The Red Bungalow and Other Stories
Date: 1889-12-31T15:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Ghost Stories; Supernatural Fiction; Paranormal fiction; Horror
Description: Strange roads leading to frightful realms…
Publisher: MobileRead.com
Rights: Public domain worldwide.

THE RED BUNGALOW
AND  OTHER  STORIES

B. M. CROKER

MobileRead Edition
2020

Bithia Mary (or May) Croker (née Sheppard, c. 1848 – 20 October 1920) was a prolific and popular Irish novelist, most of whose work concerns life and society in British India. She was also a notable writer of ghost stories.

Compilation by ECM. Contents were originally published 1890 ~ 1919. This book is in the public domain worldwide.

CONTENTS:

- “To Let”
- The Khitmatgar
- The Dak Bungalow at Dakor
- “If You See Her Face”
- The Former Passengers
- Number Ninety
- The Red Bungalow
- The First Comer
- Jack Straw’s Castle
- The Red Woollen Necktie
- Her Last Wishes
- The Helper
- The North Verandah
- The Creaking Board
- The Sword of Lanbryde

“TO LET”

“List, list, O list!”

—Hamlet, Act I.

Some years ago, when I was a slim young spin, I came out to India to live with my brother Tom: he and I were members of a large and somewhat impecunious family, and I do not think my mother was sorry to have one of her four grown-up daughters thus taken off her hands. Tom’s wife, Aggie, had been at school with my eldest sister; we had known and liked her all our lives, and regarded her as one of ourselves; and as she and the children were at home when Tom’s letter was received, and his offer accepted, she helped me to choose my slender outfit, with judgement, zeal, and taste; endowed me with several pretty additions to my wardrobe; superintended the fitting of my gowns and the trying on of my hats, with most sympathetic interest, and finally escorted me out to Lucknow, under her own wing, and installed me in the only spare room in her comfortable bungalow in Dilkousha.

My sister-in-law is a pretty little brunette, rather pale, with dark hair, brilliant black eyes, a resolute mouth, and a bright, intelligent expression. She is orderly, trim, feverishly energetic, and seems to live every moment of her life. Her children, her wardrobe, her house, her servants, and last, not least, her husband, are all models in their way; and yet she has plenty of time for tennis, and dancing, and talking and walking. She is, undoubtedly, a remarkably talented little creature, and especially prides herself on her nerve, and her power of will, or will power. I suppose they are the same thing? and I am sure they are all the same to Tom, who worships the sole of her small slipper. Strictly between ourselves, she is the ruling member of the family, and turns her lord and master round her little finger. Tom is big and fair (of course), the opposite to his wife, quiet, rather easy-going and inclined to be indolent; but Aggie rouses him up, and pushes him to the front, and keeps him there. She knows all about his department, his prospects of promotion, his prospects of furlough, of getting acting appointments, and so on, even better than he does himself. The chief of Tom’s department – have I said that Tom is in the Irritation Office? – has placed it solemnly on record that he considers little Mrs. Shandon a surprisingly clever woman. The two children, Bob and Tor, are merry, oppressively active monkeys, aged three and five years respectively. As for myself, I am tall, fair – and I wish I could add pretty! but this is a true story. My eyes are blue, my teeth are white, my hair is red – alas, a blazing red; and I was, at this period, nineteen years of age; and now I think I have given a sufficient outline of the whole family.

We arrived at Lucknow in November, when the cold weather is delightful, and everything was delightful to me. The bustle and life of a great Indian station, the novelty of my surroundings, the early morning rides, picnics down the river, and dances at the “Chutter Munzil,” made me look upon Lucknow as a paradise on earth; and in this light I still regarded it, until a great change came over the temperature, and the month of April introduced me to red-hot winds, sleepless nights, and the intolerable “brain fever” bird. Aggie had made up her mind definitely on one subject: we were not to go away to the hills until the rains. Tom could only get two months’ leave (July and August), and she did not intend to leave him to grill on the plains alone. As for herself and the children – not to speak of me – we had all come out from home so recently that we did not require a change. The trip to Europe had made a vast hole in the family stocking, and she wished to economize; and who can economize with two establishments in full swing? Tell me this, ye Anglo-Indian matrons? With a large, cool bungalow, plenty of punkahs, khuskhus tatties, ice, and a thermantidote, surely we could manage to brave May and June – at any rate the attempt was made.

Gradually the hills drained Lucknow week by week; family after family packed up, warned us of our folly in remaining on the plains, offered to look for houses for us, and left by the night mail. By the middle of May, the place was figuratively empty. Nothing can be more dreary than a large station in the hot weather – unless it is an equally forsaken hill station in the depths of winter, when the mountains are covered with snow, the mall no longer resounds with gay voices and the tramp of Jampanies, but is visited by bears and panthers, and the houses are closed, and, as it were, put to bed in straw! As for Lucknow in the summer, it was a melancholy spot; the public gardens were deserted, the chairs at the Chutter Munzil stood empty, the very bands had gone to the hills! the shops were shut, the baked white roads, no longer thronged with carriages and bamboo carts, gave ample room to the humble ekka, or a Dhobie’s meagre donkey, shuffling along in the dust.

Of course we were not the only people remaining in the place, grumbling at the heat and dust and life in general; but there can be no sociability with the thermometer above 100° in the shade. Through the long, long Indian day we sat and gasped, in darkened rooms, and consumed quantities of “Nimbo pegs,” i.e. limes and soda water, and listened to the fierce hot wind roaring along the road and driving the roasted leaves before it; and in the evening, when the sun had set, we went for a melancholy drive through the Wingfield Park, or round by Martiniere College, and met our friends at the library, and compared sensations and thermometers. The season was exceptionally bad (but people say that every year), and presently Bobby and Tor began to fade: their little white faces and listless eyes appealed to Aggie as Tom’s anxious expostulations had never done. “Yes, they must go to the hills with me.” But this idea I repudiated at once; I refused to undertake the responsibility – I, who could scarcely speak a word to the servants – who had no experience! Then Bobbie had a bad go of fever – intermittent fever; the beginning of the end to his alarmed mother; the end being represented by a large gravestone! She now became as firmly determined to go, as she had previously been resolved to stay; but it was so late in the season to take a house. Alas, alas, for the beautiful tempting advertisements in the Pioneer, which we had seen and scorned! Aggie wrote to a friend in a certain hill station, called (for this occasion only) “Kantia,” and Tom wired to a house agent, who triumphantly replied by letter, that there was not one unlet bungalow on his books. This missive threw us into the depths of despair; there seemed no alternative but a hill hotel, and the usual quarters that await the last comers, and the proverbial welcome for children and dogs (we had only four); but the next day brought us good news from Aggie’s friend Mrs. Chalmers.

Dear Mrs. Shandon (she said),

I received your letter, and went at once to Curaitjee, the agent. Every hole and corner up here seems full, and he had not a single house to let. Today I had a note from him, saying that Briarwood is vacant; the people who took it are not coming up, they have gone to Naini Tal. You are in luck. I have just been out to see the house, and have secured it for you. It is a mile and a half from the club, but I know that you and your sister are capital walkers. I envy you. Such a charming place – two sitting-rooms, four bedrooms, four bathrooms, a hall, servants’ go-downs, stabling, and a splendid view from a very pretty garden, and only Rs. 800 for the season! Why, I am paying Rs. 1000 for a very inferior house, with scarcely a stick of furniture and no view. I feel so proud of myself, and I am longing to show you my treasure-trove. Telegraph when you start, and I shall have a milkman in waiting and fires in all the rooms.

Yours sincerely,

Edith Chalmers

We now looked upon Mrs. Chalmers as our best and dearest friend, and began to get under way at once. A long journey in India is a serious business, when the party comprises two ladies, two children, two ayahs, and five other servants, three fox terriers, a mongoose, and a Persian cat – all these animals going to the hills for the benefit of their health – not to speak of a ton of luggage, including crockery and lamps, a cottage piano, a goat, and a pony. Aggie and I, the children, one ayah, two terriers, the cat and mongoose, our bedding and pillows, the tiffin basket and ice basket, were all stowed into one compartment, and I must confess that the journey was truly miserable. The heat was stifling, despite the water tatties. One of the terriers had a violent dispute with the cat, and the cat had a difference with the mongoose, and Bob and Tor had a pitched battle; more than once I actually wished myself back in Lucknow.

I was most truly thankful to wake one morning, to find myself under the shadow of the Himalayas – not a mighty, snow-clad range of everlasting hills, but merely the spurs – the moderate slopes, covered with scrub, loose shale, and jungle, and deceitful little trickling watercourses. We Bent the servants on ahead, whilst we rested at the Dak bungalow near the railway station, and then followed them at our leisure. We accomplished the ascent in dandies – open kind of boxes, half box, half chair, carried on the shoulders of four men. This was an entirely novel sensation to me, and at first an agreeable one, so long as the slopes were moderate, and the paths wide; but the higher we went, the narrower became the path, the steeper the naked precipice; and as my coolies would walk at the extreme edge, with the utmost indifference to my frantic appeals to “Beetor! Beetor!” – and would change poles at the most agonizing corners – my feelings were very mixed, especially when droves of loose pack ponies came thundering downhill, with no respect for the rights of the road. Late at night we passed through Kantia, and arrived at Briarwood, far too weary to be critical. Fires were blazing, supper was prepared, and we despatched it in haste, and most thankfully went to bed and slept soundly, as anyone would do who had spent thirty-six hours in a crowded compartment, and ten in a cramped wooden case.

The next morning, rested and invigorated, we set out on a tour of inspection; and it is almost worth while to undergo a certain amount of baking in the sweltering heat of the lower regions, in order to enjoy those deep first draughts of cool hill air, instead of a stifling, dust-laden atmosphere; and to appreciate the green valleys and blue hills, by force of contrast to the far-stretching, eye-smarting, white glaring roads, that intersect the burnt-up plains – roads and plains, that even the pariah abandons, salamander though he be!

To our delight and surprise, Mrs. Chalmers had by no means overdrawn the advantages of our new abode. The bungalow was soundly built of stone, two storied, and ample in size. It stood on a kind of shelf, cut out of the hillside, and was surrounded by a pretty flower garden, full of roses, fuchsias, and carnations. The high road passed the gate, from which the avenue descended, direct to the entrance door, at the end of the house, and from whence ran a long passage. Off this passage three rooms opened to the right, all looking south, and all looking into a deep, delightful, flagged, verandah. The stairs were very steep. At the head of them, the passage and rooms were repeated. There were small nooks, and dressing-rooms, and convenient outhouses, and plenty of good water; but the glory of Briarwood was undoubtedly its verandah: it was fully twelve feet wide, roofed with zinc, and overhung a precipice of a thousand feet – not a startlingly sheer khud, but a tolerably straight descent of grey-blue shale, rocks, and low jungle. From it there was a glorious view, across a valley, far away, to the snowy range. It opened at one end into the avenue, and was not enclosed; but at the side next the precipice, there was a stout wooden railing, with netting at the bottom, for the safety of too enterprising dogs or children A charming spot, despite its rather bold situation; and as Aggie and I sat in it, surveying the scenery and inhaling the pure hill air, and watching Bob and Tor tearing up and down, playing horses, we said to one another that “the verandah alone was worth half the rent.”

“It’s absurdly cheap,” exclaimed my sister-in-law complacently. “I wish you saw the hovel I had, at Simla, for the same rent. I wonder if it is feverish, or badly drained, or what?”

“Perhaps it has a ghost,” I suggested facetiously; and at such an absurd idea we both went into peals of laughter.

At this moment Mrs. Chalmers appeared, brisk, rosy, and breathlessly benevolent, having walked over from Kantia.

“So you have found it,” she said as we shook hands. “I said nothing about this delicious verandah! I thought I would keep it as a surprise. I did not say a word too much for Briarwood, did I?”

“Not half enough,” we returned rapturously; and presently we went in a body, armed with a list from the agent, and proceeded to go over the house and take stock of its contents.

“It’s not a bit like a hill furnished house,” boasted Mrs. Chalmers, with a glow of pride, as she looked round the drawing-room; “carpets, curtains, solid, very solid chairs, and Berlin wool-worked screens, a card-table, and any quantity of pictures.”

“Yes, don’t they look like family portraits?” I suggested, as we gazed at them. There was one of an officer in faded water colours, another of his wife, two of a previous generation in oils and amply gilded frames, two sketches of an English country house, and some framed photographs – groups of grinning cricketers, or wedding guests. All the rooms were well, almost handsomely, furnished in an old-fashioned style. There was no scarcity of wardrobes, looking-glasses, or even armchairs, in the bedrooms, and the pantry was fitted out – a most singular circumstance – with a large supply of handsome glass and china, lamps, old moderators, coffee and teapots, plated side dishes, and candlesticks, cooking utensils and spoons and forks, wine coasters and a cake-basket. These articles were all let with the house (much to our amazement), provided we were responsible for the same. The china was Spode, the plate old family heirlooms, with a crest – a winged horse – on everything, down to the very mustard spoons.

“The people who own this house must be lunatics,” remarked Aggie, as she peered round the pantry; “fancy hiring out one’s best family plate, and good old china! And I saw some ancient music-books in the drawing-room, and there is a side saddle in the bottle khana.”

“My dear, the people who owned this house are dead,” explained Mrs. Chalmers. “I heard all about them last evening from Mrs. Starkey.”

“Oh, is she up there?” exclaimed Aggie, somewhat fretfully.

“Yes, her husband is cantonment magistrate. This house belonged to an old retired colonel and his wife. They and his niece lived here. These were all their belongings. They died within a short time of one another, and the old man left a queer will, to say that the house was to remain precisely as they left it for twenty years, and at the end of that time, it was to be sold and all the property dispersed. Mrs. Starkey says she is sure that he never intended it to be let, but the heir-at-law insists on that, and is furious at the terms of the will.”

“Well, it is a very good thing for us,” remarked Aggie; “we are as comfortable here, as if we were in our own house: there is a stove in the kitchen, there are nice boxes for firewood in every room, clocks, real hair mattresses – in short, it is as you said, a treasure trove.”

We set to work to modernize the drawing-room with phoolkaries, Madras muslin curtains, photograph screens and frames, and such-like portable articles. We placed the piano across a corner, arranged flowers in some handsome Dresden china vases, and entirely altered and improved the character of the room. When Aggie had despatched a most glowing description of our new quarters to Tom, and when we had had tiffin, we set off to walk into Kantia to put our names down at the library, and to inquire for letters at the post-office. Aggie met a good many acquaintances – who does not, who has lived five years in India in the same district?

