The Storyteller

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIX, Issue 37, 12 September 1901, Page 23

The Storyteller

THE LAVENDER LADY.

I. Bomb half a mile or bo from the high-road leading to an old cathedral town in middle England stood a grey stone Elizabethan mansion. Occasional tourists or antiquarians visiting the neighborhood made persistent efforts to explore it, bat they invariably met with a conrteous denial. The grim gargoyles, with thiir goblin ears, frowned or grinned down at them from odd corners of the Btone masonry ; and the huge, wide, latticed windows seemed to them to enolose a world of mystery in the way of labyrinthine passages, mouldy dungeons, and anoient banqueting halls. The long picture-gallery was said to contain three or four really valuable old pictures, a Vandyke among the number. The uncertainty and remoteness of conjecture added its own oharm— that of the unattainable — to the natural beauty of the building and gloomy grandeur of its surroundings. Stately beeches to the westward, with mossy winding walks among them, were not too dense to show the glow of a sunset between their branches ; while to the eastward a thicket of rhododendron bushes sloped down to a winding stream, which emptied itself, five miles off, in a fairsized river. Here lived an old man and his lovely daughter, almost as though they were on a desert island, for all they saw of their neighbors. He was gentle and amiable, willing always to help those in distress ; naturally a hermit, he was wont to exclaim with Prospero, ' My library were dukedom large enough I ' But Ethelberta, as was natural, oared for none of these things. Six months ago she had returned from a convent school in France. The weeks slipped by, and Ethelberta sat solitary at her latticed window or wandered through the winding garden ways, dreaming of many things ; but chiefly Bhe mused on the history of an unfortunate lady of great beauty whose portrait hung in the picture-gallery. Old ghostly legends told her by her nurse, an old family servant, had first drawn the girl's attention to it. The painting was somewhat faded ; Ethelberta'a unpractised eye would hardly, of itself, have appreciated the unusual excellence of the workmanship, had not the weird interest surrounding it caused her to study it line by line, until it seemed to her girlish imagination something almost real. The lady's face had a look of unusual sadness predominating over any other expression ; but there was something else to be read in that face, of resolution and endurance in no common degree. The hazel eyes were soft, but her whole bearing was purposeful. Her long-trained gown was of lavender silk, made in the fashion of the seventeenth century, with deep lace collar and cuffs so familiar in Vandyke's portraits. One bleak November afternoon the girl strolled solitary up and down the picture-gallery, swinging her mandolin in her hand as she went. Finally she seated herself listlessly on the old oaken window Beat, and watched the dead leavea whirling by on the gravel-walk below. Then she counted all the tiny panes of glass in the big window, find more than three hundred. ' Oh, this triste climate ! ' exclaimed Ethelberta, half aloud. ' I wish I were back in the sunny convent garden in dear old Brittany. We called those high, high walls prison, but they were a golden cage. I feel like the Lady of Shalot, of whom I read to-day, more than " half sick of shadows." ' She picked out carelessly on her mandolin, as she ruminated, the well-known ditty, ' Au clair de la lane.' The sun peeped out just before setting, with a faint, rosy flush of color, growing gradually in intensity, fithelberta's spirits rose a little, for she loved light and color. The slanting rays of the sun fell on her ' dear Lavender Lady,' as the girl called the cavalier portrait. 4 How I wish you would step down and talk to your lonely little great -great -great -gre at -grandchild I How I should love you ! ' She had spoken aloud. It seemed to her lonely imagination that the picture moved a little, and she was almost sure she heard a long-drawn sigh. Half ashamed of a sudden feeling of fear, Bhe took up her mandolin and fled, almost sliding along the polished black oak floor, until she came to a little turret chamber, used now for a sewingroom. Here she knew she would find her beloved Nan a, who bad nursed her and her mother before her. She was a genteel-looking old creature, in her old-fashioned black Bilk dress and white muplin apron. She bad douned the former every afternoon ever since Ethelberta could remember. (Oh, where is the secret warp and woof that made those perennial silks of olden time ?) She raioed her Bilvery head and pushed back her spectacles, letting the fine damask tablecloth she had been darning fall into her lap as the girl came into the room.

