Quentin made some well-bred reply, he knew not what; but with all its awkwardness he felt that "the situation had its charm," as he took her hand and suggested that they should investigate the premises and see whether the villa was really so deserted as it appeared.
From the splendid vestibule, the lofty walls and rich cornices of which were covered with armorial bearings of the past Condes de Maciera, many of their escutcheons being collared by the orders of Santiago de Compostella, Santiago de Montesa, the Dove of Castile, and the Golden Fleece, with the crossed batons that showed how many had of old commanded the Monteros de Espinosa, or Ancient Archers of the Spanish Royal Guard, Quentin and Donna Isidora ascended a marble stair to a large corridor, off which several suites of apartments opened, and through these they proceeded, every moment fearful of coming suddenly upon some sight of horror, as the French were seldom slow in using their bayonets against any household that received them unwillingly, and the battered state of the entrance door showed that the villa had been entered forcibly.
The great corridor, like many of the rooms, was hung with portraits of grisly saints and meek-eyed Madonnas, and of many a lank-visaged and long-bearded hidalgo, with breast-plate, high ruff, and bowl-hilted toledo, looking with calm pride, or it might be defiance, from the flapping canvas, which had been slashed in mere wantonness by the sabres of the French dragoons.
Save that a number of chairs were overthrown, that several lockfast places had been broken open, and that many empty bottles strewed the floors, the furniture appeared to have been left untouched. The gilt clocks on the marble mantel-pieces ticked no more, and the spiders had spun their webs over the hour-hands and dials, thus showing that the villa must have been deserted by the family and servants of the count for some weeks. The damask sofas and ottomans were covered with dust, and many books lay strewn about on the dry and now musty esparto grass that covered some of the floors, which were nearly all of highly polished oak.
Quentin picked up a lady's white kid glove, and a black fan covered with silver spangles.
"These have belonged to the mother of the Conde, who resided here; where can the poor lady have fled—what may have become of her?" said Isidora as they wandered on, her voice and Quentin's sounding strange and hollow in the emptiness of the great villa.
All the bed-chambers were untouched, save in some instances where a mirror or cheval glass was starred or smashed by a pistol-shot; and so, ere long, the visitors in their search found themselves in the chapel, a little gothic oratory of very florid architecture, which had evidently formed a portion of a much older edifice than the present villa; for there, on a pedestal tomb, having a row of carved weepers round it, and little niches and sockets for twelve votive lamps, lay side by side the effigies of two knights in chain-armour, with their cross-hilted swords and military girdles on, and their hands folded in prayer. Quentin drew near them with interest, for he remembered the quaint effigy of Sir Ranulph Crawford, Keeper of the Palace of Carrick, in the old kirk of Rohallion, and while Isidora knelt for a moment before the little altar, he read on a brass plate this inscription:
"Aqui yazen el noble y valiente Conde, Don Fernando de Estremera, y su hijo, Don Antonio, Condes de Maciera y Estremera; fueron muertos en una batalla con los Infieles, en tiempo del Rey Don Alfonso de Castile, Leon, y Galicia. Requiescant in pace."
"More than seven hundred years ago," thought Quentin. "Sir Ranulph's tomb is a thing of yesterday compared with this."
He surveyed with emotions of pleasure and interest this little oratory, the sanctuary of which, with its half Moorish and arabesque-like carvings was a miracle of art and a mass of gilding. It must have been erected almost immediately after the expulsion of the Arabs from that part of Castile, and so those Counts of Maciera had lived and died before the days of the Cid himself,