Turning from the bed, Ezekiel approached the bureau. The mirror was thick with dust, and in front of it stood an alabaster candlestick—the image of a dancing nymph,—now alas! looking more like ebony than alabaster. It held a half-burned waxen candle.
"That candle, when lighted last, shone over the death agonies of Alice Van Huyden."
Up and down that place, whose very air breathed heart-rending memories, the old man walked, his head sinking low and lower on his breast at every step.
He paused at length before a portrait, covered with dust. Standing on a chair, Ezekiel with the purple tapestry, brushed the dust away from the canvas and the walnut frame. The portrait came out into light, so fresh, so vivid, so life-like, that Ezekiel stepped hastily from the chair as though the apparition of one long dead, had suddenly confronted him.
It was a portrait of a manly face, shaded by masses of brown hair. There was all the hope of young manhood, in the dark eyes, on the cheeks rounded with health, and upon the warm lips full of life and love. A fresh countenance; one that you would have taken at sight for the countenance of a man of true nobility of heart and soul. It was the portrait of Gulian Van Huyden at twenty-one.
For a long time Ezekiel Bogart lingered silently in front of the portrait.
At last he left the chamber, locked the door,—first pausing to look over his shoulder toward the bed upon which Alice Van Huyden died,—and then slowly ascended to the upper rooms of the old mansion.
He came into a small chamber panneled with oak; an oaken pillar, crowned with carved flowers, and satyr faces in every corner; and a death's head grinning from the center of the oaken ceiling. Once the floor, the walls, the ceiling and the pillars, had shone like polished steel, but now they were black with dust.
Holding the light above his skull-cap, Ezekiel silently surveyed the scene.