Among them Mrs. Starkey, an elderly lady with a prominent nose and goggle eyes, who greeted her loudly across the reading-room table, in this agreeable fashion:

“And so you have come up after all, Mrs. Shandon. Someone told me that you meant to remain below, but I knew you never could be so wicked as to keep your poor little children in that heat.” Then coming round and dropping into a chair beside her, she said, “And I suppose this young lady is your sister-in-law?”

Mrs. Starkey eyed me critically, evidently appraising my chances in the great marriage market. She herself had settled her own two daughters most satisfactorily, and had now nothing to do, but interest herself in other people’s affairs.

“Yes,” acquiesced Aggie; “Miss Shandon – Mrs. Starkey.”

“And so you have taken Briarwood?”

“Yes, we have been most lucky to get it.”

“I hope you will think so, at the end of three months,” observed Mrs. Starkey, with a significant pursing of her lips. “Mrs. Chalmers is a stranger up here, or she would not have been in such a hurry to jump at it.”

“Why, what is the matter with it?” inquired Aggie. “It is well built, well furnished, well situated, and very cheap.”

“That’s just it – suspiciously cheap. Why, my dear Mrs. Shandon, if there was not something against it, it would let for two hundred rupees a month. Common sense would tell you that!”

“And what is against it?”

“It’s haunted! There you have the reason in two words.”

“Is that all? I was afraid it was the drains. I don’t believe in ghosts and haunted houses. What are we supposed to see?”

“Nothing,” retorted Mrs. Starkey, who seemed a good deal nettled at our smiling incredulity.

“Nothing!” with an exasperating laugh.

“No, but you will make up for it in hearing. Not now – you are all right for the next six weeks – but after the monsoon breaks, I give you a week at Briarwood. No one would stand it longer, and indeed you might as well bespeak your rooms at Cooper’s Hotel now. There is always a rush up here in July, by the two months’ leave people, and you will be poked into some wretched go-down.”

Aggie laughed, rather a careless ironical little laugh, and said, “Thank you, Mrs. Starkey; but I think we will stay on where we are – at any rate for the present.”

“Of course it will be as you please. What do you think of the verandah?” she inquired, with a curious smile.

“I think, as I was saying to Susan, that it is worth half the rent of the house.”

“And in my opinion the house is worth double rent without it;” and with this enigmatic remark, she rose, and sailed away.

“Horrid old frump!” exclaimed Aggie, as we walked home in the starlight. “She is jealous and angry that she did not get Briarwood herself – I know her so well. She is always hinting, and repeating stories about the nicest people – always decrying your prettiest dress, or your best servant.”

We soon forgot all about Mrs. Starkey, and her dismal prophecy, being too gay, and too busy, to give her, or it, a thought. We had so many engagements – tennis-parties and tournaments, picnics, concerts, dances, and little dinners. We ourselves gave occasional afternoon teas in the verandah – using the best Spode cups and saucers, and the old silver cake-basket – and were warmly complimented on our good fortune in securing such a charming house and garden. One day the children discovered, to their great joy, that the old chowkidar belonging to the bungalow possessed an African grey parrot – a rare bird indeed in India; he had a battered Europe cage, doubtless a remnant of better days, and swung on his ring, looking up at us inquiringly, out of his impudent little black eyes.

The parrot had been the property of the former inmates of Briarwood, and as it was a long-lived creature, had survived its master and mistress, and was boarded out with the chowkidar, at one rupee per month.

The chowkidar willingly carried the cage into the verandah, where the bird seemed perfectly at home.

We got a little table for its cage, and the children were delighted with him, as he swung to and fro, with a bit of cake in his wrinkled claw.

Presently he startled us all by suddenly calling “Lucy,” in a voice that was as distinct as if it had come from a human throat. “Pretty Lucy – Lu – cy.”

“That must have been the niece,” said Aggie. “I expect she was the original of that picture over the chimney-piece in your room; she looks like a Lucy.”

It was a large, framed, half-length photograph of a very pretty girl, in a white dress, with gigantic open sleeves. The ancient parrot talked incessantly now that he had been restored to society; he whistled for the dogs, and brought them flying to his summons – to his great satisfaction, and their equally great indignation. He called “Qui hye” so naturally, in a lady’s shrill soprano, or a gruff male bellow, that I have no doubt our servants would have liked to have wrung his neck. He coughed and expectorated like an old gentleman, and whined like a puppy, and mewed like a cat, and, I am sorry to add, sometimes swore like a trooper; but his most constant cry was, “Lucy, where are you, pretty Lucy – Lucy – Lu – cy?”

•   •   •   •   •

Aggie and I went to various picnics, but to that given by the Chalmers (in honour of Mr. Chalmers’ brother Charlie, a captain in a Ghoorka regiment, just come up to Kantia on leave) Aggie was unavoidably absent. Tor had a little touch of fever, and she did not like to leave him; but I went under my hostess’s care, and expected to enjoy myself immensely. Alas! on that selfsame afternoon, the long-expected monsoon broke, and we were nearly drowned! We rode to the selected spot, five miles from Kantia, laughing and chattering, indifferent to the big blue-black clouds that came slowly, but surely, sailing up from below; it was a way they had had for days, and nothing had come of it! We spread the tablecloth, boiled the kettle, unpacked the hampers, in spite of sharp gusts of wind and warning rumbling thunder. Just as we had commenced to reap the reward of our exertions, there fell a few huge drops, followed by a vivid flash, and then a tremendous crash of thunder, like a whole park of artillery, that seemed to shake the mountains – and after this the deluge. In less than a minute we were soaked through; we hastily gathered up the table-cloth by its four ends, gave it to the coolies, and fled. It was all I could do to stand against the wind; only for Captain Chalmers I believe I would have been blown away; as it was, I lost my hat, it was whirled into space. Mrs. Chalmers lost her boa, and Mrs. Starkey, not merely her bonnet, but some portion of her hair. We were truly in a wretched plight, the water streaming down our faces, and squelching in our boots; the little trickling mountain rivulets were now like racing seas of turbid water; the lightning was almost blinding; the trees rocked dangerously, and lashed one another with their quivering branches. I had never been out in such a storm before, and sincerely hope I never may again. We reached Kantia more dead than alive, and Mrs. Chalmers sent an express to Aggie, and kept me till the next day. After raining as it only can rain in the Himalayas, the weather cleared, the sun shone, and I rode home in borrowed plumes, full of my adventures, and in the highest spirits. I found Aggie sitting over the fire in the drawing-room, looking ghastly white: that was nothing uncommon; but terribly depressed, which was most unusual.

“I am afraid you have neuralgia?” I said, as I kissed her.

She nodded, and made no reply,

“How is Tor?” I inquired, as I drew a chair up to the fire.

“Better – quite well.”

“Any news – any letter?”

“Not a word – not a line.”

“Has anything happened to Pip” – Pip was a fox-terrier, renowned for having the shortest tail and being the most impertinent dog in Lucknow – “or the mongoose?”

“No, you silly girl! Why do you ask such ridiculous questions?”

“I was afraid something was amiss; you seem rather down on your luck.”

Aggie shrugged her shoulders, and then said, “Pray, what put such an absurd idea into your head? Tell me all about the picnic,” and she began to talk rapidly, and to ask me various questions; but I observed that once she had set me going – no difficult task – her attention flagged, her eyes wandered from my face to the fire. She was not listening to half I said, and my most thrilling descriptions were utterly lost on this indifferent, abstracted little creature! I noticed from this time, that she had become strangely nervous (for her). She invited herself to the share of half my bed; she was restless, distrait, and even irritable; and when I was asked out to spend the day, dispensed with my company with an alacrity that was by no means flattering. Formerly, of an evening she used to herd the children home at sundown, and tear me away from the delights of the reading-room at seven o’clock; now she hung about the library, until almost the last moment, until it was time to put out the lamps, and kept the children with her, making transparent pretexts for their company. Often we did not arrive at home till half-past eight o’clock. I made no objections to these late hours, neither did Charlie Chalmers, who often walked back with us and remained to dinner. I was amazed to notice that Aggie seemed delighted to have his company, for she had always expressed a rooted aversion to what she called “tame young men,” and here was this new acquaintance dining with us, at least twice a week!

About a month after the picnic we had a spell of dreadful weather – thunderstorms accompanied by torrents. One pouring afternoon, Aggie and I were cowering over the drawing-room fire, whilst the rain came fizzing down among the logs, and ran in rivers off the roof, and out of the spouts. There had been no going out that day, and we were feeling rather flat and dull, as we sat in a kind of ghostly twilight, with all outdoor objects swallowed up in mist, listening to the violent battering of the rain on the zinc verandah, and the storm which was growling round the hills. “Oh, for a visitor!” I exclaimed; “but no one but a fish, or a lunatic, would be out on such an evening.”

“No one, indeed,” echoed Aggie, in a melancholy tone. “We may as well draw the curtains, and have in the lamp and tea to cheer us up.”

She had scarcely finished speaking, when I heard the brisk trot of a horse along the road. It stopped at the gate, and came rapidly down our avenue. I heard the wet gravel crunching under his hoofs, and – yes, a man’s cheery whistle. My heart jumped, and I half rose from my chair. It must be Charlie Chalmers braving the elements to see me! – such, I must confess, was my incredible vanity! He did not stop at the front door as usual, but rode straight into the verandah, which afforded ample room, and shelter for half a dozen mounted men.

“Aggie,” I said eagerly, “do you hear? It must be—”

I paused, my tongue silenced, by the awful pallor of her face, and the expression of her eyes, as she sat with her little hands clutching the arms of her chair, and her whole figure bent forward in an attitude of listening – an attitude of rigid terror.

“What is it, Aggie?” I said. “Are you ill?”

As I spoke, the horse’s hoofs made a loud clattering noise on the stone-paved verandah outside, and a man’s voice – a young man’s eager voice – called, “Lucy.”

Instantly a chair near the writing-table was pushed back, and someone went quickly to the window – a French one – and bungled for a moment with the fastening. I always had a difficulty with that window myself. Aggie and I were within the bright circle of the firelight, but the rest of the room was dim, and outside the streaming grey sky was spasmodically illuminated by occasional vivid flashes, that lit up the surrounding hills as if it were daylight. The trampling of impatient hoofs, and the rattling of a door-handle, were the only sounds that were audible for a few breathless seconds; but during those seconds Pip, bristling like a porcupine, and trembling violently in every joint, had sprung off my lap and crawled abjectly under Aggie’s chair, seemingly in a transport of fear. The door was opened audibly, and a cold, icy blast swept in, that seemed to freeze my very heart,. and made me shiver from head to foot. At this moment there came, with a sinister blue glare, the most vivid flash of lightning I ever saw. It lit up the whole room, which was empty save for ourselves, and was instantly followed by a clap of thunder, that caused my knees to knock together, and that terrified me and filled me with horror. It evidently terrified the horse too; there was a violent plunge, a clattering of hoofs on the stones, a sudden loud crash of smashing timber, a woman’s long, loud, piercing shriek, which stopped the very beating of my heart, and then a frenzied struggle in the cruel, crumbling, treacherous shale, the rattle of loose stones, and the hollow roar of something sliding down the precipice.

I rushed to the door and tore it open, with that awful despairing cry still ringing in my ears. The verandah was empty; there was not a soul to be seen, or a sound to be heard, save the rain on the roof.

“Aggie,” I screamed, “come here! Someone has gone over the verandah, and down the khud! You heard him.”

“Yes,” she said, following me out; “but come in – come in.”

“I believe it was Charlie Chalmers” – shaking her violently as I spoke. “He has been killed – killed – killed! And you stand, and do nothing. Send people! Let us go ourselves! Bearer! Ayah! Khitmatgar!” I cried, raising my voice.

“Hush! It was not Charlie Chalmers,” she said, vainly endeavouring to draw me into the drawing-room. “Come in – come in.”

“No, no!” pushing her away, and wringing my hands. “How cruel you are! How inhuman! There is a path. Let us go at once – at once!”

“You need not trouble yourself, Susan,” she interrupted; “and you need not cry and tremble; – they will bring him up. What you heard was supernatural; it was not real.”

“No – no – no! It was all real. Oh! that scream is in my ears still.”

“I will convince you,” said Aggie, taking my hand as she spoke. “Feel all along the verandah. Are the railings broken?”

I did as she bade me. No, though very wet and clammy, the railing was intact 1

“Where is the broken place?” she asked, imperatively.

Where, indeed?

“Now,” she continued, “since you will not come in, look over, and you will see something more presently.”

Shivering with fear, and the cold, drifting rain, I gazed down as she bade me, and there, far below, I saw lights moving rapidly to and fro, evidently in search of something. After a little delay they congregated in one place. There was a low, buzzing murmur – they had found him – and presently they commenced to ascend the hill, with the “hum-hum” of coolies carrying a burden. Nearer and nearer the lights and sounds came; up to the very brink of the khud, past the end of the verandah. Many steps and many torches – faint blue torches held by invisible hands – invisible but heavy-footed bearers carried their burden slowly upstairs, and along the passage, and deposited it with a dump in Aggie’s bedroom I As we stood clasped in one another’s arms, and shaking all over, the steps descended, the ghostly lights passed up the avenue, and gradually disappeared in the gathering darkness. The repetition of the tragedy was over for that day.

“Have you heard it before?” I asked with chattering teeth, as I bolted the drawing-room window.

“Yes, the evening of the picnic, and twice since. That is the reason I have always tried to stay out till late, and to keep you out. I was hoping and praying you might never hear it. It always happens just before dark: I am afraid you have thought me very queer of late. I have told no end of stories to keep you and the children from harm. I have—”

“I think you have been very kind,” I interrupted. “Oh, Aggie, shall you ever get that crash, and that awful cry out of your head?”

“Never!” hastily lighting the candles as she spoke.

“Is there anything more?” I inquired tremulously.

“Yes; sometimes at night, the most terrible weeping and sobbing in my bedroom;” and she shuddered at the mere recollection.

“Do the servants know?” I asked anxiously.

“The ayah Muma has heard it, and the khansamah says his mother is sick, and he must go, and the bearer wants to attend his brother’s wedding. They will all leave.”

“I suppose most people know too?” I suggested dejectedly.

