"Yes—to meet again," said the young man, pleasantly.
"Very true; les beaux esprits se rencontrent," returned the old man, slowly and cautiously backing his crazy vehicle around. And with another "Good day," and a parting gesture, he quickly disappeared among the fast-falling shadows.
The young man stood looking after him for a moment, with a smile half of amusement, half, of pity, upon his lips. But his features soon settled into something more than their accustomed gravity, and suddenly facing about, he pursued his way.
Ere long the tall, crowded pines of the barren gave place to various stubble and fallow grounds, with here and there a late crop waiting to be harvested; and shortly after, the narrow, irregular track that he had been following encountered a broader and more beaten one. Recognizing this, with some difficulty, as the "avenue" of which his late companion had spoken, he stopped, and gazed up and down with a look of surprise and pain.
It was bare of trees; but on either side extended a long row of live oak stumps, the size of which showed what massive trunks and far-reaching branches had once columned and arched it like a temple. Here and there, some forgotten bole or bough lay and rotted upon the very spot which it had formerly overhung with a soft canopy of verdure, and made beautiful with pleasant play of sunshine and leaf-shadow; while around it gathered a rank luxuriance of weeds, transmuting its slow aristocratic decay into teeming, plebeian life. In one or two cases, as if moved by an almost human sympathy, vines had sprung up around the bereaved stumps, and sought to soften their hard outlines with clinging drapery of leaves and tendrils. They had also done their best to cover up various unsightly gaps in the long lines of ruinous fence that divided the avenue from the open fields on either side. Yet the final effect of these gentle touches was only to deepen the painful impression of the scene. Where they did not reach, the bareness was so much more bare, the dilapidation so much uglier!
The young observer felt this bareness and dilapidation to his heart's core,—felt it all the more keenly because an image of the avenue's pristine grandeur, derived from the surrounding fragments (or from some other source), continually rose before his mind's eye, to heighten its present desolation by contrast. His brow contracted as he gazed; and the expression of his face changed rapidly from surprise to dissatisfaction, from dissatisfaction to perplexity, from perplexity to doubt. Once, he turned as if half-minded to retrace his steps; but the next moment, he shook off his irresolution with a gesture of disdain, and immediately hastened forward.
The avenue terminated in an open, circular space. Evidently, it had once been a lawn; but it was now covered with half-obliterated furrows, showing that at some not very remote period, it had been planted with corn. Around it stood a number of gigantic live-oaks, heavily draped with moss, and brooding dusky shadows under their massive boughs. Fronting upon it, was a large mansion of dark brick, consisting of an upright, two-story main building, with a huge, clustered chimney in the midst, and long, low, rambling wings on either side.
The whole place had a deserted and melancholy appearance. The moss on the live-oaks swayed slowly to and fro in the evening breeze, with a wonderfully sombre and funereal effect; and the mansion was dark and silent as any ruin. Not a light shone from the closed windows; not a sound came from the deep, shadowy doorway; and the unsteady stone steps, slippery with damp and green with moss, gave the impression of a spot where no human foot had left its print for many years.
The young man halted at a little distance from the dark building, and surveyed it moodily. "Can this be Bergan Hall?" he murmured. "Can this gloomy old ruin be the open, cheery, hospitable mansion, full of light and life, that my mother has so often described to me? It looks a habitation for ghosts—and for ghosts only! I wonder if any living being—"
Breaking off abruptly, he ascended the moss-grown steps, only to find that the vines which so heavily draped the portico, had woven a thick network across the door. It was plain that it had not been opened for months, perhaps years. Nevertheless, not to be easily daunted, he found and lifted the knocker. It fell with a dull lifeless sound, that smote the young man's heart like a sudden chill. A dreary reverberation came from within, and then died away into silence. He knocked again, and, listening intently, he fancied that he heard the sound of stealthy footsteps within, and a slight creaking of the floor. But so dead a silence followed upon these imaginary sounds, that he soon became convinced of his involuntary self-deception.