And to make his probation still more painful, he was in love! not as men
are who are taken with a new face every year of their lives, but as the
heroes of old used to be--for once and forever! profoundly,
passionately, desperately in love, almost despairingly in love, since
she whom he loved was at once the richest heiress, the greatest beauty,
and the proudest lady in the whole community--Sybil Berners! Miss
Berners, of Black Hall!--in social position as far above the briefless
young lawyer as the sun above the earth; at least so said those who
observed this presumptuous passion, and predicted for the young lover,
should he ever really aspire to her hand, the fate of Phaeton, to be
consumed in the splendor of her sphere, and cast down blackened to his
native earth.
Had they who cavilled at his high-placed love but known the truth; how
she whom he so worshipped, on her part, adored him? But this he himself
did not know, or even suspect. Had he possessed much less of a fine,
high-toned sense of honor, he might, by wooing the lady, have found this
out for himself; but he, an almost penniless young man, was much too
proud to ask the hand of the wealthy heiress. Or had he possessed a
little more personal vanity, he might have suspected the truth; for
certainly there was not a handsomer man in the whole county than was
this briefless young lawyer with the napless hat and thread-bare coat.
His person was of that medium height and just proportions necessary to
give perfect elegance of form and grace of motion. His features were
classic, with the straight forehead, hooked nose, short upper lip, and
pointed chin of the strong old Roman type. His complexion was fair, his
eyes blue, and his hair and beard a golden auburn. Added to these
attractions, there was an intense magnetic power in the gaze of his dark
eyes, and in the tone of his deep voice, a power that few could resist,
and certainly not Sybil Berners.
But who and what besides heiress and beauty was Sybil Berners? To tell
you all she was. I must first tell you something about her family, the
"Berners of Black Hall."
Theirs was an old family, and a historical name interwoven with the
destinies of the two hemispheres. Their house was older than the history
of the new world, and almost as ancient as the fables of the old world.
They were among the first lords of the manor in Colonial Virginia, and
they claimed descent from a ducal house whose patent of nobility dated
back to the first months of the Norman Conquest of England.