“Yes; don’t you remember Mrs. Starkey’s warnings, and her saying that without the verandah the house was worth double rent? We understand that dark speech of hers now, and we have not come to Cooper’s Hotel yet.”

“No, not yet. I wish we had. I wonder what Tom will say? He will be here in another fortnight. Oh, I wish he was here now!”

In spite of our heart-shaking experience, we managed to eat, and drink, and sleep, yea, to play tennis – somewhat solemnly, it is true – and go to the club, where we remained to the very last moment; needless to mention, that I now entered into Aggie’s manoeuvre con amore. Mrs. Starkey evidently divined the reason of our loitering in Kantia, and said in her most truculent manner, as she squared up to us—

“You keep your children out very late, Mrs. Shandon.”

“Yes, but we like to have them with us,” rejoined Aggie, in a meek apologetic voice.

“Then why don’t you go home earlier?”

“Because it is so stupid, and lonely,” was the mendacious answer.

“Lonely is not the word I should use. I wonder if you are as wise as your neighbours now? Come now, Mrs. Shandon.”

“About what?” said Aggie, with ill-feigned innocence.

“About Briarwood. Haven’t you heard it yet? The ghastly precipice and horse affair?”

“Yes, I suppose we may as well confess that we have.”

“Humph! you are a brave couple to stay on. The Tombs tried it last year for three weeks. The Paxtons took it the year before, and then sub-let it; not that they believed in ghosts – oh, dear no!” and she laughed ironically.

“And what is the story?” I inquired eagerly.

“Well, the story is this. An old retired officer and his wife, and their pretty niece, lived at Briarwood a good many years ago. The girl was engaged to be married to a fine young fellow in the Guides. The day before the wedding, what you know of happened, and has happened every monsoon ever since. The poor girl went out of her mind, and destroyed herself, and the old colonel and his wife did not long survive her. The house is uninhabitable in the monsoon, and there seems nothing for it but to auction off the furniture, and pull it down; it will always be the same as long as it stands. Take my advice, and come into Cooper’s Hotel. I believe you can have that small set of rooms at the back. The sitting-room smokes – but beggars can’t be choosers.”

“That will only be our very last resource,” said Aggie, hotly.

“It’s not very grand, I grant you; but any port in a storm.”

Tom arrived, was doubly welcome, and was charmed with Briarwood, chaffed us unmercifully, and derided our fears until he himself had a similar experience, and heard the phantom horse plunging in the verandah, and that wild, unearthly and utterly appalling shriek. No, he could not laugh that away; and seeing that we had now a mortal abhorrence of the place, that the children had to be kept abroad in the damp till long after dark, that Aggie was a mere hollow-eyed spectre, and that we had scarcely a servant left, that – in short, one day, we packed up precipitately and fled in a body to Cooper’s Hotel. But we did not basely endeavour to sub-let, nor advertise Briarwood as “a delightfully situated pucka-built house, containing all the requirements of a gentleman’s family.” No, no. Tom bore the loss of the rent, and – a more difficult feat – Aggie bore Mrs. Starkey’s insufferable “I told you so.”

Aggie was at Kantia again last season. She walked out early one morning to see our former abode. The chowkidar and parrot are still in possession, and are likely to remain the solo tenants on the premises. The parrot suns and dusts his ancient feathers in the empty verandah, which re-echoes with his cry of “Lucy, where are you – pretty Lucy?” The chowkidar inhabits a secluded go-down at the back, where he passes most of the day in sleeping, or smoking the soothing “huka.” The place has a forlorn, uncared-for appearance now; the flowers are nearly all gone; the paint has peeled off the doors and windows; the avenue is grass-grown. Briarwood appears to have resigned itself to emptiness, neglect, and decay, although outside the gate there still hangs a battered board, on which, if you look very closely, you can decipher the words “To Let.”

THE KHITMATGAR

“Whence and what art thou, execrable shape?”

—Milton.

Perhaps you have seen them more than once on railway platforms in the North-West Provinces. A shabby, squalid, weary-looking group, sitting on their battered baggage, or scrambling in and out of intermediate compartments; I mean Jackson, the photographer, and his belongings. Jackson is not his real name, but it answers the purpose. There are people who will tell you that Jackson is a man of good family, that he once held a commission in a crack cavalry regiment, and that his brother is Lord-Lieutenant of his county, and his nieces are seen at Court balls. Then how comes their kinsman to have fallen to such low estate – if kinsman he be – this seedy-looking, unshorn reprobate, with a collarless flannel shirt, greasy deerstalker, and broken tennis shoes? If you look into his face, who runs may read the answer – Jackson drinks; or his swollen features, inflamed nose, and watery and uncertain eye greatly belie him.

Jackson was a mauvais sujet from his youth upwards, if the truth must be confessed. At school he was always in trouble and in debt. At Oxford his scrapes were so prominent that he had more than one narrow escape of being sent down. Who would believe, to look at him now, that he had once been a very pretty boy, the youngest and best-looking of a handsome family, and naturally his mother’s darling? Poor woman! whilst she lived she shielded him from duns and dons, and from his father’s wrath; she pawned her diamonds and handed over her pin-money to pay his bills; she gave him advice – and he gave her kisses. By the time he had joined his regiment, this reckless youth had lost his best friend, but his bad luck – as he termed it – still clung to him and overwhelmed him. His father had a serious interview with his colonel, paid up like a liberal parent, and agreed to his son’s exchange into a corps in India. “India may steady him,” thought this sanguine old gentleman; but, alas! it had anything but the desired effect. In India the prodigal became more imprudent than ever. Cards, racing, simpkin, soon swallowed up his moderate allowance, and he fell headlong into the hands of the soucars – a truly fatal fall! Twenty per cent, per month makes horrible ravages in the income of a subaltern, and soon he was hopelessly entangled in debt, and had acquired the disagreeable reputation of being “a man who never paid for anything, and always let others in, when it was a question of rupees.” Then his name was whispered in connection with some very shady racing transaction, and finally he was obliged to leave the service, bankrupt alike in honour and credit. His father was dead, his brothers unanimously disowned him, and for twenty years he fell from one grade to another, as he roamed over India from Peshawar to Madras, and Rangoon to Bombay. He had been in turn planter, then planter’s clerk, house agent, tonga agent; he had tried touting for a tailoring firm and manufacturing hill jams; and here he was at fifty years of age, with a half-caste wife, a couple of dusky children, and scarcely an anna in his pocket. Undoubtedly he had put the coping-stone on his misfortunes when he took for his bride the pretty, slatternly daughter of a piano-tuner, a girl without education, without energy, and without a penny.

Ten years ago Fernanda Braganza had been a charming creature (with the fleeting beauty of her kind), a sylph in form, with superb dark eyes, fairy-like feet, and a pronounced taste for pink ribbons, patchouli, and pearl-powder. This vision of beauty, who had gushed to Jackson with her soul in her exquisite eyes, and who was not insensible to the honour of marrying a gentleman, was she the selfsame individual as this great fat woman, in carpet slippers, and a bulging’ tweed ulster, who stood with a sallow, hungry-looking child in either hand? Alas! she was.

The Jacksons had come to try their fortunes at Panipore – a small up-country station, where there were two European regiments and half a battery of Artillery – for is not Tommy Atkins ever a generous patron to an inexpensive photographer? The finances of the family were at a very low ebb that February afternoon, as they stood on the platform collecting their belongings, a camera and chemicals, a roll of frowsy bedding, a few cooking things, a couple of boxes, also a couple of grimy servants – in India the poorest have a following, and third-class tickets are cheap. Jackson had a “three-finger” peg at the bar, although there was but little in his pocket, besides a few cards and paper posters, and thus invigorated proceeded to take steps respecting the removal of his family.

Poverty forbade their transit in a couple of ticca gharries, and pride shrank from an ekka; therefore Jackson left his wife in the waiting-room whilst he tramped away in the blinding sun and powdery white dust to see if there was accommodation at the Dak Bungalow. It proved to be crammed, and he had not yet come down to the Serai, or native halting-place. He was (when sober) a man of some resource. He made his way up to the barracks and asked questions, and heard that the station was in the same condition as the Dak Bungalow, quite full. Even Fever Hall and Cholera Villa were occupied, and the only shelter he could put his head into was the big two-storied bungalow in the Paiwene road. It had been empty for years; it was to be had at a nominal rent – say two rupees a week – and there was no fear of anyone disturbing him there! It was large and close to the barracks, but greatly out of repair. With this useful intelligence, Mr. Jackson rejoined his impatient circle, and, with their goods in a handcart, they started off for this house of refuge without delay.

Past the native bazaar, past the officers’ mess, past the church, then along a straight wide road,, where the crisp dead leaves crackled underfoot, a road lined with dusty half-bare trees, whose branches stood out in strong relief against a hard blue sky, whilst a vast tract of grain country, covered with green barley and ripe sugar-cane, stretched away on the right. On the left were a pair of great gaunt gate piers, leading by a grass-grown approach, to the two-storied bungalow – an imposing-looking house, that was situated well back from the highway amid a wilderness of trees, and rank and rotting vegetation. Distance in this case certainly had lent enchantment to the view! When the little party arrived under the wide, dilapidated portico, they found all the doors closed, the lower windows stuffed with boards, matting, and even paper in default of glass; weeds and creepers abounded, and there was a dangerous fissure in the front wall.

After knocking and calling for about ten minutes, an ancient chowkidar appeared, looking half asleep. At first he thought it was merely a party from the station, wishing, as was their eccentric custom, “to go over” the haunted house, the Bhootia Bungalow; but he soon learnt his mistake from the voluble, shrill-tongued mem-sahib.

This family of shabby Europeans, who had arrived on foot, with all their belongings in a “tailer” from the station, had actually come to stay, to sleep, to livelive on the premises! Grumbling to himself, he conducted them up an exceedingly rickety, not to say dangerous, staircase – for the lower rooms were dark and damp – to three or four large and cheerful apartments, opening on a fine verandah. Mrs. Jackson was accustomed to pitching her tent in queer places, and in a very short time she had procured from the bazaar a table, a few chairs, and a couple of charpoys, and furnished two rooms – she had but little to unpack – whilst Kadir Bux, the family slave, vibrated between cooking and chemicals. Meanwhile Mr. Jackson, having washed, shaved, and invested himself in his one linen collar and black alpaca coat, set forth on a tour of inspection, to stick up posters and distribute cards. His wife also made her rounds; the upper rooms were habitable, and the verandah commanded a fine view; it overlooked the park-like but neglected compound, intersected with short cut paths, and which, despite its two grand entrance gates, was now without hedge or paling, and quite open to the road, a road down which not a few ladies and gentlemen in bamboo carts or on ponies were trotting past for their evening airing. Below the suite Mr. Jackson had chosen, were the dismal vault-like rooms, the chowkidar with his charpoy and huka, and beyond, at the back of the bungalow, the servants’ quarters and stables, both roofless. Behind these ruins, stretched an immense overgrown garden (with ancient, dried-up fruit trees, faint traces of walks and water-channels, and a broken fountain and sundial) now abandoned to cattle. On the whole, Mrs. Jackson was pleased with her survey. She had never as yet inhabited such a lordly-looking mansion, and felt more contented than she had done for a long time, especially as Jackson was on his best behaviour – he had no friends in the place, and scarcely any funds.

In a short time Mr. Jackson had acquired both. His good address, his gentlemanly voice, and the whisper of his having once been an officer who had come to grief – who had been unfortunate – went far in a military station. With extraordinary discretion he kept his belongings entirely out of sight; he also kept sober, and consequently received a number of orders for photographs of groups, of bungalows, and of polo ponies. He had the eye of an artist and really knew his business, and although some were startled at the strength of the pegs which he accepted, he had a large and lucrative connection in less than no time, and rupees came flowing in fast. As he and the invaluable Kadir worked together, he talked glibly to portly field-officers and smooth-faced subalterns, of men whom he had known, men whose names at least were familiar to them – distinguished veterans, smart soldiers, and even celebrated personages. He attended church, and sang lustily out of a little old Prayer-book, and looked such a picture of devout, decayed gentility, that the tender-hearted ladies pitied him and thought him quite romantic, and hastened to order photographs of all their children, or, children being lacking, dogs. Little did they know that Mr. Jackson’s shabby Prayerbook would have been sold for drink years previously, only that he found it an absolutely unmarketable article!

Meanwhile Mrs. Jackson was convinced that she was positively about to be “a lady at last.” She purchased frocks for her sallow girls, a dress and boots for herself; she set up a rocking-chair and a cook, and occasionally drove to the bazaar in a “ticca” gharry, where she looked down with splendid dignity on the busy bargaining wives of Tommy Atkins. The chaplain’s lady had called upon her, also the barrack-sergeant’s wife, who lived in a small bungalow or quarters beyond the garden. She had haughtily snubbed this good woman at first, but subsequently had thawed toward her, for several reasons. Jackson, having been uproariously drunk, and unpleasantly familiar to an officer, had now fallen back on the sergeants’ mess for his society, and on private soldiers for his patrons. He was still doing a roaring trade, especially in cartes-de-visite at six rupees a dozen. He bragged and talked, and even wept, to his listeners in the barrack-rooms, and in the canteen: listeners who thought him an uncommonly fine fellow, liberal as a lord, flinging his coin right and left. They little guessed the usual sequel, or of how the Jackson family were wont to steal out of a station by rail in the grey dawn of an Indian morning, leaving many poor natives, who had supplied their wants in the shape of bread and meat, coffee, and even clothes, to bewail their too abrupt departure.

Jackson was “on the drink,” as his wife frankly expressed it, never home before twelve o’clock at night, and then had to be helped upstairs, and Mrs. Jackson found these evenings extremely wearisome. She rarely read, but she did a little crochet and not a little scolding; she slept a good deal; and, as long as her coffee and her curry were well and punctually served, she was fairly content, for she was naturally lethargic and indolent. But still she liked to talk, and here she had no one with whom to exchange a word. She pined for the sound of another female tongue, and accordingly one afternoon she arrayed herself in her new hat with scarlet cock’s feathers, also her yellow silk gloves, and with the cook as a body-servant and to carry her umbrella, she sallied forth to return the visit of the barrack-sergeant’s wife. She had not far to go – only through the garden and across the road.

