul's appet.i.te, which had been temporarily lulled by his novel surroundings, was beginning to a.s.sert itself, and as there was no prospect of an attendant to conduct him to his room, he was about to ask where he might find a bowl of water to relieve himself of some of the stains of travel.

Before he had finished the sentence, however, his attention was arrested by the sound of a distant footstep. He listened; it came nearer, and in a minute was descending the black staircase in the corner. Paul watched, and saw the figure of an old man as it turned an angle in the stairs. Then it stopped, and coughed lightly as if to announce its approach.

"Come," cried Dorothy, "it's only Mr. Henley, and I'm sure he'll be glad to see you."

The figure advanced, and when it had descended far enough to be in range with the fire and lamplight, Paul saw a most extraordinary person. The man, although very old, was tall and dignified in appearance, with deep-set, mysterious eyes, and flowing white moustache and hair. The top of his head was lightly bound in a turban of some flimsy material, and a loose robe of crimson silk hung from his shoulders, gathered together with a cord about the waist. As he advanced Henley observed that the bones of his cheeks were high and prominent, and the eyes buried so deep beneath their projecting brows and skull, that he was at a loss to account for the strange sense of power which he felt to be lodged in so small a s.p.a.ce.

"This is Ah Ben, Mr. Henley, of whom I have spoken," said Dorothy, rising.

The old man extended his hand and bowed most courteously. He hoped that they had had a pleasant drive from the station, and then took his seat beside the fire.

Paul was dumfounded. Probably he was expected to know all about the man, and he had only just decided that he had been dead for a century. How could he so have misinterpreted what he had heard?

Ah Ben stretched his long bony fingers to the fire, and observed that the nights were beginning to grow quite cold.

"Yes," said Henley, "I had hardly expected to find the season so far advanced in your Southern home."

"Our alt.i.tude more than amends for our lat.i.tude," answered the old man; and then, taking a pair of ma.s.sive tongs from the corner of the mantel, he stirred the balsam logs into a fierce blaze, starting a myriad of sparks in their flight up the chimney. Dorothy was looking above, and Paul, following the direction of her eyes, observed a model of Father Time reclining upon a shelf near the ceiling. The figure's scythe was broken; his limbs were in shackles, and his body covered with chains. It was an original conception, and Henley could not help asking if Time had really been checked in his onward march at Guir House.

"Ah!" said Dorothy, "that is a symbol of a great truth; but I am not surprised at your asking;" then, turning to the old man, added: "Mr.

Henley has not yet been shown to his room, and I am sure he would like to see it. It is the west chamber."

"True," said Ah Ben, rising and taking a candle from the mantel, which he lighted with a firebrand; "if Mr. Henley will follow me, I shall take pleasure in pointing it out to him."

Paul followed the elder man up the black stairs, through devious pa.s.sages, and past doors with pictured panels, until he began to wonder if he could ever find his way back again. At last they stopped before a rough door, hung with ma.s.sive hinges stretching half way across it, discolored with rust, and looking as if they had not been moved in an age, and which creaked dismally as Ah Ben entered.