Is there not one who will do so--not one who will rescue me from the
horror that surrounds me, for Heaven will not? I dare not ask mercy
there." The storm continued louder and louder. The wind, it is true, was nearly
hushed, but the roar and the rattle of the echo-awakening thunder fully
made up for its cessation, while, now and then, even there, in that
underground abode, some sudden reflection of the vivid lightning's light
would find its way, lending, for a fleeting moment, sufficient light to
Marchdale, wherewith he could see the gloomy place in which he was. At times he wept, and at times he raved, while ever and anon he made
such frantic efforts to free himself from the chains that were around
him, that, had they not been strong, he must have succeeded; but, as it
was, he only made deep indentations into his flesh, and gave himself
much pain. "Charles Holland!" he shouted; "oh! release me! Varney! Varney! why do
you not come to save me? I have toiled for you most unrequitedly--I have
not had my reward. Let it all consist in my release from this dreadful
bondage. Help! help! oh, help!" There was no one to hear him. The storm continued, and now, suddenly, a
sudden and a sharper sound than any awakened by the thunder's roar came
upon his startled ear, and, in increased agony, he shouted,--

"What is that? oh! what is that? God of heaven, do my fears translate
that sound aright? Can it be, oh! can it be, that the ruins which have
stood for so many a year are now crumbling down before the storm of
to-night?" The sound came again, and he felt the walls of the dungeon in which he
was shake. Now there could be no doubt but that the lightning had struck
some part of the building, and so endangered the safety of all that was
above ground. For a moment there came across his brain such a rush of
agony, that he neither spoke nor moved. Had that dreadful feeling
continued much longer, he must have lapsed into insanity; but that
amount of mercy--for mercy it would have been--was not shown to him. He
still felt all the accumulating horrors of his situation, and then, with
such shrieks as nothing but a full appreciation of such horrors could
have given him strength to utter, he called upon earth, upon heaven and
upon all that was infernal, to save him from his impending doom. All was in vain. It was an impending doom which nothing but the direct
interposition of Heaven could have at all averted; and it was not likely
that any such perversion of the regular laws of nature would take place
to save such a man as Marchdale. Again came the crashing sound of falling stones, and he was certain that
the old ruins, which had stood for so many hundred years the storm, and
the utmost wrath of the elements, was at length yielding, and crumbling
down. What else could he expect but to be engulphed among the
fragments--fragments still weighty and destructive, although in decay. How fearfully now did his horrified imagination take in at one glance,
as it were, a panoramic view of all his past life, and how absolutely
contemptible, at that moment, appeared all that he had been striving
for. But the walls shake again, and this time the vibration is more fearful
than before. There is a tremendous uproar above him--the roof yields to
some superincumbent pressure--there is one shriek, and Marchdale lies
crushed beneath a mass of masonry that it would take men and machinery
days to remove from off him. All is over now. That bold, bad man--that accomplished hypocrite--that
mendacious, would-be murderer was no more. He lies but a mangled,
crushed, and festering corpse. May his soul find mercy with his God! The storm, from this moment, seemed to relax in its violence, as if it
had accomplished a great purpose, and, consequently, now, need no longer
"vex the air with its boisterous presence." Gradually the thunder died
away in the distance. The wind no longer blew in blustrous gusts, but,
with a gentle murmuring, swept around the ancient pile, as if singing
the requiem of the dead that lay beneath--that dead which mortal eyes
were never to look upon. CHAPTER LXXIV. THE MEETING OF CHARLES AND FLORA. [Illustration]

Charles Holland followed Jack Pringle for some time in silence from
Bannerworth Hall; his mind was too full of thought concerning the past
to allow him to indulge in much of that kind of conversation in which
Jack Pringle might be fully considered to be a proficient. As for Jack, somehow or another, he had felt his dignity offended in the
garden of Bannerworth Hall, and he had made up his mind, as he
afterwards stated in his own phraseology, not to speak to nobody till
somebody spoke to him. A growing anxiety, however, to ascertain from one who had seen her
lately, how Flora had borne his absence, at length induced Charles
Holland to break his self-imposed silence. "Jack," he said, "you have had the happiness of seeing her lately, tell
me, does Flora Bannerworth look as she was wont to look, or have all the
roses faded from her cheeks?" "Why, as for the roses," said Jack, "I'm blowed if I can tell, and
seeing as how she don't look at me much, I doesn't know nothing about
her; I can tell you something, though, about the old admiral that will
make you open your eyes." "Indeed, Jack, and what may that be?" "Why, he's took to drink, and gets groggy about every day of his life,
and the most singular thing is, that when that's the case with the old
man, he says it's me." "Indeed, Jack! taken to drinking has my poor old uncle, from grief, I
suppose, Jack, at my disappearance." "No, I don't think it's grief," said Jack; "it strikes me it's
rum-and-water." "Alas, alas, I never could have imagined he could have fallen into that
habit of yours; he always seemed so far from anything of this kind." "Ay, ay, sir," said Jack, "I know'd you'd be astonished. It will be the
death of him, that's my opinion; and the idea, you know, Master Charles,
of accusing me when he gets drunk himself." "I believe that is a common delusion of intemperate persons," said
Charles. "Is it, sir; well, it's a very awkward I thing, because you know, sir,
as well as most people, that I'm not the fellow to take a drop too
much." "I cannot say, Jack, that I know so much, for I have certainly heard my
uncle accuse you of intoxication." "Lor', sir, that was all just on account of his trying it hisself; he
was a thinking on it then, and wanted to see how I'd take it." "But tell me of Flora; are you quite certain that she has had no more
alarms from Varney?" "What, that ere vampyre fellow? not a bit of it, your honour. Lor' bless
you, he must have found out by some means or another that I was on the
look out, and that did the business.