The Shadow of a Sin

Sir Arthur and Lady Vaughan lived at Queen's Chase in Derbyshire, a beautiful and picturesque place, known to artists, poets, and lovers of quaint old architecture. Queen's Chase had been originally built by good Queen Elizabeth of York, and was perhaps one of the few indulgences which that not too happy queen allowed herself. It was large, and the rooms were all lofty. The building was in the old Tudor style, and one of its peculiarities was that every part of it was laden with ornament: it seemed to have been the great ambition of the architect who designed it to introduce as much carving as possible about it. Heads of fauns and satyrs, fruit and flowers—every variety of carving was there; no matter where the spectator turned, the sculptor's work was visible.

To Hyacinth Vaughan, dreamy and romantic, it seemed as though the Chase were peopled by these dull, silent, dark figures. Elizabeth of York did not enjoy much pleasure in the retreat she had built for herself. It was there she first heard of and rejoiced in the betrothal of her fair young daughter Marguerite, to James IV. of Scotland. A few years afterward she died, and the Chase was sold. Sir Dunstan Vaughan purchased it, and it had remained in the family ever since. It was now their principal residence—the Vaughans of Queen's Chase never quitted it.

Though it was picturesque it was not the most cheerful place in the world. The rooms were dark by reason of the huge carvings of the window frames and the shade of the trees, which last, perhaps, grew too near the house. The edifice contained no light, cheerful, sunny rooms, no wide large windows; the taste of the days in which it was built, led more toward magnificence than cheerfulness. Some additions had been made; the western wing of the building had been enlarged; but the principal apartments had remained unaltered; the stately, gloomy rooms in which the fair young princess had received and read the royal love-letters were almost untouched. The tall, spreading trees grew almost to the Hall door; they made the whole house dark and perhaps unhealthy. But no Vaughan ventured to cut them down; such an action would have seemed like a sacrilege.

From father to son Queen's Chase had descended in regular succession. Sir Arthur, the present owner, succeeded when he was quite young. He was by no means of the genial order of men: he had always been cold, silent, and reserved. He married a lady more proud, more silent, more reserved than himself—a narrow-minded, narrow-hearted woman whose life was bounded by rigid law and formal courtesies, who never knew a warm or generous impulse, who lived quite outside the beautiful fairyland of love and poetry.