The Master of Silence | Page 6

whence he came or anything of his past history. He is apparently a total stranger here below, holding no intercourse with the world beyond that enclosure. His wife is said to have been a woman of great beauty, and her death doubtless threw him into a morbid state of mind, from which he has never rallied. Many years ago he is known to have bought a full-grown African lion from a traveling menagerie, and, soon after, he erected the wall, presumably out of regard for the public safety. Passers along the street have caught an occasional glimpse of him through the high gate, walking in the grounds surrounding his house, with the lion at his heels apparently in complete subjection to its master. A dense thicket runs along the wall on all sides within the enclosure, which, according to local tradition, is alive with rattlesnakes, bred for some strange purpose known only to himself--perhaps to make his isolation more secure.
"He is supposed to have resigned the companionship of men for study and scientific research. He has no children, and his only servant being a deaf-mute, who is almost an idiot, there is little chance at present of learning anything of his life. For more than two years nothing has been seen of the mysterious master of the house. His disappearance would, we think, be a legitimate subject of investigation by the authorities of the town. May he not have been eaten by the lion, or killed by the rattlesnakes? Who knows?"
My heart was beating fast and my hands shook as if stricken with palsy before I had finished the paragraph. The strange old man who had come to me in Liverpool that night was probably the mute servant to which the article referred. In an hour I was on the way to Ogdensburg, quite confident that the issue of my wanderings was at hand. I reached that town next morning nearly two years, as I have said, after the beginning of my journey to the New World. Not stopping to breakfast even, I started out to find the house, which my busy imagination had already pictured for itself. The first townsman I saw directed me to the place.
"Follow the turnpike," said he. "'Sa mild or more--straight ahead. You'll know it when y' git there. 'S' queer place an' stan's off by itself."
The man was going my way, evidently to begin his day's work, for it was then early in the morning, and I walked along with him.
"Folks say," he continued, "them grounds is full of hejious reptyles, an' I've heerd fellers tell queer things they've seen when passin' there at night--red lights a-flyin' about an' spooks at the winders. An' one night, when Uncle Bill Jemson was comin' down the turnpike, they was a storm come up, an' jest as he got opposite the big iron gate they was a flash a lightnin'--an' Bill says he see the ole man, his long white hair a-flyin' in th' wind, an' a lion standin' there in front a th' house. Th' flash was out'n a minit, an' Bill whipped up his hosses an' sent em clear to Mills' tavern on the dead run," said he, laughing as if it were a good joke.
"They don't nobody like th' place ner th' man, though I don' know why, fer no one's ever passed a word with him in these parts. There 'tis, over yender with the pines around it an' th' high wall," said he, pointing with his finger. But my eye had already discovered the low-built rambling house on the high banks of the river, well in the distance, and had recognized it at once.
Leaving my companion at the next turn in the road I walked hurriedly on, and when I had reached the big iron gate I stopped and peered through it. A gravel roadway, now overgrown with weeds, led from the gate to the front of the house, which stood facing me. It was built entirely of wood and consisted of four wings (at least there were no others visible) evidently enclosing a quadrangular courtyard, the rear wings being lower than those in front, and hidden by the latter from the view of one standing at the gate as I was. It was only at a distance that one could see their roofs above the enclosure. There was but one line of windows along the front, but there was an oriel just under the peak of the main building, and I could see a skylight here and there upon the roofs.
The blinds were closed and there was no sign of life about the house--evidently planned with hospitable intentions, but now silent and forbidding. I tried the gates. They were locked securely. A screen of closely woven wire rose from the pavement