Stories with a Vengeance — page 44: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

40 THE HAUNTED HANSOM. All nacure seemed to smile a merry Christ-[low window feeding some hungry Little mas welvome, as if conscious of the sweetly | birds gathered in a chirping crowd on the solemn season. At least so 1: seemed to, lawn. ime, just released from Babylon and its| Lawrence at once introduced me to the jarring sounds and murky canopy cf fog. | young lady as his sister Beatrice. How vast a store of misery and crime, of| Now, I’m not going toattempt a descrip. | heroic endurance and greedy cunning, of|tion of the most indescribable thing in brave Christian helpfulness and more than | nature—a bright and beautiful girl. In fiendish vice that same grim canopy covers! |all my reading I have never yet come I felt like one transported into a newjacross a word-picture that did anything world that morning. Under the bracing | like justice to such a subject. influences of the weather, our brisk drive,| Weread of girls graceful as Hebe and and Tom’s lively conversation, I rapidly | lovely as Venus, and how much the wiser regained my wonted elasticity of spirits,'are we? What do you or I, dear reader, and the hideous events of the previous : know of those mythical, and probably over- night lost their hold of me for the time | rated, females of antiquity? I wager you being. that we have in these degenerate days ‘"There’s the dear old place!” said Tom, | many a maiden in cur quiet English homes as we turned a sharp corner, and came in| before whom the gods of old would have view of a fine old mansion situated on a| bowed with a lower reverence and a wilder ‘passion than was ever evoked by their own esthetic damsels in their palmiest days! gentle slope facing the sea. I have little or no architectural know- ledze; and even had I possessed ten times! I have a shrewd suspicion that in my the amount I did at that time, it would | heart of hearts I considered Beatrice Law- have puzzled me to say which of the|rence one of these incomparable beauties. various orders prevailed in the construc-| She gave me a frank and hearty welcome tion of The Priory. There were corners; to The Pnory,so that I sat down to our and gables of every conceivable form, and|comfortable breakfast in a very happy in all imaginable positions. Yonder loomed | frame of mind, and with an exceedingly out a broad bay-window, and beside it an | voracious appetite for the good things set ancient Gothic light. Here a low French | before me. window opened upon the bright, smooth; Mrs. Lawrence did not put in an appear- lawn, whilst, far above it, quaimt dormer | ance at the early meal; but later in the panes admitted the day. day I was presented to her, and a sweet, Perhaps my best description of the house|matronly old lady she was. Her face would be to call it a perfect specimen of | must have been wonderfully handsome in the eminently-comfort2ble order. It cer-|its youth ; now there were deep lines on it, tainly was that. which gave it a look of intense, almost pain- I have visited it many times since that|ful melancholy~lines that it was easy to eventful morning, and each succeeding |see had not been carved by the patient visit has but served to confirm my first | hand of Time, but that seemed rather to impression as to its sweet homeliness, its|have been rudely chiselled by the crue! quiet, inviting comfort. Never have I seen | strokes of some stupendous sorrow. a place which so thoroughly realized my| Withal it was a grand, sweet face, and idea of what a true English home should | one that commanded love and esteem from be. all. No wonder in our boyhood’s days Tom| The day passed off pleasantly but used to speak of it with such tenderness | quietly. Tom had so much to tell me and vnd affection. It was indeed a home that so many questions to ask, that the hours «ny lad might be proud of. Moreover, it | flew by on rapid wings as we strolled about had been in his family for generations, and | the fine old park, or wandered on the beach was intimately interwoven with all its} near by. traditions. Of course, the stables were inspected, the Little did I think, as I entered its| dogs introduced, with a due acknowledg- friendly portal, that my coming would| ment of all their exceptional merits, and produce the effects it did. the gun-room overhauled. ° On entering, I was at once shown to the} Sothe day wore on, and evening came, rooms that had been set aside for me in| with its quiet comforts. the very pleasantest part of that very plea-| When we were in the drawing-room, sant house. As soon as I had removed the|awaiting the announcement of dinner, grimy traces of my all-night journey, I| Beatrice seemed unusually gloomy and dis- ound my way down to the breakfast-room, | trait. where Tom and a young lady stood at the} Rousing herself with evident effort, she Google JOO @ © = a S CO)