The Haunted Chamber | Page 2

and the last train from London being due half an
hour ago Sir Adrian is standing on the steps of his hall-door anxiously
awaiting some of his guests.
There is even a touch of genuine impatience in his manner, which could
hardly be attributed to the ordinary longing of a young man to see a few

of his friends. Sir Adrian's anxiety is open and undisguised, and there is
a little frown upon his brow. Presently his face brightens as be hears the
roll of carriage-wheels. When the carriage turns the corner of the drive,
and the horses are pulled up at the hall door, Sir Adrian sees a fair face
at the window that puts to flight all the fears he has been harboring for
the last half hour.
"You have come?" he says delightedly, running down the steps and
opening the carriage door himself. "I am so glad! I began to think the
train had run away with you, or that the horses had bolted."
"Such a journey as it has been!" exclaims a voice not belonging to the
face that had looked from the carriage at Sir Adrian. "It has been
tiresome to the last degree. I really don't know when I felt so fatigued!"
A little woman, small and fair, steps languidly to the ground as she says
this, and glances pathetically at her host. She is beautifully "got up,"
both in dress and complexion, and at a first glance appears almost
girlish. Laying her hand in Sir Adrian's, she lets it rest there, as though
glad to be at her journey's end, conveying at the same time by a gentle
pressure of her taper fingers the fact that she is even more glad that the
end of her journey has brought her to him. She looks up at him with her
red lips drooping as if tired, and with a bewildered expression in her
pretty blue eyes that adds to the charm of her face.
"It's an awful distance from town!" says Sir Adrian, as if apologizing
for the spot on which his grand old castle has been built. "And it was
more than good of you to come to me. I can only try to make up to you
for the discomfort you have experienced to-day by throwing all
possible chances of amusement in your way whilst you stay here."
By this time she has withdrawn her hand, and so he is free to go up to
his other guest and bid her welcome. He says nothing to her, strange to
say, but it is his hand that seeks to retain hers this time, and it is his
eyes that look longingly into the face before him.
"You are tired, too?" he says at length. "Come into the house and rest
awhile before dinner. You will like to go to your rooms at once,

perhaps?" he adds, turning to his two visitors.
"Thank you--yes. If you will have our tea sent upstairs," replies Mrs.
Talbot plaintively, "it will be such a comfort!" she always speaks in a
somewhat pouting tone, and with heavy emphasis.
"Tea--nonsense!" responds Sir Adrian. "There's nothing like
champagne as a pick-me-up. I'll send you tea also; but, take my advice,
and try the champagne."
"Oh, thank you, I shall so much prefer my tea!" Mrs. Talbot declares,
with a graceful little shrug of her shoulders, at which her friend Miss
Delmaine laughs aloud.
"I accept your advice, Sir Adrian," she says, casting a mischievous
glance at him from under her long lashes. "And--yes, Dora will take
champagne too--when it comes."
"Naughty girl!" exclaims Mrs. Talbot, with a little flickering smile.
Dora Talbot seldom smiles, having learned by experience that her
delicate face looks prettier in repose. "Come, then, Sir Adrian," she
adds, "let us enter your enchanted castle."
The servants by this time have taken in all their luggage--that is, as
much as they have been able to bring in the carriage; and now the two
ladies walk up the steps and enter the hall, their host beside them.
Mrs. Talbot, who has recovered her spirits a little, is chattering gayly,
and monopolizing Sir Adrian to the best of her ability, whilst Miss
Delmaine is strangely silent, and seems lost in a kind of pleased
wonder as she gazes upon all her charming surroundings.
The last rays of light are streaming in through the stained-glass
windows, rendering the old hall full of mysterious beauty. The grim
warriors in their coats of mail seem, to the entranced gaze of Florence
Delmaine, to be making ready to spring from the niches which hold
them.

Waking from her dream as she reaches the foot of the stone staircase,
she says abruptly, but with a lovely smile playing round her mouth--
"Surely, Sir Adrian, you have a