Ethelberta forgot her recently-acquired dignity of young ladyhood, and flung herself, as she used to do in the olden days, on the floor at Nana's feet, with her arm across the old woman's knees, and her curly chestnut head half buried in the snowy apron and tablecloth. ♦ • Nana, really, really," she began, half playfully, ' I have seen a ghost, and you'd knock me down with a feather, as cook says.' She looked up, expecting the familiar, 'Oh, fie now, Mies Ethelberta 1 It iB them old f urrin notions again I ' But she met instead a sympathetic look of grave concern. ' Mercy on us, Miss Berta ! Do tell me all about it.'

Surprised and flattered that dear old Nana should condescend to recognise as not beneath contempt anything bo unsubstantial, she related the episode, not without coloring ; for, like many other

young girls, Ethelberta was given to exaggeration, as she had confessed with tears to the parish priest before making her First Communion.

' But you never saw nothing ? • asked Nana, as Ethelberta stopped, her eyes bright and her cheeks burning, more from the vividness of her imagination than anything else. ' No ; but that was because I fled. 1 Nana crossed herself reverently : 1 Thank the Lord ! '

1 Why, Nana,' said the young girl, ' you believe in ghosts t I wish I had known it before. Now do tell me all about everything. I have been dying to hear bo many things ever since I can remember. If I ask father, he laughs or makes one of his little sarcastic speeches, and I thought you would too. Do you really believe in ghosts ? '

' 'Tis well, dear ohild, that you saw nothing ; for they do say as any one as sees the Lavender Lady will never smile no more. Your mother eeen her two year before she died, and I never seen her Bmile no more ; not even when you talked your pretty baby chatter to her. _ She made me promise, afore Father White oome in with his holy oil, that she should not be buried in the family vault. "If my pore Ernestine is not good enough to be buried there, no more will I. She shall be laid beside me ; for I know she will come back one day." Them was your pore mother's last words, Miss Ethelberta. If you ain't got a right to hear them, I don't know who have. Your father may think you'll always be a baby, but I know better. Men is pore foolish critturs, at the best,' she concluded, ventilating her favorite theory even at the expense of her master.

' Where is Ernestine buried, then ? I want to much to know about my sister ; but every one I ever asked about her snubbed me. I asked father the first night I came home from school, when he actually left off reading the whole evening to talk to me. He looked quite stern and just said : " You don't know what you are talking about, child. I have no daughter but you." ' ' She isn't buried anywhere — at least not as I know of. She was just your age the last time I saw her — 14 years agone come Candlemas. But she looked muoh older than you do now, for she was very tall and her eyes and hair was darker ; and she hadn't none of your kittenish ways with her. I loved Miss Ernestine, but I love you best.'

' 0 Nana 1 ' said Ethelberta, recurring to her nursery ways. ' I'll never disobey you again as long as I live if only you will tell me all about Ernestine. Why did she go away ? Why is father so mad with her ? Where is Bhe now ? '

' I'd give a pretty to know where Bhe is myself, Miss. Well, no one ever heard on her, as I knows of, from that day to this, — except your mother saw her once, a month after she left. Miss Ernestine was quite like her in tastes, loved books better than anything in the world except her mother. She was as like master as ever she could be, but he never seemed so fond of her as he is of you. Well, them two things, her mother and the library — not to forget Holy Church, for she was very devout — seemed enough for her, until a furrin painter man from Germany come along to teach her painting. I says to your mother the first time ever I set eyes on him : " I don't like the look of that man. You mark my words he'll bring trouble on this bouse." Your mother turned on me ; I mind it well. Them was most the only unkind wordß she ever said to me. " Nana," she says, says she, "you are getting insufferable with your continual advice and criticism. You must allow me to arrange my own affairs without interference." Still, I could Bee from her speaking back bo sharp that what I said worried her ; for she always thought a deal of my opinion. Sure enough, he come oftener and of tener, and them two got thicker and thicker. Miss Ernestine was awful wilful, and had a haughty look that would make any one feel mean when they criticised her. Day after day them two would go off and bring home paintings, — your father had them all looked away the day after she left.'

' I'd give anything to find them," said Ethelberta. ' Let us have a hunt, Nana. But go on, please. I can hardly breathe till you finish.'