The barrack-sergeant’s wife was knitting outside in her verandah, for the weather was “warming up,” when Mrs. Jackson, all-gorgeous in her best garments, loomed upon her vision. Now, Mrs. Clark “had no notion of the wives of drunken photographers giving themselves hairs! And don’t go for to tell her as ever that Jackson was a gentleman! A fellow that went reeling home from the canteen every night!” But she dissembled her feelings and stood up rather stiffly, and invited her visitor into her drawing-room, a small apartment, the walls coloured grey, furnished with cheap straw chairs, covered in gaudy cretonne, further embellished by billowy white curtains, tottering little tables, and a quantity of photographs in cotton velvet frames – a room of some pretensions, and Mrs. Clark’s pride. Its unexpected grandeur was a blow to Mrs. Jackson, as was also the appearance of two cups of tea on a tray, accompanied by a plate of four water-biscuits. It seemed to her that Mrs. Clark also set up for being quite the lady, although her husband was not a gentleman. The two matrons talked volubly, as they sipped their tea, of bazaar prices, cheating hawkers, and the enormities of their servants. “My cook,” was continually in Mrs. Jackson’s mouth. They played a fine game of brag, in which Mrs. Jackson, despite her husband who had been an officer, of her cook, and of her large house, came off second best!

“I can’t think,” she said, looking round contemptuously, “how you can bear to live in these stuffy quarters. I am sure I couldn’t; it would kill me in a week. You should see the splendid rooms we have; they do say it was once a palace, and built by a nabob.”

“May be so,” coolly rejoined her hostess. “I know it was a mess-house, and after that an officers’ chummery, fifteen or twenty years ago; but no one would live there now, unless they had no other roof to cover them, and came to a place like a parcel of beggars!”

“Why, what’s up with it?” inquired Mrs. Jackson, suddenly becoming of a dusky puce, even through her pearl-powder.

“Don’t you know – and you there this two months and more?”

“Indeed I don’t; what is there to know?”

“And haven’t you seen him?” demanded Mrs. Clarke, in a key of intense surprise – “I mean the Khitmatgar?”

“I declare I don’t know what yon are talking about,” cried the other, peevishly, “What Khitmatgar?”

“What Khitmatgar? Hark at her! Why, a short, square-shouldered man, in a smart blue coat, with a regimental badge in his turban. He has very sticking-out, curling black whiskers, and a pair of wicked eyes that look as if they could stab you, though he salaams to the ground whenever you meet him.”

“I believe I have seen him, now you mention it,” rejoined Mrs. Jackson; “rather a tidy-looking servant, with, as you say, a bad expression. But bless you! we have such crowds of officers’ messengers coming with chits to my husband, I never know who they are! I’ve seen him now and then, of an evening, I’m sure, though I don’t know what brought him, or whose servant he is.”

“Servant!” echoed the other. “Why, he is a ghost – the ghost what haunts the bungalow!”

“Ah, now, Mrs. Clark,” said her visitor, patronizingly, “you don’t tell me you believe such rubbish?”

“Rubbish!” indignantly, “is it? Oh, just you wait and see. Ask old Mr. Soames, the pensioner, as has been here this thirty year – ask anyone – and they will all tell you the same story.”

“Story, indeed!” cried Mrs. Jackson, with a loud, rude laugh.

“Well, it’s a true story, ma’am – but you need not hear it unless you like it.”

“Oh, but I should like to hear it very much,” her naturally robust curiosity coming to the front. “Please do tell it to me.”

“Well, twenty years ago, more or less, some young officers lived in that bungalow, and one of them in a passion killed his Khitmatgar. They say he never meant to do it, but the fellow was awfully cheeky, and he threw a bottle at his head and stretched him dead. It was all hushed up, but that young officer came to a bad end, and the house began to get a bad name – people died there so often; two officers of delirium tremens; one cut his throat, another fell over the verandah and broke his neck – and so it stands empty! No one stays a week.”

“And why?” demanded the other, boldly. “Lots of people die in houses; they must die somewhere.”

“But not as they do there!” shrilly interrupted Mrs. Clark. “The Khitmatgar comes round at dusk, or at night, just like an ordinary servant, with pegs or lemonade and so on. Whoever takes anything from his hand – seems to get a sort of madness on them, and goes and destroys themselves.”

“It’s a fine tale, and you tell it very well,” said Mrs. Jackson, rising and nodding her red cock’s feathers, and her placid, dark, fat face. “There does be such in every station; people must talk, but they won’t frighten me.”

And having issued this manifesto, she gave her hostess a limp shake of the hand and waddled off.

“She’s jealous of the grand big house, and fine compound, fit for gentry,” said Mrs. Jackson to herself, “and she thinks to get me out of it. Not that she could get in 1 for she has to live in quarters; and she is just a dog in the manger, and, anyways, it’s a made-up story from first to last!”

As she reached her abode, and called “Qui hai! buttie lao!” a figure came out from the passage, salaamed respectfully, and, by the light of a two-anna lamp on the staircase, she descried the strange Khitmatgar, whose appearance was perfectly familiar to her – a short, square, surly-looking person. No doubt he was one of Kadir’s many friends; the lower rooms were generally overrun with his visitors.

“Send Kadir!” she said imperiously, and went upstairs, and as she spoke the man salaamed again and vanished.

The wife of his bosom had a fine tale to tell Mr. Jackson the next morning, as, with a very shaky hand, he was touching up some plates in his own room.

“A Khitmatgar that offers free pegs!” he exclaimed, with a shout of laughter. “Too good to be true. Why, I’d take a whisky and soda from the devil himself – and glad to get it. My mouth is like a lime-kiln at this moment – Qui hai! whisky-pani do!”

Many days, warm and sweltering days, rolled on; the hot winds blew the crackling leaves before them, blew great clouds of red dust along the roads, blew ladies up to the hills, and dispersed many of Jackson’s patrons. But he did not care; he had made a good many rupees; he had more than one boon-companion, and he drank harder than ever. “Why not?” he demanded; “he had earned the money, and had the best right to spend it.” He was earning none now. When customers came, Kadir always informed them the sahib was sota (asleep). Yes, sleeping off the effects of the preceding night. Mrs. Jackson was accustomed to this state of affairs, and what she called his “attacks.” She rocked herself, fanned herself and dozed, and did a little crochet, whilst the two children played quietly in a back room, with old photographs and bits of cardboard. When her husband did awake, and enjoy a few hours’ lucid interval, it was only to recall bills and duns, and flashes of his old life: the cool green park at home, the hunting-field, reviews at Aldershot, his pretty cousin Ethel. Then the chill reality forced itself upon his half-crazy brain. The park was this great, barren, scorched compound, with the hot winds roaring across it; the figure in the verandah was not Ethel in her riding-habit, but Fernanda in carpet slippers and a greasy old dressing-gown. Was this life worth living?

Mrs. Jackson had seen the Khitmatgar several times; once she noticed him looking down at her as she ascended the stairs, once he had appeared in answer to her call, carrying a tray and glasses, but she had boldly waved him away, and said, “Send Kadir; why does he allow strangers to do his work?” There was something far too human about the appearance of the man for her to give a moment’s credence to the ghost-story.

One still hot night, a night as bright as day, Mrs. Jackson found the air so oppressive that she could not sleep. She lay tossing from side to side on her charpoy, looking out on the moon-flooded verandah, and listening to the indefatigable brain-fever bird, when suddenly she heard her husband’s familiar call, “Qui hai, peg lao!” He had been drinking as usual, and had fallen into a sodden sleep in his own room.

After an unusually short interval, steps came up the stairs, shoes were audibly slipped off, and there were sounds of the jingling of a glass and bottle.

The door of Mrs. Jackson’s apartment opened into the verandah and stood wide, on account of the intense breathless heat of that Indian night. In a few moments someone came and paused on the threshold, tray in hand, someone who surveyed her with a grin of Satanic satisfaction. It was the strange Khitmatgar! There was a triumphant expression in his eyes that made her blood run cold, and whilst she gazed, transfixed with horror, he salaamed and was gone. In a second she had jumped out of bed; she ran into the verandah. Yes, the long verandah was empty – he had disappeared. She called excitedly to her husband; no answer. She rushed into his room, to unfold her experience. Jackson was sitting at the table, or rather half lying across it, his hands clenched, his features convulsed, his eyes fixed – quite dead.

He had swallowed one of his chemicals, a fatal poison. Of course, there was the usual ephemeral excitement occasioned by a tragedy in the station, the usual inquest and verdict of temporary insanity, and then a new nameless grave in the corner of the cantonment cemetery.

•   •   •   •   •

Jackson’s fate was generally attributed to whisky – or filthy country liquor. “Poor fellow! his position preyed on his mind, and he drank himself to death.”

This was the universal opinion in mess-room, barrack-room, and bazaar. But there were one or two people, including his wife and Mrs. Clark, who thought otherwise, and who gravely shook their heads and whispered – “The Khitmatgar.”

THE DAK BUNGALOW
AT DAKOR

“When shall these phantoms flicker away.

Like the smoke of the guns on the wind-swept hill;

Like the Bounds and colours of yesterday,

And the soul have rest, and the air be still?”

—Sir A. Lyall.

“And so you two young women are going off on a three days’ journey, all by yourselves, in a bullock tonga, to spend Christmas with your husbands in the jungle?”

The speaker was Mrs. Duff, the wife of our deputy commissioner, and the two enterprising young women were Mrs. Goodchild, the wife of the police officer of the district, and myself, wife of the forest officer. We were the only ladies in Karwassa, a little up-country station, more than a hundred miles from the line of rail. Karwassa was a pretty place, an oasis of civilization, amid leagues and leagues of surrounding forest and jungle; it boasted a post-office, public gardens (with tennis courts), a tiny church, a few well-kept shady roads, and half a dozen thatched bungalows, surrounded by luxuriant gardens. In the hot weather all the community were at home, under the shelter of their own roof-trees and punkahs, and within reach of ice – for we actually boasted an ice machine! During these hot months we had, so to speak, our “season.” The deputy commissioner, forest officer, police officer, doctor, and engineer were all “in,” and our gaieties took the form of tennis at daybreak, moonlight picnics, whist-parties, little dinners, and now and then a beat for tiger, on which occasions we ladies were safely roosted in trustworthy trees. It is whispered that in small and isolated stations the fair sex are either mortal enemies or bosom-friends! I am proud to be in a position to state that we ladies of Karwassa came under the latter head. Mrs. Goodchild and I were especially intimate; we were nearly the same age, we were young, we had been married in the same year and tasted our first experiences of India together. We lent each other books, we read each other our home letters, helped to compose one another’s dirzee-made costumes, and poured little confidences into one another’s ears. We had made numerous joint excursions in the cold season, had been out in the same camp for a month at a time, and when our husbands were in a malarious or uncivilized district, had journeyed on horseback or in a bullock tonga and joined them at some accessible spot, in the regions of dak bungalows and bazaar fowl.

Mrs. Duff, stout, elderly, and averse to locomotion, contented herself with her comfortable bungalow at Karwassa, her weekly budget of letters from her numerous olive-branches in England, and with adventures and thrilling experiences at second-hand.

“And so you are off tomorrow,” she continued, addressing herself to Mrs. Goodchild. “I suppose you know where you are going?”

“Yes,” returned my companion promptly, unfolding a piece of foolscap as she spoke; “I had a letter from Frank this morning, and he has enclosed a plan copied from the D.P.W. map. We go straight along the trunk road for two days, stopping at Korai bungalow the first night and Kular the second, you see; then we turn off to the left on the Old Jubbulpore Road and make a march of twenty-five miles, halting at a place called Chanda. Frank and Mr. Loyd will meet us there on Christmas Day.”

“Chanda – Chanda,” repeated Mrs. Duff, with her hand to her head. “Isn’t there some queer story about a bungalow near there – that is unhealthy – or haunted – or something?”

Julia Goodchild and I glanced at one another significantly. Mrs. Duff had set her face against our expedition all along; she wanted us to remain in the station and spend Christmas with her, instead of going this wild-goose chase into a part of the district we had never been in before. She assured us that we would be short of bullocks, and would probably have to walk miles; she had harangued us on the subject of fever and cholera and bad water, had warned us solemnly against dacoits, and now she was hinting at ghosts.

“Frank says that the travellers’ bungalows after we leave the main road are not in very good repair – the road is so little used now that the new railway line comes within twenty miles; but he says that the one at Chanda is very decent, and we will push on there,” returned Julia, firmly. Julia was nothing if not firm; she particularly prided herself on never swerving from any fixed resolution or plan. “We take my bullock tonga, and Mr. Loyd’s peon Abdul, who is a treasure, as you know; he can cook, interpret, forage for provisions, and drive bullocks if the worst comes to the worst.”

“And what about bullocks for three days’ journey – a hundred miles if it’s a yard?” inquired Mrs. Duff, sarcastically.

“Oh, the bazaar master has sent on a chuprassie and five natives, and we shall find a pair every five miles at the usual stages. As to food, we are taking tea, bread, plenty of tinned stores, and the plum-pudding. We shall have a capital outing, I assure you, and I only wish we could have persuaded you into coming with us.”

“Thank you, my dear,” said Mrs. Duff, with a patronizing smile. “I’m too old, and I hope too sensible to take a trip of a hundred miles in a bullock tonga, risking fever and dacoits and dak bungalows full of bandicoots, just for the sentimental pleasure of eating a pudding with my husband. However, you are both young and hardy and full of spirits, and I wish you a happy Christmas, a speedy journey and safe return. Mind you take plenty of quinine – and a revolver;” and, with this cheerful parting suggestion, she conducted us into the front verandah and dismissed us each with a kiss, that was at once a remonstrance and a valediction.

Behold us the next morning, at sunrise, jogging off, behind a pair of big white bullocks, in the highest spirits. In the front seat of the tonga we had stowed a well-filled tiffin basket, two Gladstone bags, our blankets and pillows, a hamper of provisions, and last, not least, Abdul. Julia and I and Julia’s dog “Boss” occupied the back seat, and as we rumbled past Mrs. Duffs bungalow, with its still silent compound and closed Venetians, we mutually agreed that she was “a silly old thing,” that she would have far more enjoyment of life if she was as enterprising as we were. Our first day’s journey went off without a hitch. Fresh and well-behaved cattle punctually awaited us at every stage. The country we passed through was picturesque and well wooded; doves, peacocks, and squirrels enlivened the roads; big black-faced monkeys peered at us from amid the crops that they were ravaging within a stone’s throw of our route. The haunt of a well-known man-eating tiger was impressively pointed out to us by our cicerone Abdul – this beast resided in some dense jungle, that was unpleasantly close to human traffic. Morning and afternoon wore away speedily, and at sundown we found ourselves in front of the very neat travellers’ bungalow at Korai. The interior was scrupulously clean, and contained the usual furniture: two beds, two tables, four chairs, lamps, baths, a motley collection of teacups and plates, and last, not least, the framed rules of the establishment and visitors’ book. The khansamah cooked us an excellent dinner (for a travellers’ bungalow), and, tired out, we soon went to bed and slept the sleep of the just. The second day was the same as the first – highly successful in every respect.

