Chapter XXV: The Roland Family

The next day we drove to Castle Hall, and I was enchanted with the beauty of the Elizabethan house, and its situation among the fine woods at the bottom of a steep hill, which was surmounted by the towers and ruins of the ancient castle. The most perfect and highest of these towers was supposed to be Roman, and, as in many other English castles, is therefore called Cæsar’s. It is built at the edge of a high perpendicular rock, and its lofty battlements, and a beautiful oriel window in its upper story, project over the river, which rushes round its base, and then forms a lake at the bottom of the terraced gardens far below.

The comparatively modern house was partly built in Henry VII.’s time, had received several additions in succeeding centuries, and was placed half way down the rocky height; but some of the old Castle buildings extended down the least precipitous side of it, and joined the present dwelling. One of these had been the ancient Castle chapel, afterwards turned into a banqueting room by a certain Earl Hugh, who was called the black devil of ----, and had died of apoplexy at the first banquet he gave there. Above this, a range of building, nearly entire, wound round the side of the height, and joined the whole to Cæsar’s tower.

We drove up to the entrance of the Hall, and the grand old porch door was opened by Aunt Jane’s old friend, Mrs. Lacy, the housekeeper, who received us with stately curtseys and dignified smiles of welcome. She was nearly eighty, and had lived in the family ever since she was born, being the foster-sister of one of the Earls of Roland. We entered a vast hall, which was said to be the most modern part of the whole, erected in James the First’s reign. The lofty ceiling was beautifully carved, and ornamented with pendent bosses and coloured shields, showing the numerous quarterings of the Rolands. The walls were all covered with armour, shields, helmets, and banners, won in the Crusades and other wars.

Mrs. Lacy then took us into a long suite of rooms, filled with old pictures and tapestry, and all kinds of picturesque cabinets and old furniture. Then we went up the grand old oak staircase to a long gallery, which extended for more than a hundred feet along the western side of the quadrangle, and from some of its deep bay windows we had a good view of the park--a real English park, which reminded me of my own dear Priory woods; but the scenery was finer here, from the hills being higher, and the dells more rocky and steep.

Then we went to the library and the blue drawing-room, which were on a still higher level, and joined the hall with some of the old castle buildings.

A picture of Vandyck over the carved chimney-piece in the blue room riveted my attention more than anything I had seen, for I recognized at once its striking likeness to the portrait I had seen of the Countess Dorina.

This was the beautiful Lady Jane Roland which the blind woman had so well described, and I found that Mrs. Lacy also remembered her, and had the same admiration for the lovely Countess.

While I was looking at the picture I heard Aunt Jane ask Mrs. Lacy what door that was at the opposite end of the room, and whether any use was ever made of the old buildings beyond. As I looked in the direction Aunt Jane pointed, I found that Mrs. Lacy’s countenance changed, and a look of embarrassment and perplexity overspread her fair old face. After a little pause, she said,

“No, ma’am, no use was ever made of those rooms in my time, nor my mother’s either, and she was housekeeper for sixty-six years, before I succeeded her.”

“Is it because they are said to be haunted?” inquired Aunt Jane.

“Perhaps so; but the floors of many of them are gone, and the windows have no glass; and the dead-room, which looks into the upper courtyard, has not been used since the good Earl Lawrence was laid out in state then, when I was quite a child, and the roof was said to be unsafe.”

“And the Chapel or Banqueting Hall--why is that never shown? It must be a splendid room, from the appearance of its windows. I remember looking down upon it when I once mounted to the top of Cæsar’s tower.”

“That’s not safe either, I have heard, ma’am.”

“And the ghost of the wicked Earl Hugh is said to haunt it, and now I hear that a lady appears, too, sometimes. Is that supposed to be the ghost of this lovely creature?” inquired Aunt Jane, as she pointed to the portrait of Lady Jane.

“No, ma’am,” said Mrs. Lacy, with a serious and somewhat proud look; “she was far too good to become a ghost. It is poor Lady Alice who was not quite--but, ma’am, you must excuse me, for I never like to talk of any but the real, downright good ones of our family.”

“And Lady Alice has been seen lately, has she not?”

“Have you heard so, ma’am?” she said, with a look of alarm.

“Yes; the village gossips say that she has been seen often during this last year, and that strange lights appear up in the ruined windows of the old castle on dark nights--even in the oriel that projects over the torrent, and to which there is no staircase. So it must be a ghost that lights it up then,” said Aunt Jane, with a smile.

“Do they say so, indeed, ma’am? Well, I do wish that---- However, the Lord’s will be done; it is not for me to wish or think--”

“Do you regret that the family--that the Count and Countess Rossi are coming here?”

“I certainly ought not,” said the old dame, decidedly, and as if she was determined not to say anything more; and there was something in the way she seemed to check the utterance of her thoughts that reminded us both of the blind woman’s words when speaking of the family.

END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.

LONDON: PRINTED BY MACDONALD AND TUGWELL, BLENHEIM HOUSE.