' Well, there ain't much more. The wet weather come on after a bit, and they couldn't go out painting, but still he conte. He and Miss Ernestine got a big canvas and began copying a picture in the gallery — your Lavender Lady. But Mies Ernestine didn't do none of the painting scarcely ; she just stood and watched him paint. One day your father come along, blinking his eyes, out of his library where he stayed all day long. He saw the two of them there together. It seemed to come into his head all at once, and he come np behind them quietly. The man was painting on, and saying some old furrin poetry to Miss Ernestine while he i painted, and neither of them heard your father come up. He stood a minute and listened to the poetry. I was sitting by them, in the window-seat, with my sewing, as Missus had told me to do. Master's face got crimson and he was co mad he could hardly talk. I thought they'd never find out he was there ; so I coughed fit to break my throat to make Ernestine look round, and finally she did. " Sir," said your father to Mr. Frondberg — for that was the artist's name, — "have the goodness to tend in your account to me to-night. We shall require your services no longer at Branecombe Hall." With that he turned on his heel and walked away very slow and dignified. The two young people stood facing each other. Miss Ernestine's cheeks was crimson and so was his. She turned to me saying quietly (she always had any amount of self-control) : " Nana, please fetch me a handkerchief." Well I knew what that meant, and there was nothing for me to do but to leave them uninterrupted ; so I went off as quick as I could, but didn't trouble about the handkerchief.'

' 0 Nana ! what did they do ?' asked her auditor, excitedly.

'Three days after that,' 6he went on, 'there was a dreadful snowstorm. Miss Ernestine had been very quiet and wouldn't speak a word to no one, but sat perfectly mum all through meal-times. Foster who was waiting- at the table, told me since that your father

tried to talk very nice and gentlelike to Miss Ernestine ; but she looked as haughty as oould be, and took no more notice of his remarks than if he was a block of wood.

' Next day and the next the snow kept on falling, falling, deeper than I ever Raw it afore or since. Your mother took sick the third day of the st rm and went to bed. Miss Ernestine sat beside her all day long and held her hand, but I never heard either of them say a word. Just about twilight Miss Ernestine called me, saying : " Stay with mother until my return, Nana. And she kissed me, to my great surprise ; for I didn't remember her doing that since phe wa« a baby. Next she went to her mother, who was dozing just then, and kissed her hand many times. 'I must hare sat there two hours before your mother awoke. She seemed very troubled and said : " 0 Nana, I have seen the Lavender Lady I Tell me it was a dream— surely it was a dream. Did you see her ? She came here to the bottom of the bed and pointed out to the rhododendrons. Nana, what can ie mean ? I fear some great misfortune—" " Oh, Btop, my dear mistress," I cried. "Itis a bad dream." Though I did not believe it, I feared as much as she. But I chafed her hands and bathed her head, and racked my brain for any funny story I had ever heard, to get her mind off the ghost.' ' Was it really the ghost, then, Nana ? ' ' That I can't tell you, dearie ; but that some calamity was upon us I felt in my bone*, and so it was. ' The snow had ceased about four o'clock, and a clear frost succeeded it. Miss Ernestine did not come to inquire for her mother or to breakfast. I went to her bedroom and found it empty, the bed undisturbed. Then I remembered the ghost of your mother's dream, and my knees trembled bo that I could hardly crawl to the library to tell your father. He pooh-poohed it, said Miss Ernestine was hiding to soare everyone. "At any rate," I said, " she could not leave the house through all this snow without leaving her footprints in it." 'He caught at this eagerly, showing that he had been more harried about it than you would think from his words. The both of us went together past every window and door, but not a footstep anywhere disturbed the smooth sheet of snow, near two feet deep, which lay around the hall. What time had I seen her the night before, he asked. It had been just about sunset when she left us, bidding me stay with her mother until she returned. I told your father of her words, but said nothing about your mo hera dream, knowing how impatient he was of "that woman's tomfoolery," aa he would have called it.

' Well, the longer we looked the more disturbed in his mind he became. We went round the house and in and out of her room a dozen times before we spoke of it to your mother. He opened Miss Ernestine's window to see if she could have let herself down by a rope, but the show on the window-ledge was undisturbed and the window latched. I hunted about, hoping Bhe might have left a note, but never a sign could I find, Your father was nearly frantic with grief, but he showed it only at first and to no one but me. He was too proud to let the servants see his feelingß. ' The mystery only increased with searching ; for nine days they talked of nothing else in the servants' hall. Foster, the cook, and in fact nearly all the servants, firmly believed that the Lavender Lady had spirited her away. I was foolish enough to tell them of Missus' dream, and that only served to make them the more certain ot it. Not one of them wou'd dare to go near the picture-gallery or rhododendron bushes after dark for anything. ' Why 1 ' inquired Ethelberta. ' What had the rhododendron busheß to do witn it, Nana ? ' 4 But that is another story,' said the nur«e. ' Run and dre's for dinner, or your father will have his soup cold waiting for you.'