On the third morning we left the great highway and turned to the left, on to what was called the Old Jubbulpore Road, and here our troubles commenced! Bullocks were bad, lame, small, or unbroken; one of Mrs. Duff’s dismal prophecies came to pass, for after enduring bullocks who lay down, who kicked and ran off the road into their owners’ houses, or rushed violently down steep places, we arrived at one stage where there were no bullocks at all! It was four o’clock, and we were still sixteen miles from Chanda. After a short consultation, Julia and I agreed to walk on to the next stage or village, leaving Abdul to draw the neighbourhood for a pair of cattle and then to overtake us at express speed.

“No one coming much this road now, mem sahib,” he explained apologetically; “village people never keeping tonga bullocks – only plough bullocks, and plenty bobbery.”

“Bobbery or not, get them,” said Julia with much decision; “no matter if you pay four times the usual fare. We shall expect you to overtake us in half an hour.” And having issued this edict we walked on, leaving Abdul, a bullock-man, and two villagers all talking together and yelling at one another at the top of their voices.

Our road was dry and sandy, and lay through a perfectly flat country. It was lined here and there by rows of graceful trees, covered with wreaths of yellow flowers; now and then it was bordered by a rude thorn hedge, inside of which waved a golden field of ripe jawarri; in distant dips in the landscape we beheld noble topes of forest trees and a few red-roofed dwellings – the abodes of the tillers of the soil; but, on the whole, the country was silent and lonely; the few people we encountered driving their primitive little carts stared hard at us in utter stupefaction, as well they might – two mem sahibs trudging along, with no escort except a panting white dog. The insolent crows and lazy blue buffaloes all gazed at us in undisguised amazement as we wended our way through this monotonous and melancholy scene. One milestone was passed and then another, and yet another, and still no sign of Abdul, much less the tonga. At length we came in sight of a large village that stretched in a ragged way at either side of the road. There were the usual little mud hovels, shops displaying, say, two bunches of plantains and a few handfuls of grain, the usual collection of gaunt red pariah dogs, naked children, and unearthly-looking cats and poultry.

Julia and I halted afar off under a tree, preferring to wait for Abdul to chaperon us, ere we ran the gauntlet of the village streets. Time was getting on, the sun was setting; men were returning from the fields, driving bony bullocks before them; women were returning from the well, with water and the last bit of scandal; at last, to our great relief, we beheld Abdul approaching with the tonga, and our spirits rose, for we had begun to ask one another if we were to spend the night sitting on a stone under a tamarind tree without the village.

“No bullocks,” was Abdul’s explanation. The same tired pair had come on most reluctantly, and in this village of cats and cocks and hens it was the same story – “no bullocks.” Abdul brought us this heavy and unexpected intelligence after a long and animated interview with the head man of the place.

“What is to be done?” we demanded in a breath.

“Stop here all night; going on tomorrow.”

“Stop where?” we almost screamed.

“Over there,” rejoined Abdul, pointing to a grove of trees at some little distance. “There is a travellers’ bungalow; Chanda is twelve miles off.”

A travellers’ bungalow! Sure enough there was a building of some kind beyond the bamboos, and we lost no time in getting into the tonga and having ourselves driven in that direction. As we passed the village street, many came out and stared, and one old woman shook her hand in a warning manner, and called out something in a shrill cracked voice.

An avenue of feathery bamboos led to our destination, which proved to be the usual travellers’ rest-house, with white walls, red roof, and roomy verandah; but when we came closer, we discovered that the drive was as grass-grown as a field; jungle grew up to the back of the house, heavy wooden shutters closed all the windows, and the door was locked. There was a forlorn, desolate, dismal appearance about the place; it looked as if it had not been visited for years. In answer to our shouts and calls no one appeared; but, as we were fully resolved to spend the night there, we had the tonga unloaded and our effects placed in the verandah, the bullocks untackled and turned out among the long rank grass. At length an old man in dirty ragged clothes, and with a villainous expression of countenance, appeared from some back cook-house, and seemed anything but pleased to see us. When Abdul told him of our intention of occupying the house, he would not hear of it.

“The bungalow was out of repair; it had not been opened for years; it was full of rats; it was unhealthy; plenty fever coming. We must go on to Chanda.”

Naturally we declined his hospitable suggestion.

“Was he the khansamah – caretaker of the place?” we inquired imperiously.

“Yees,” he admitted with a grunt.

“Drawing government pay, and refusing to open a government travellers’ bungalow!” screamed Julia. “Let us have no more of this nonsense; open the house at once and get it ready for us, or I shall report you to the commissioner sahib.”

The khansamah gave her an evil look, said “Missus please,” shrugged his shoulders and hobbled away – as we hoped, to get the key; but after waiting ten minutes we sent Abdul to search for him, and found that he had departed – his lair was empty. There was nothing for it but to break the padlock on the door, which Abdul effected with a stone, and as soon as the door moved slowly back on its hinges Julia and I hurried in. What a dark, damp place! What a smell of earth, and what numbers of bats; they flew right in our faces as we stood in the doorway and tried to make out the interior. Abdul and the bullock-man quickly removed the shutters and let in the light, and then we beheld the usual dak sitting-room – a table, chairs, and two charpoys (native beds), and an old pair of candlesticks; the table and chairs were covered with mould; cobwebs hung from the ceiling in dreadful festoons, and the walls were streaked with dreary green stains. I could not restrain an involuntary shudder as I looked about me rather blankly. “I should think this was an unhealthy place!” I remarked to Julia. “It looks feverish; and see – the jungle comes right up to the back verandah; fever plants, castor-oil plants, young bamboos, all growing up to the very walls.”

“It will do very well for tonight,” she returned. “Come out and walk down the road whilst Abdul and the bullock-man clean out the rooms and get dinner. Abdul is a wonderful man – and we won’t know the place in an hour’s time; it’s just the same as any other travellers’ bungalow, only it has been neglected for years. I shall certainly report that old wretch! The idea of a dak bungalow caretaker refusing admittance and running away with the key! What is the name of this place?” she asked, deliberately taking out her pocket-book; “did you hear?”

“Yes; I believe it is called Dakor.”

“Ah, well! I shall not forget to tell Frank about the way we were treated at Dakor bungalow.”

The red, red sun had set at last – gone down, as it were, abruptly behind the fiat horizon; the air began to feel chilly, and the owl and the jackal were commencing to make themselves heard, so we sauntered back to the bungalow, and found it indeed transformed: swept and garnished, and clean. The table was neatly laid for dinner, and one of our own fine hurricane lamps blazed upon it; our beds had been made up with our rugs and blankets, one at either end of the room; hot water and towels were prepared in a bathroom, and we saw a roaring fire in the cook-house in the jungle. Dinner, consisting of a sudden-death fowl, curry, bread, and páté de foie gras, was, to our unjaded palates, an excellent meal. Our spirits rose to normal, the result of food and light, and we declared to one another that this old bungalow was a capital find, and that it was really both comfortable and cheerful, despite a slight arrïere pensée of earth in the atmosphere!

Before going to bed we explored the next room, a smaller one than that we occupied, and empty save for a rickety camp table, which held some dilapidated crockery and a press. Need you ask if we opened this press? The press smelt strongly of mushrooms, and contained a man’s topee, inch-deep with mould, a tiffin basket, and the bungalow visitors’ book. We carried this away with us to read at leisure, for the visitors’ book in dak bungalows occasionally contains some rather amusing observations. There was nothing funny in this musty old volume! Merely a statement of who came, and how long they stayed, and what they paid, with a few remarks, not by any means complimentary to the khansamah: “A dirty, lazy rascal,” said one; “A murderous-looking ruffian,” said another; “An insolent, drunken hound,” said a third – the last entry was dated seven years previously.

“Let us write our names,” said Julia, taking out her pencil; “‘Mrs. Goodchild and Mrs. Loyd, December 23rd. Bungalow deserted, and very dirty khansamah.’ What shall we say?” she asked, glancing at me interrogatively.

“Why, there he is!” I returned with a little jump; and there he was sure enough, gazing in through the window. It was the face of some malicious animal, more than the face of a man, that glowered out beneath his filthy red turban. His eyes glared and rolled as if they would leave their sockets; his teeth were fangs, like dogs’ teeth, and stood out almost perpendicularly from his hideous mouth. He surveyed us for a few seconds in savage silence, and then melted away into the surrounding darkness as suddenly as he appeared.

“He reminds me of the Cheshire cat in ‘Alice in Wonderland,’” said Julia with would-be facetiousness, but I noticed that she looked rather pale.

“Let us have the shutters up at once,” I replied, “and have them well barred and the doors bolted. That man looked as if he could cut our throats.”

In a very short time the house was made fast. Abdul and the bullock-man spread their mats in the front verandah, and Julia and I retired for the night. Before going to bed we had a controversy about the lamp. I wished to keep it burning all night (I am a coward at heart), but Julia would not hear of this – impossible for her to sleep with a light in the room – and in the end I was compelled to be content with a candle and matches on a chair beside me. I fell asleep very soon. I fancy I must have slept long and soundly, when I was awoke by a bright light shining in my eyes. So, after the ridiculous fuss she had made, Julia had lit the candle after all! This was my first thought, but when I was fully awake I found I was mistaken, or dreaming. No, I was not dreaming, for I pinched my arm and rubbed my eyes. There was a man in the room, apparently another traveller, who appeared to be totally unaware of our vicinity, and to have made himself completely at home. A gun-case, a tiffin basket, a bundle of pillows and rugs – the usual Indian traveller’s belongings – lay carelessly scattered about on the chairs and the floor. I leant up on my elbow and gazed at the intruder in profound amazement. He did not notice me, no more than if I had no existence; true, my charpoy was in a corner of the room and rather in the shade, so was Julia’s. Julia was sound asleep and (low be it spoken) snoring. The stranger was writing a letter at the table facing me. Both candles were drawn up close to him, and threw a searching light upon his features. He was young and good-looking, but very, very pale; possibly he had just recovered from some long illness. I could not see his eyes, they were bent upon the paper before him; his hands, I noticed, were well shaped, white, and very thin. He wore a signet-ring on the third finger of the left hand, and was dressed with a care and finish not often met with in the jungle. He wore some kind of light Norfolk jacket and a blue bird’s-eye tie. In front of him stood an open despatch-box, very shabby and scratched, and I could see that the upper tray contained a stout roundabout bag, presumably full of rupees, a thick roll of notes, and a gold watch. When I had deliberately taken in every item, the unutterable calmness of this stranger, thus establishing himself in our room, came home to me most forcibly, and clearing my throat I coughed – a clear decided cough of expostulation, to draw his attention to the enormity of the situation. It had no effect – he must be stone-deaf! He went on writing as indefatigably as ever. What he was writing was evidently a pleasant theme, possibly a love-letter, for he smiled as he scribbled. All at once I observed that the door was ajar. Two faces were peering in – a strange servant in a yellow turban, with cruel, greedy eyes, and the khansamah! Their gaze was riveted on the open despatch-box, the money, the roll of notes, and the Watch. Presently the traveller’s servant stole up behind his master noiselessly, and seemed to hold his breath; he drew a long knife from his sleeve. At this moment the stranger raised his eyes and looked at me. Oh, what a sad, strange look! a look of appeal. The next instant I saw the flash of the knife – it was buried in his back; he fell forward over his letter with a crash and a groan, and all was darkness. I tried to scream, but I could not. My tongue seemed paralysed. I covered my head up in the clothes, and oh, how my heart beat! thump, thump, thump – surely they must hear it, and discover me. Half suffocated, at length I ventured to peer out for a second. All was still, black darkness. There was nothing to be seen, but much to be heard – the dragging of a heavy body, a dead body, across the room; then, after an appreciable pause, the sounds of digging outside the bungalow. Finally, the splashing of water – someone washing the floor. When I awoke the next morning, or came to myself – for I believe I had fainted – daylight was demanding admittance at every crevice in the shutters; night, its dark hours and its horrors, was past. The torture, the agony of fear, that had held me captive, had now released me, and, worn out, I fell fast asleep. It was actually nine o’clock when I opened my eyes. Julia was standing over me and shaking me vigorously, and saying, “Nellie, Nellie, wake; I’ve been up and out this two hours; I’ve seen the head man of the village.”

“Have you?” I assented sleepily.

“Yes, and he says there are no bullocks to be had until tomorrow; we must pass another night here.”

“Never!” I almost shrieked. “Never! Oh, Julia, I’ve had such a night. I’ve seen a murder!” And straightway I commenced, and told her of my awful experiences. “That khansamah murdered him. He is buried just outside the front step,” I concluded tearfully. “Sooner than stay here another night I’ll walk to Chanda.”

“Ghosts! murders! walk to Chanda!” she echoed scornfully. “Why, you silly girl, did I not sleep here in this very room, and sleep as sound as a top? It was all the páté de foie gras. You know it never agrees with you.”

“I know nothing about páté de foie gras,” I answered angrily; “but I know what I saw. Sooner than sleep another night in this room I’d die. I might as well – for such another night would kill me!”

Bath, breakfast, and Julia brought me round to a certain extent. I thought better of tearing off to Chanda alone and on foot, especially as we heard (per coolie) that our respective husbands would be with us the next morning – Christmas Day. We spent the day cooking, exploring the country, and writing for the English mail. As night fell, I became more and more nervous, and less amenable to Julia and Julia’s jokes. I would sleep in the verandah; either there, or in the compound. In the bungalow again – never. An old witch of a native woman, who was helping Abdul to cook, agreed to place her mat in the same locality as my mattress, and Julia Goodchild valiantly occupied the big room within, alone. In the middle of the night I and my protector were awoke by the most piercing, frightful shrieks. We lit a candle and ran into the bungalow, and found Julia lying on the floor in a dead faint. She did not come round for more than an hour, and when she opened her eyes she gazed about her with a shudder and displayed symptoms of going off again, so I instantly hunted up our flask and administered some raw brandy, and presently she found her tongue and attacked the old native woman quite viciously.

