Turner stood up, and his white face was revealed to the barrister, who began to roll up the parchment.
“Good heavens, is it so?” he exclaimed, in a suppressed voice, “and in this strange place.”
“My master, O my master!” cried Turner, falling upon his knees, and crying aloud in his anguish as he lifted the pale hand of the dead, and laid it reverently on the still bosom, “oh, would to God I had died for thee!”
I looked on the old man with wonder and envy. He could weep, but I was frozen into stone—he could touch the beloved hand; I was afraid even to look that way. The curse of my gipsy inheritance was upon me; the first act in the great drama of vengeance was performed, and it had left me branded, heart and soul. I sat cowering in the shadows like a criminal, not like the avenger of a great wrong. I had built up walls of granite between myself and the dead, I, his only child.
The rush of all these thoughts on my brain stifled me. I could no longer endure the presence of the living nor the dead, but arose and descended into the garden. Turner followed me, weeping, and evidently with a desire to comfort me. I, wishing to avoid him, was still held by a sort of fascination under the windows of the death-chamber. A litter stood beneath the balcony, on which a mattress had been placed; I knew what it was for, and lingered near it with my eyes uplifted to the room above. There was a faint conversation, smothered whispers, and a muffled tread of feet upon the carpet.
I know not how or whence she came, but Maria stood by me, with her hands clasped in the shock of a first terrible surprise, tearless and hushed, a picture of mute sorrow. We were both looking upward. We saw them as they lifted him from the cushions, and bore him forward over the trampled vines to the broken steps. The faces of these men wore a look of stern sorrow. They descended, very slowly, while Turner stood below with arms uplifted, prepared to receive the dead.
The men paused, half way down the steps, to free a portion of the Oriental gown which had entangled itself in the balustrade. Just then, a first beam of the sunrise fell across that marble face. Oh, how beautiful it was! how mournfully beautiful! Dim blue shadows lay around the closed eyelids. The deathly white of the forehead gleamed out from the golden auburn of his hair and beard, which the sunshine struck aslant, and the wind softly stirred in terrible contrast with the stillness of the face and limbs. A look of holy quiet, more heavenly than a smile, hovered around his mouth; the very winds of morning seemed unholy for disturbing the solemn stillness that lay upon him.
Once more I passed the threshold of my father’s house—the threshold upon which I had slept a child-beggar and an infant outcast; for the first time I trod over the spot not only without bitterness, but in humility of soul. I followed the dead body of my father, whose love I had repulsed, whose repentance I had rejected. That one idea drove all the evil blood from my heart. I would have crept after him on my knees before every proud remnant of his race, could the act have appeased this thought within me.
It was early in the morning, so early that not even a servant was astir. The men trod lightly over the marble vestibule and up the broad staircase; after that thick carpets muffled their steps; and thus our mournful group entered Lord Clare’s chamber without disturbing a soul in the house.
Even young Morton, that had been left to watch with him when old Turner went away, was not aroused from the deep slumber which had overtaken him, in an easy-chair wheeled to a remote corner of the room.