Regretfully Ethelberta left the little sewing-room, now quite dark, and directed her steps along the picture-gallery toward her own bedroom at the farther end of it. She w&b half ashamed of herself to find she had run past the portrait as fast as she could, and tried to persuade herself it was all on account of the soup.

Ethelberta and her father sat down to dinner, as usual, alone. The long, lofty dining-hall seemed to accentuate the solitariness of the repast. The old, white-headed Foster Btood behind his matter's chair, as he had done any time the last 30 years.

Kthelberta's cheeks were unusually bright from excitement, and she looked a pioture of youth and beauty in her simple white dress. Her father touched her arm caressingly before taking his seat, saying playfully : 'And where has my Miranda been dyeing her cheeks to-day ? One would think she had been helping Ferdinand chop wood on the enchanted island.'

Ethelberta blushed violently, with a half-guilty feeling, though she did not understand her father's words.

• I have bee*, studying, father, the works of art in your picturegallery.'

lAh ! ' said her father, glad to find her showing some appreciation of such things. ' And what, may I ask, chained your wandering fancy the longest ? '

' The portrait of a lady in lavender,' she replied. ' There you show come discernment, my child. That portrait, though a trifle dingy now, is by Vandyke, and the most valuable in the colleclion.

' What was her name, father ? And what made her look so sad ? ' asked the young girl. Her eye now happened to rest oa the the usually immovable countenance of Foster. He was standing at the sideboard, with a decanter of port wine in his hand, which trembled perceptibly. His eyes were fixed on his master's face, and he bent forward, in the intensity of his anxiety, to see how he would take this allusion to the forbidden theme.

' Her name,' he said, ' was Ernestine. Great mystery surrounds her fate ; but it was, presumably, a melancholy one.' ' Tell me about her, father. What was her history ? When did she live ? '

' The portrait, I believe, bears the date 1637. It was about ten years later that her flight took place. Her husband was in France with Prince Charles, and she was left alone in the house with her infant son, having no one but the family chaplain and servants to protect her. Catholics at that time were in great danger from Cromwell's army. Terrible tales had reached her of their treatnifut of different papist families, and of their desecration of Woroes'tr Cathedral — riding rough-shod through the building, mutilating the priceless old carvings.

' One snowy night news came to her that the army was in eight and fast approaching Branscombe Hall. From these soldiers her lite would hardly have been in danger, bat she did not know this, and was in mortal terror. She had a boat waiting at the river, in case ot need, should the army surprise her. It is supposed that the lady, with her child and the padre, escaped by that means. She watched at the window for the soldiers, but they came in a different direction from the one from which she expected them. Consequently they were at the hall before she knew it. Her first admonition of their presence was a sound of trampling in the chapel. When she looked toward it she saw the sacred images flung roughly out and shattered in pieces on the gravel walk. ' Panic-stricken, she flew before them. When last seen by one of the servants, she wan down in the rhododendron thicket, clasping her child in her arms. The servant followed her as soqn as possible, but no trace of her could be found. Whether she sailed away toward France and was lost on the seas ; or, as some have affirmed, was oaught and killed by the soldiers, remains a mystery to this day. This latter fate, though, would seem highly improbable. At any rate, in her flight she was somehow separated from the chaplain and her child.

'He subsequently rejoined the child's father in France, but that fair lady was never seen again. The impenetrable mystery surrounding her fate is, I suppose, accountable for any Billy ghost stories you may have heard. Foolish persons have from time to time imagined they saw her form appearing, where she was last seen in life, in the rhododendron thicket'

' But, O father,' exclaimed Ethelberta eagerly, ' are you positive there are no such things as ghosts ? '

'My dear child,' he replied, smiling, 'there are few things about which any but the very young people are positive.'

(To be concluded in our next issue").