“Tell the truth about this place!” she said fiercely. “What is it that is here, in this room?”

“Devils,” was the prompt and laconic reply.

“Nonsense! Murder has been done here; tell the truth.”

“How I knowing?” she whined. “I only poor native woman.”

“An English sahib was murdered here seven years ago; stabbed and dragged out, and buried under the steps.”

“Ah, bah! ah, bah! How I telling? this not my country,” she wailed most piteously.

“Tell all you know,” persisted Julia. “You do know! My husband is coming today; he is a police officer. You bad better tell me than him.”

After much whimpering and hand-wringing, we extracted the following information in jerks and quavers:

The bungalow bad a bad name, no one ever entered it, and in spite of the wooden shutters there were lights in the windows every night up to twelve o’clock. One day (so the villagers said), many years ago, a young sahib came to this bungalow and stayed three days. He was alone. He was in the Forest Department. The last evening he sent his horses and servants on to Chanda, and said be would follow in the morning after having some shooting, he and his “boy;” but though his people waited two weeks, be never appeared – was never seen again. The khansamah declared that be and his servant bad left in the early morning, but no one met them. The khansamah became suddenly very rich; said he had found a treasure; also, be sold a fine gold watch in Jubbulpore, and took to drink. He had a bad name, and the bungalow had a bad name. No one would stay there more than one night, and no one had stayed there for many years till we came. The khansamah lived in the cook-house; he was always drunk. People said there were devils in the house, and no one would go near it after sundown. This was all she knew.

“Poor fellow, he was so good-looking!” sighed Julia when we were alone. “Poor fellow, and he was murdered and buried here!”

“So I told you,” I replied, “and you would not believe me, but insisted on staying to see for yourself.”

“I wish I had not – oh, I wish I had not! I shall never, never forget last night as long as I live.”

“That must have been his topee and tiffin basket that we saw in the press,” I exclaimed. “As soon as your husband comes, we will tell him everything, and set him on the track of the murderers.”

Breakfast on Christmas morning was a very doleful meal; our nerves were completely shattered by our recent experiences, and we could only rouse ourselves up to offer a very melancholy sort of welcome to our two husbands, when they cantered briskly into the compound. In reply to their eager questions as to the cause of our lugubrious appearance, pale faces, and general air of mourning, we favoured them with a vivid description of our two nights in the bungalow. Of course, they were loudly, rudely incredulous, and, of course, we were very angry; vainly we re-stated our case, and displayed the old topee and tiffin basket; they merely laughed still more heartily and talked of “nightmare,” and gave themselves such airs of offensive superiority, that Julia’s soul flew to arms.

“Look here,” she cried passionately, “I laughed at Nellie as you laugh at us. We will go out of this compound, whilst you two dig, or get people to dig, below the front verandah and in front of the steps, and if yon don’t find the skeleton of a murdered man, then you may laugh at us for ever.”

With Julia, impulse meant action, and before I could say three words I was out of the compound, with my arm wedged under hers; we went and sat on a little stone bridge within a stone’s throw of the bungalow, glum and silent enough. What a Christmas Day! Half an hour’s delay was as much as Julia’s patience could brook. We then retraced our steps and discovered what seemed to be the whole village in the dak bungalow compound. Frank came hurrying towards us, waving us frantically away. No need for questions; his face was enough. They had found it.

•   •   •   •   •

Frank Goodchild had known him – he was in his own department, a promising and most popular young fellow; his name was Gordon Forbes; he had been missed but never traced, and there was a report that he had been gored and killed in the jungle by a wild buffalo. In the same grave was found the battered despatch-box, by which the skeleton was identified. Mr. Goodchild and my husband re-interred the body under a tree, and read the Burial Service over it, Nellie and I and all the village patriarchs attending as mourners. The khansamah was eagerly searched for – alas! in vain. He disappeared from that part of the country, and was said to have been devoured by a tiger in the Jhanas jungles; but this is too good to be true. We left the hateful bungalow with all speed that same afternoon, and spent the remainder of the Christmas Day at Chanda; it was the least merry Christmas we ever remembered. The Goodchilds and ourselves have subscribed and placed a granite cross, with his name and the date of his death, over Gordon Forbes’s lonely grave, and the news of the discovery of the skeleton was duly forwarded to the proper authorities, and also to the unfortunate young man’s relations, and to these were sent the despatch-box, letters, and ring.

Mrs. Duff was full of curiosity concerning our trip. We informed her that we spent Christmas at Chanda, as we had originally intended, with our husbands, that they had provided an excellent dinner of black buck and jungle fowl, that the plum-pudding surpassed all expectations: but we never told her a word about our two nights’ halt at Dakor bungalow.

“IF YOU SEE HER FACE”

“I heard a voice across the press,

Of one who called in vain.”

Barrack Room Ballads.

Daniel Gregson, Esq., B.S.C., political agent to the Rajah of Oonomore (a child of seven years of age), and Percy Goring, his junior assistant, were travelling from their own state to attend the great Delhi durbar. Mr. Gregson was a civilian of twenty-five years’ standing, short of neck, short of stature, and short of temper. His red face, pale prominent eyes, and fierce bushy brows had gained for him the nickname of “The Prawn;” but he was also known as a marvellously clever financier, ambitious, shrewd, and prompt in action; and by those who were under him, he was less loved than feared. Young Goring was just twenty-six, and much more eager to discuss good shooting, or a good dance, than the assessment of land, the opium trade, or even acting allowances!

The pair journeyed with due ceremony on the native state line, and in the little Rajah’s own gilt and royal carriage. He was laid up in the palace with chicken-pock, and had wept sorely because he had been unable to accompany his guide, philosopher, and friend to the grand “Tamasha,” to wear his new velvet coat, and all his jewels, and to hear the guns, that would thunder in his honour. Child as he was, he was already keenly sensitive respecting his salute!

Meanwhile the agent and his subordinate got on capitally without him, travelling at the leisurely rate of ten miles an hour, that fine November afternoon, surrounded with tiffin-baskets, cigarettes, ice-boxes, and other luxurious accompaniments. About four o’clock the train came to a sudden standstill – there was no station to account for this, merely a country road, a white gate, and a mud hut. The halt resolved itself into a full step; Mr. Gregson thrust his red face out of the window, and angrily inquired the reason of the delay.

“Beg your pardon, sir,” said the Eurasian guard, “there has been a break on the line – bridge gone – and we can’t get forward nohow.”

Mr. Gregson glanced out on the prospect – the dusty cactus hedge, the white telegraph posts, the expanse of brownish grass, black goats, and jungle.

“Any village, any dak bungalow?” demanded the political agent, who might have known better than to ask.

“I’m afraid not, your honour. If your honour will wait here, we will send a messenger to the next station on foot, and tell them to telegraph for another train from the junction. This will arrive at the other side of the break, and take you on about twelve o’clock tomorrow.”

“And meanwhile we are to sit here!” cried Mr. Gregson, indignantly. “A pretty state of affairs! I’ll send a memo to the railway engineer that will astonish him,” he said, turning to Goring. “It’s four now, and we shall be here till twelve o’clock tomorrow, if we don’t mind. We shall be late for the durbar, and I shall have to wire, ‘unavoidably absent.’”

“I wonder if there is any sport to be had?” said Goring, descending from the carriage, and stretching his long legs. “Any shooting, any black buck?” looking at the guard interrogatively.

“Ah, that reminds me!” exclaimed Mr. Gregson. “The Rajah has a hunting box somewhere in these parts – Kori; we can go there for the night.”

“Yes, your honour,” assented a listener, with profound respect; “but it is four koss from here – a ‘Kutcha’ road – and a very poor part of the state.”

“I vote we stop here,” said Goring. “We can shoot a bit, and come back and dine, and sleep in the train. We shall be all right and jolly; twice as comfortable as in some tumble-down old summer-house.”

“I shall go to Kori, at any rate,” rejoined his superior officer, who resented opposition. “The place is kept up, and I’ve never seen it. This will be a capital opportunity to inspect it.”

“But it’s four koss away; and how are we to get our baggage, and bedding, and grub over?”

“Coolies,” was the laconic rejoinder. “Get them ready to start at once” – to his head servant, with an imperious wave of his hand.

“There is no way of transport for your majesty,” said his obsequious bearer with a deep salaam. “No ponies, not even an ekka – unless the ‘Protector of the Poor’ would stoop to a country cart?” (Which same is a long rude open basket, between two round wooden wheels, and drawn by a pair of bullocks.)

“I really think it is hardly worth while to move,” urged Goring, as he cast a greedy eye in the direction of a promising snipe jheel. “It will be an awful fag, and you know you hate walking!”

“You can please yourself, and stay here,” said Mr. Gregson, with immense dignity, who, if he hated walking, liked his own way.

As the whole suite (not to mention the commissariat) were bound to accompany him, Goring was compelled to submit; he dared not run counter to his arbitrary companion, who, rejecting with scorn the lowly vehicle that had been suggested, set out for Kori on foot, whither a long string of coolies had already preceded him. The sandy country road wound over a barren, melancholy-looking tract, diversified with scanty pasture and marshy patches (or jheels), pools of water, tall reeds, and brown grasses. It was dotted with droves of lean cattle, paddy birds, milk-white herons, and cranes – especially the tall sirius family, who danced to one another in a stately, not to say solemn, fashion.

Truly a bleak, desolate-looking region, and, save one or two miserable huts and some thorn bushes, there was no sign of tree or human habitation. At last they came in sight of a wretched village – the once prosperous hanger-on of the now deserted hunting palace – that showed its delicate stone pinnacles behind a high wall; apparently it stood in an enclosure of vast extent, an enclosure that must have cost lakhs of rupees. Two sahibs were naturally an extraordinary sight in this out-of-the-way district; the fame and name of Mr. Gregson, a Burra-Burra sahib, had been spread before him by the coolies, therefore beggars and petitioners swarmed eagerly round this great and all-powerful personage.

Mr. Gregson liked to feel his own importance at a durbar, or an official dinner, but it was quite another matter to have it thrust upon him by a gang of clamouring paupers – the maimed, the halt, the blind – crying out against taxation, imploring alms, and mercy. He was a hard man, with a quick, impatient temper. An aged blind beldame got in his way, and he struck her savagely with his stick. She shrank back with a sharp cry, and Goring, who was ever known as “a sahib with a soft heart,” spoke to her and gave her a rupee – a real rupee; it was years since she had felt one!

“Although she is blind, sahib, beware of her,” said an officious youth, with his hair in a topknot, “She has the evil eye!”

“Peace, dog!” she screamed; then to Goring, “I am a lone old woman; my kindred are dead – I have lived too long. I remember the former days – rich days; but bad days. Sahib, if you would be wise, go not to the palace Khana.”

Goring was moving on when the hag hastily clutched him by the sleeve, and added in a rasping whisper—

“If you see her face – you die!”

“She is mad,” he said to himself, as he hastened to join Mr. Gregson, who had arrived at the great iron-studded gates in a state of crimson fury.

“You say we have land – true!” shouted a haggard, wild-eyed ryot; “but what is land without crops? What is a remission of five per cent, to wretches like us? It is but as a caraway seed in a camel’s mouth! The wild beasts take our cattle and destroy our grain, and yet we must work and pay you, and starve! Would that the Rajah was a man grown! Would that you were dead!”

Mr. Gregson hurried inside, and banged the great gate violently in the face of the importunate crowd.

“It is a very poor district, and much too heavily assessed,” said Goring to himself. “There is not even a pony in the place. The very Bunnia is in rags; the deer eat the crops, such as they are, since the deer are preserved, and there is no one now to shoot them. It is abominable!”

The palace was a pretty, light stone building, two stories in height, with a tower at either end, and a double verandah all the way round. In front of it a large space was paved with blocks of white marble, which ran the whole length of the building, and it was surrounded by the most exquisite gardens, kept up in perfect order – doubtless by the taxes wrung from the wretched creatures outside its gates – a garden that was never entered by its proprietor or enjoyed by anyone from year’s end to year’s end, save the mallee’s children and the monkeys. The monkeys ate the fruit, the roses and lilies bloomed unseen, the fountains dripped unheeded; it was a paradise for the doves and squirrels, like a garden in a fairy tale.

The chowkidar and head mallee (he was a rich man) received their great guest with every expression of humble delight. Dinner was prepared with much bustle in the hall of audience, whilst Mr. Gregson and his junior explored. There were long shady walks paved with white marble, immense bushes of heliotrope and myrtle, delicate palms, fine mango trees, peach trees, and orange trees. It was truly an oasis in the desert when one contrasted it with the bare, desolate, barren country that lay outside its walls.

“I shall bring the little chap here,” said Mr. Gregson, pompously. “We will have a camp here at Christmas.” And then he strolled back to the palace, and made an excellent dinner of roast turkey, and asparagus, and champagne.

After this repast he got out his despatch-box and his cigarette-case, and set about writing an official, whilst Goring took a chair, and adjourned to the marble pavement outside the palace.

It was an exquisite night; a low moon was peering over the wall – the air was heavy with the scent of syringa and orange blossoms; there was not a sound, not a voice to be heard, not a soul in sight, save Mr. Gregson, who, illuminated by two wax candles, bent eagerly over his pen, as he sat in the open hall of audience.

Goring, as he smoked, thought of many things; of the half-famished villagers; of the splendid shooting that was going to waste; of the grand bag he could make, and would make, at Christmas. Then he began sleepily to recall some stories – half-told stories – about this very place; tales of hideous atrocities, and crimes that had been done here, in the days of the Tiger Rajah, the present ruler’s grandfather. He was gradually dozing off, when he was aroused by the sounds of distant tom-toms, playing with extravagant spirit. The drumming came slowly nearer and nearer; it actually seemed to be in the garden – louder and louder – with a whispered murmuring and low applause, and as it were the footsteps of a great multitude. But there was nothing whatever to be seen, and it was as light as day. He moved uneasily in his chair, and gazed behind him; no! nothing to be seen but his senior steadily covering sheets of foolscap. He turned his head, and was aware of an unexpected sight – as startling as it was uncanny! Two twinkling little brown feet, dancing before him on the marble pavement! exquisite feet, that seemed scarcely to touch the ground, and that kept perfect time to the inspiriting sounds of the tom-toms; they were decked with massive golden anklets, which tinkled as they moved, and above them waved a few inches of the heavy yellow gold-embroidered skirt of the dancing-girl. No more was visible. Round and round the fairy feet flitted, in a very poetry of motion; faster and faster played the tom-toms. Such dancing, such nimble feet, it had never been young Goring’s lot to behold! Yes – but where was the rest of the body?

As he gazed in half-stupefied amazement, he suddenly recalled the old hag’s warning, with an unpleasant thrill—

“If you see her face – you die!”

At this instant there was a scraping sound, of the pushing back of a chair, of slow footsteps on the marble, of a loud cry, and a heavy fall.

Goring jumped up, and beheld Mr. Gregson lying prone on his face. He rushed to his assistance, and raised him with considerable difficulty. His eyes were fixed with an expression of unutterable horror. He gave one or two shuddering gasps, his head drooped forward on his breast, and he expired.

Goring looked round apprehensively. The feet had disappeared; the tom-toms had ceased.

He shouted for help, and immediately a vast crowd of dismayed retainers assembled around him, and Babel ensued.

“The Burra sahib dead! Well, well, it was ever an evil place. Ah, bah! Ah, bah! It was the nautch-girl, without doubt.”

They further informed Goring that the old Rajah had once tortured a dancing-girl on that very spot, and inhumanly disfigured her face. More than one had seen her since, and perished thus.

That morning, at sunrise, the dead body of Mr, Gregson was placed in a native cart, similar to the one he had so scornfully rejected, and taken by slow stages to the nearest station and back to the city, accompanied by Goring.

The doctors, European and native, declared with one consent that Mr. Gregson had died in a fit – an apoplectic seizure.

Goring – wise man – said nothing.

THE FORMER PASSENGERS

“Who is whispering and calling through the rain?

Far above the tempest crashing,

And the torrent’s ceaseless dashing,

I hear a weary calling, as of pain.”

“If anyone can help you, it will be Captain Blane.”

This sentence was uttered by a smart young clerk, in a shipping office in Rangoon, who, clothed in cool white drill, leant his elbows confidentially on the desk, and concluded his speech with a reassuring nod.

I was en route from Upper Burma to Singapore, in order to attend my sister’s wedding. Our flat river-boat was late, and when I presented myself at the booking-office of the P. and O., I found to my dismay that the steamer for the Straits had sailed at dawn, and that there would not be another for a week! I was therefore bound to miss the wedding, and waste my precious leave in Rangoon, thanks to the leisurely old tub that had dawdled down from Mandalay.

I turned my eyes expectantly on Captain Blane, a short-necked, weather-beaten sailor, in a blue serge coat with gilt buttons, and a peaked cap. He surveyed me steadily, with a pair of small keen eyes, and evidently did not receive the suggestion with enthusiasm.

“We don’t carry passengers,” he announced in a gruff voice. “My ship is only a cargo-boat, a tramp; and we have no accommodation whatsoever.”

“No accommodation!” echoed the clerk, incredulously. “Oh, I say, come!”

“Why, you know very well that all the cabins are chock-full of cargo; and we have never carried a passenger since I took command.”

“If there was any hole or corner where you could stow me, I don’t mind how I rough it,” I urged; “and I’ll pay full first-class fare.”

“Oh, there’s lots of holes and corners,” admitted the captain. “And you’d just get the ship’s rations, same as the officers and myself; no soups and entrées – plain roast and boiled.”

“I’m not particular; I’m ready to eat salt junk and sea biscuit. I’ll do anything, short of swimming, to get to Singapore by next Wednesday.”

“Is it so very important?” demanded Captain Blane.

“A wedding. No – no,” in answer to his commiserating stare, “not my own – but I’ve to give away the bride.”

“Well, well, I suppose I must try and stretch a point. Mind! I’ll take you at your word about the passage money. ‘Never refuse a good offer,’ is my motto; so, Mr. – – ?” and he paused interrogatively.

“Lawrence is my name.”

“Mr. Lawrence, if you’ll be down at Godwin’s Wharf tomorrow, at nine o’clock, with your baggage and bedding and servant, we will be off a bit, and any sampan will put you aboard in five minutes. Ask for the Wandering Star;” and with a nod between the clerk and myself, he turned his back and stumped out.

“He is not very keen about passengers, eh?” remarked the clerk with a laugh. “I wonder why?”

“I suppose because she is a dirty old cargo-boat. But any port in a storm, or rather, any ship, in this crisis, for me!”

“Ah,” said the clerk, rubbing his chin reflectively, “I’ve a sort of idea – though perhaps I dreamt it – that there is something rum, or out of the way, about this Wandering Star.”

“Well, whatever it is, I’ll risk it,” I answered with a laugh, as I followed the captain’s example, and took my departure.

Punctually at nine o’clock next morning I embarked in a sampan, and was rowed down the swift Irrawaddy.

“That cannot be my steamer,” I protested, as the boatman made for a long, low, raking craft, a craft of considerable pretensions! She looked like one of the smaller vessels of the P. and O. fleet.

But sure enough the boatman was right, for as we passed under her stern, I read in yellow letters the name – Wandering Star.

A closer inspection showed her to be simply what her commander had stated – a tramp; she was dirty, rusty, and travel-stained. When I clambered aboard, I found no snowy decks, or shining brasses, but piles of cargo, bustling coolies, and busy blue-clad lascars. I was immediately accosted by the captain, who presented me to the chief officer, and to a fellow-traveller, a sallow, lanky youth of nineteen, going to join his friends in the Straits.

“I thought he would be company for you,” explained the sailor. “We are off in half an hour,” pointing to the Blue Peter at the fore. “And we’re loaded to the hatches. Mr. Kelly here will show you your quarters.”

As I followed the chief officer, I was astonished at the dimensions of the Star; it was a considerable distance from the captain’s snug cabin, near the bridge, to the poop. We made our way below, into a long saloon with tables and seats intact, but the aft part piled high with bales. There was a strange, musty, mouldy smell; it felt damp and vault-like, and afforded a sharp contrast to the blazing sun and cobalt sky on deck.

As my eye became used to the gloom, I noticed the lavish carving, the handsome mahogany and brass fittings, the maple-wood doors and panels – the remains of better days!

My cabin contained two bunks, and in one of these my servant, a Madras butler, called “Sawmy,” had already arranged my bedding.

“I wonder you don’t carry passengers?” I remarked to Mr. Kelly. “What a fine saloon! I should have thought it would have paid well.”

“She carried hundreds in her day,” he said complacently. “You see there is where the piano was hitched, and there the swinging lamps, and bookcase; but, all the same, it would never pay us to take passengers;” and he laughed – an odd sort of laugh. “We are not a regular liner, you know, trading between two ports. Regular liners look on us as dirt; but lots of ’em would give a good deal for our lines, and our engines. There’s some of them I would not send my old boots home in! We pick up cargo as we find it; one time we run to Zanzibar, another to Hong Kong, another to the Cape, or maybe Sydney. I’ve not been home this three years. I hope you’ll find your bunk comfortable; the youngster is opposite, just across the saloon – you know your way back!” and having done the honours, he left me.

Certainly, the Star was much above her present business, and bore the remains of having seen better days. Even my marble washstand was not in keeping with a cargo-steamer. I opened the next cabin; it was crammed to the door with freight – bird-cages in this instance. Every cabin was no doubt similarly packed. I was not sorry to exchange the earthy, chill atmosphere below for the bright sunshine on deck. Soon we had weighed anchor, and were moving smoothly down the rapid Irrawaddy, between high banks of tawny grass, gradually losing sight of the shipping, then of the golden Pagoda, then of Elephant Point; finally the Star put her nose straight out, to cross the Gulf of Martaban. The sea was calm, we were well fed and found, and made a pleasant party of six; the captain, first and second officers, the chief engineer, and two passengers. I slept like a top that night, and awoke next morning, and found we were anchored off Moulmein, with its hills covered with pagodas and palms. From Moulmein we put to sea, and still the weather once more favoured us. The captain was a capital companion, full of anecdotes and sea-stories; the chief engineer was a first-rate chess-player, and I began to think I had done rather a smart thing in securing a passage in this stray steamer. As the captain concluded a thrilling yarn apropos of a former ship, in which he had been third officer, I suddenly recalled the shipping clerk’s hint, and asked—

“Are there no stories about this one? has she no history?”

Captain Blane looked at the chief officer – with a knowing grin, and then replied—

“History? – of course she has. What do you call the log-book? That’s her history. I suppose that chap at the office told you she was considered an unlucky ship? Eh? Come, now, own up!”

“No; but he said he had an idea that there was something queer about her – he could not remember what it was.”

“Well, I’ve been in command of her now four years, and I’ve seen nothing to complain of. What do you say, Kelly?” appealing to the first officer.

“I say that I never wish to put foot on a better sea-boat, and there’s nothing wrong with her, as far as I know.”

But Sawmy, my Madras boy, entertained a totally different opinion of the Star. When I asked him why he did not sleep outside my door in the saloon, he frankly replied—

“Because plenty devil in this ship; the chief Serang” (head of the Lascars) “telling me that saloon plenty bad place.”

•   •   •   •   •

We were now within forty-eight hours of Singapore, when the weather suddenly changed, as it frequently does in those treacherous seas. The awning was taken down – sure presage of a bad time coming. The ports were closed, and all was made ready for a blow; and we were not disappointed – it came. We had a rough night, but I was not in the least inconvenienced; I slept like a dormouse rocked in the cradle of the deep.

In the morning my fellow-passenger (whose name, by the way, was Mellish, and who had evidently “suffered,” to judge by his ghastly appearance) accosted me timidly and said—

“Did you get up and walk about last night?”

“No.”

“Do you ever walk in your sleep?” he continued.

“Not to my knowledge – why?”

“Because last night someone came and hammered on my cabin door, and shouted, ‘The ship’s aground.’ What do you think it can have been?” he asked with a frightful face,

“I think there is no doubt that it was the hot tinned lobster you had for supper,” I answered promptly.

“No, no, no, it was not a dream – it woke me,” he returned. “I thought it was you. Then I tried to think it was a nightmare, and had almost brought myself to believe it, and was dropping off to sleep, when a cold, cold wet hand was passed slowly across my face;” and he shuddered violently.

“Lobster!” I repeated emphatically.

“No, no. Oh, Mr. Lawrence, I heard moaning and whispering and praying. I’m afraid to sleep in that cabin alone; may I come and share yours?”

“There is no room,” I answered, rather shortly. “The top berth is crammed full of my things.”

At breakfast there was a good deal of movement, and now and then a loud splash upon the deck. The captain, who had been tapping the barometer, looked unusually solemn, and said—

“We are in for a bit of dirty weather; unless I’m mistaken, there’s a cyclone somewhere about. I don’t think we shall do more than touch the edge of it, and this is a stout craft, so you need not be uneasy.”

This was vastly reassuring, when the sky to the west changed from a lowering grey to an inky black. The wind rose with a whimper, that increased to a shriek; it lashed the sea with fury, lashed it into enormous waves, and, laden as we were, we began to roll, at first majestically, then heavily, then helplessly. We took in great green seas over the bows, tons of water discharged themselves amidships, and made us stagger and groan, but still through it all the engines thumped doggedly on.

We seized our dinner anyhow; sitting, standing, kneeling, adapting ourselves to the momentary angle of the vessel. It was a miserable evening, wet and cold, and Mellish and I went to bed early.

The dead-lights were down, the hatchway closed behind us; we were entirely cut off from the rest of our shipmates for the night, and the saloon smelt more vault-like than ever. I turned away from Mellish’s grey frightened face, and stammering, piteous importunities, shut myself into my cabin, bolted the door, went to bed, and fell asleep. Meanwhile the storm increased to a hurricane, the motion was tremendous. I was flung violently out on the floor, as the Star made one awful plunge, and then righted herself. I was, needless to state, now thoroughly awake, and scrambling back into my berth, and clinging to the woodwork with both hands, lay listening to the roaring of the tempest, which rose now and then to a shrill shriek, that had a terribly human sound; my heart beat fast, as my ears assured it that I was not merely listening to the raving of the gale, but actually to the piercing screams of women, and the hoarse shouts of men! Just as I had arrived at this amazing conclusion, the door of the cabin was burst open, and an elderly man, in his shirt-sleeves, was hurled in.

“She’s going down,” he bawled excitedly, “and the hatches are fast.”

I sprang up, and the next lurch shot us both out into the saloon. And what a scene did I behold by three lamps that swung violently to and fro! Their fitful light showed me a large number of half-dressed strangers, in the last extremity of mortal fear; there was the horrible, selfish pushing and struggling of a panic-stricken crowd, fighting their way towards the companion-ladder; the wild frenzied distraction people exhibit when striving to escape from some deadly peril; the tumult, the cries and shrieks of frightened women making frantic appeals for rescue – cries heart-rending to hear.

Besides the dense struggling block at one end of the cabin, battling fiercely for escape, there were various groups, apparently resigned to their impending fate. A family at prayer; two men drinking raw brandy out of tumblers; an ayah beating her head upon the floor, and calling on “Ramasawmy;” an old lady, with a shawl over her head, and a Bible on her knee; a young man and a girl, hand locked in hand, whispering last words; a pale woman, with a sleeping child in her arms. I saw them all. I saw Mellish clinging to the saloon handrail, his eyes glazed with horror, and gibbering like an idiot.

The crash of broken crockery, the shrieks of despair, the roaring of the wind, the sullen thundering of the seas overhead, combined to make up the most frightful scene that could possibly be imagined.

Then all at once, a beautiful girl, with long dark hair, streaming over a white gown, rushed out of a cabin, and threw herself upon me, flinging her arms round my neck; she sobbed—

“Oh, save me – save me! Don’t let me die – don’t let me die!”

Her wild agonized face was pressed closely to mine; her frantic clasp round my neck tightened like a band of steel – closer, closer, closer. I was choking. I could not move or breathe. She was strangling me, as she shrieked in my ear—

“It is coming now! This is death!” There was one awful lurch, a grinding crash, a sinking sensation, a vice-like grip about my throat – and utter darkness.

•   •   •   •   •

I was aroused in broad daylight by Sawmy, who had brought my tea and shaving-water. I was lying on the floor of the saloon, and he was stooping over me, with a frightened expression on his broad, brown countenance.

“At first I thinking master dead!” was his candid announcement. “Me plenty fraiding. Why master lying here and no in bed?” Why indeed!

A plunge of my head into cool water, and a cup of tea, brought me to myself, and then I flung on my dressing-gown, and hurried across the saloon to see what had become of the miserable Mellish.

He was stretched in his berth, with a life-belt beside him, rigid and cold, and in a sort of fit.

With brandy, burnt brown paper, and great difficulty, Sawmy and I brought him round. As soon as he had come to his senses, and realized that he was still in the land of the living, he sat up and turned on me quite ferociously, and said—

“And that’s what you call lobster!”

•   •   •   •   •

The weather had moderated considerably, and though I had no great appetite, I was able to appear at breakfast. Mellish was too shattered to join us, and lay in a long chair in the deckhouse, sipping beef-tea, and hysterically assuring all inquirers that “he would never again set foot in the saloon – no, he would much rather die!”

“I suppose you got knocked about a bit last night?” inquired the captain, with a searching glance.

“Not exactly knocked about; I did not mind that so much, but—” and I hesitated.

“But you were disturbed?” he added significantly.

“Yes, very much so; I hope I shall never be disturbed in such a way again.”

“Then I take it you’ve seen them – the former passengers? They are generally aboard, they say, in dirty weather.”

“Whatever they were, I trust in God I may never witness such another scene.”

“You don’t wonder now that we are not free of offering cabin accommodation, eh? Not that I ever saw anything myself.”

“But you admit that there is something.”

“So they say” – nodding his head with a jaunty air.

“And what is the explanation? What do they say?” I asked impatiently.

“Just this. The Wandering Star was once the Atalanta, a fine passenger steamer, and, coming out her last trip, she fell in for the tail of a cyclone, and came to grief off the Laccadives; blown out of her course, engine-fires put out, went on a rock, and sank in ten fathoms; every soul on board went down, except a steward and a fireman, who got off on a hen-coop. It was an awful business – sixty-nine passengers, besides officers and crew. She sank like a stone, no time to get battered to pieces, and so she was right well worth her salvage. A company bought her cheap; she was but little damaged – they raised and sold her. She was intended for the pilgrim traffic, from Bombay to Mecca, and in fact she did make a couple of trips; but somehow she got a bad name; the pilgrims said she was possessed of devils – ha! ha! – and so the owners put her into the wheat and rice and general cargo trade, and we have no complaints. She has been at it these five years, and is, as I take you to witness, a grand sea-boat, and has fine accommodation between-decks as well as aft; it’s only in real dirty weather that there is anything amiss, and that in the saloon. They say,” lowering his voice to a hoarse whisper, “they kept the passengers below, battened down; they got no chance for their lives. It was a mistake; they were all drowned like rats in their holes. Mind you, I’ve seen nothing, and I’m not a superstitious man.”

“Would you sleep in the saloon?” I sternly demanded.

“No; for in a blow my place is on the bridge. But I’ll not deny that a second officer, who has left us, tried a bunk down there once, out of curiosity, and did not repeat the experiment; he was properly scared;” and the captain chuckled at the recollection.

“I suppose we shall get in tonight?” I remarked, as we paced the deck together.

“Yes, about eleven o’clock. We are doing our twelve knots, dirty-looking old hooker as we are!”

“So much the better,” I answered, “for you will not be surprised to hear that I’m not anxious to occupy my berth again.”

I am thankful to relate that I slept on land that same night, and was not “disturbed.”

•   •   •   •   •

I often glance at the shipping lists, to see if there is any news of the Wandering Star. I note that she is still tramping the ocean from China to Peru, and I have not the smallest doubt but that, on stormy nights, the saloon is still crowded with the distracted spectres of her former passengers.

NUMBER NINETY

For a period extending over some years, a notice appeared periodically in various daily papers. It read:

“To let furnished, for a term of years, at a very low rental, a large old-fashioned family residence, comprising eleven bed-rooms, four reception rooms, dressing-rooms, two staircases, complete servants’ offices, ample accommodation for a Gentleman’s establishment, including six-stall stable, coach-house, etc.”

This advertisement referred to Number Ninety.

Occasionally you saw it running for a week or a fortnight at a stretch, as if it were resolved to force itself into consideration by sheer persistency. Sometimes for months I looked for it in vain. Other folk might possibly fancy that the effort of the house agent had been crowned at last with success – that it was let, and no longer in the market.

I knew better. I knew that it would never, never find a tenant. I knew that it was passed on as a hopeless case, from house-agent to house-agent. I knew that it would never be occupied, save by rats – and, more than this, I knew the reason why! I will not say in what square, street, or road number ninety may be found, nor will I divulge to human being its precise and exact locality, but this I’m prepared to state, that it is positively in existence, is in Charleston, and is still empty. Twenty years ago, this very Christmas, I was down from New York visiting my friend John Hollyoak, a civil engineer from Charleston. We were guests at a little dinner party in the neighbourhood of the South Battery. Conversation became very brisk as the champagne circulated, and many topics were started, discussed, and dismissed.

We talked on an extraordinary variety of subjects.

I distinctly recollect a long argument on mushrooms – mushrooms, murders, racing, cholera; from cholera we came to sudden death, from sudden death to churchyards, and from churchyards, it was naturally but a step to ghosts.

John Hollyoak, who was the most vehement, the most incredulous, the most jocular, and the most derisive of the anti-ghost faction, brought matters to a climax by declaring that nothing would give him greater pleasure than to pass a night in a haunted house – and the worse its character, the better he would be pleased!

His challenge was instantly taken up by our somewhat ruffled host, who warmly assured him that his wishes could be easily satisfied, and that he would be accommodated with a night’s lodging in a haunted house within twenty-four hours – in fact, in a house of such a desperate reputation, that even the adjoining mansions stood vacant.

He then proceeded to give a brief outline of the history of number ninety. It had once been the residence of a well-known county family, but what evil events had happened therein tradition did not relate.

On the death of the last owner – a diabolical-looking aged person, much resembling the typical wizard – it had passed into the hands of a kinsman, resident abroad, who had no wish to return to Charleston, and who desired his agents to let it, if they could – a most significant condition!

Year by year went by, and still this ‘Highly desirable family mansion’ could find no tenant, although the rent was reduced, and reduced, and again reduced, to almost zero!

The most ghastly whispers were afloat – the most terrible experiences were actually proclaimed on the housetops!

No tenant would remain, even gratis; and for the last ten years, this, ‘handsome, desirable town family residence’ had been the abode of rats by day, and something else by night – so said the neighbours.

Of course it was the very thing for John, and he snatched up the gauntlet on the spot. He scoffed at its evil repute, and solemnly promised to rehabilitate its character within a week.

I was charged by our host to serve as a witness – to verify that John Hollyoak did indeed spend the night at number ninety. The next night at ten o’clock, I found myself standing with John on the steps of the notorious abode; but I was not going to remain; the carriage that brought us was to take me back to my respectable chambers.

This ill-fated house was large, solemn-looking, and gloomy. A heavy portico frowned down on neighbouring barefaced hall-doors. The elderly caretaker was prudently awaiting us outside with a key, which said key he turned in the lock, and admitted us into a great echoing hall, black as night, saying as he did so: “My missus has made the bed, and stoked up a good fire in the first front, Sir. Your things is all laid out, and I hope you’ll have a comfortable night, Sir.”

“No, Sir! Thank you, Sir! Excuse me, I’ll not come in! Goodnight!” and with the words still on his lips, he clattered down the steps with most indecent haste, and vanished.

“And of course you will not come in either?” said John. “It is not in the bond, and I prefer to face them alone!” and he laughed contemptuously, a laugh that had a curious echo, it struck me at the time. A laugh strangely repeated, with an unpleasant mocking emphasis.

“Call for me, alive or dead, at eight o’clock tomorrow morning!” he added, pushing me forcibly out into the porch, and closing the door with a heavy, reverberating clang, that sounded half-way down the street.

I did call for him the next morning as desired, with the caretaker, who stared at John’s commonplace, self-possessed appearance, with an expression of respectful astonishment.

“So it was all humbug, of course,” I said, as he took my arm, and we set off for our club.

“You shall have the whole story whenever we have had something to eat,” he replied somewhat impatiently. “It will keep till after breakfast – I’m famishing!”

I remarked that he looked unusually grave as we chatted over our broiled fish and omelet, and that occasionally his attention seemed wandering, to say the least. The moment he had brought out his cigar case and lit up he turned to me and said:

“I see you are just quivering to know my experience, and I won’t keep you in suspense any longer. In four words – I have seen them!”

I merely looked at him with widely parted mouth and staring interrogative eyes.

I believe I had best endeavour to give the narrative without comment, and in John Hollyoak’s own way. This is, as well as I can recollect, his experience word for word:

•   •   •   •   •

I proceeded upstairs, after I had shut you out, lighting my way by a match, and found the front room easily, as the door was ajar, and it was lit up by a roaring and most cheerful-looking fire, and two wax candles. It was a comfortable apartment, furnished with old-fashioned chairs and tables, and the traditional four-poster bed. There were numerous doors, which proved to be cupboards; and when I had executed a rigorous search in each of these closets and locked them, and investigated the bed above and beneath, sounded the walls, and bolted the door, I sat down before the fire, lit a cigar, opened a book, and felt that I was going to be master of the situation, and most thoroughly and comfortably ‘at home.’

My novel proved absorbing. I read on greedily, chapter after chapter, and so interested was I, and amused – for it was a lively book – that I positively lost sight of my whereabouts, and fancied myself reading in my own chamber! There was not a sound. The coals dropping from the grate occasionally broke the silence, till a neighbouring church-clock slowly boomed twelve! ‘The hour!’ I said to myself, with a laugh, as I gave the fire a rousing poke, and commenced a new chapter; but ere I had read three pages I had occasion to pause and listen. What was that distinct sound now coming nearer and nearer?

“Rats, of course,” said Common-sense – “it was just the house for vermin.” Then a longish silence. Again a stir, sounds approaching, as if apparently caused by many feet passing down the corridor – high-heeled shoes, the sweeping switch of silken trains! Of course it was all imagination, I assured myself – or rats! Rats were capable of making such curious improbable noises!

Then another silence. No sound but cinders and the ticking of my watch, which I had laid upon the table.

I resumed my book, rather ashamed, and a little indignant with myself for having neglected it, and calmly dismissed my late interruption as “rats – nothing but rats.”

I had been reading and smoking for some time in a placid and highly incredulous frame of mind, when I was somewhat rudely startled by a loud single knock at my room door. I took no notice of it, but merely laid down my novel and sat tight. Another knock more imperious this time – After a moment’s mental deliberation I arose, armed myself with the poker, prepared to brain any number of rats, and threw the door open with a violent swing that strained its very hinges, and beheld, to my amazement, a tall powdered footman in a laced scarlet uniform, who, making a formal inclination of his head, astonished me still further by saying:

“Dinner is ready!”

“I’m not coming!” I replied, without a moment’s hesitation, and thereupon I slammed the door in his face, locked it, and resumed my seat, also my book; but reading was a farce; my ears were aching for the next sound.

It came soon – rapid steps running up the stairs, and again a single knock. I went over to the door, and once more discovered the tall butler, who repeated, with a studied courtesy:

“Dinner is ready, and the company are waiting.”

“I told you I was not coming. Be off, and be hanged!” I cried again, shutting the door violently.

This time I did not make even a pretence at reading. I merely sat and waited for the next move.

I had not long to sit. In ten minutes I heard a third loud summons. I rose, went to the door, and tore it open. There, as I expected, was the servant again, with his parrot speech:

“Dinner is ready, the company are waiting, and the master says you must come!”

“All right, then, I’ll come,” I replied, wearied by reason of his importunity, and feeling suddenly fired with a desire to see the end of the adventure.

He accordingly led the way downstairs, and I followed him, noting as I went the gold buttons on his coat, also that the hall and passages were now brilliantly illuminated by glowing candles, and hung with living green, the crisp leaves of holly, mistletoe and ivy reflecting back the light. There were several uniformed servants passing to and fro, and from the dining room, there issued a buzz of tongues, loud volleys of laughter, many hilarious voices, and a clatter of knives and forks. I was not left much time for speculation, as in another second I found myself inside the door, and my escort announced me in a loud voice as “Mr. Hollyoak.”

I could hardly credit my senses, as I looked round and saw about two dozen people, dressed in a fashion of the 18th century, seated at the table, set for a sumptuous Christmas dinner, and lighted up by a blaze of wax candles in massive candelabra.

A swarthy elderly gentleman, who presided at the head of the board, rose deliberately as I entered. He was dressed in a crimson coat, braided with silver. He wore a white wig, had the most piercing black eyes I ever encountered, made me the finest bow I ever received in all my life, and with a polite wave of his hand, indicated my seat – a vacant chair between two powdered and embroidered beauties, with overflowing white shoulders and necks sparkling with diamonds.

At first I was fully convinced that the whole affair was a superbly matured practical joke. Everything looked so real, so truly flesh and blood, so complete in every detail; but I gazed around in vain for one familiar face.

I saw young, old, and elderly, handsome and the reverse. On all faces there was a similar expression – reckless, hardened defiance, and something else that made me shudder, but that I could not classify or define.

Were they a secret community? Burglars or counterfeiters? But no; in one rapid glance I noticed that they belonged exclusively to the upper stratum of society – bygone society. The jabber of talking had momentarily ceased, and the host, imperiously hammering the table with a knife-handle, said in a singularly harsh grating voice:

“Ladies and gentlemen, permit me to give you a toast! Our guest!” looking straight at me with his glittering coal-black eyes.

Every glass was immediately raised. Twenty faces were turned towards mine, when, happily, a sudden impulse seized me. I sprang to my feet and said:

“Ladies and gentlemen, I beg to thank you for your kind hospitality, but before I accept it, allow me to say grace!”

I did not wait for permission, but hurriedly repeated a Latin benediction. Ere the last syllable was uttered, in an instant there was a violent crash, an uproar, a sound of running, of screams, groans and curses, and then utter darkness.

I found myself standing alone by a big mahogany table which I could just dimly discern by the aid of a street-lamp that threw its meagre rays into the great empty dining-room from two deep and narrow windows.

I must confess that I felt my nerves a little shaken by this instantaneous change from light to darkness – from a crowd of gay and noisy companions, to utter solitude and silence. I stood for a moment trying to recover my mental balance. I rubbed my eyes hard to assure myself that I was wide awake, and then I placed this very cigar-case in the middle of the table, as a sign and token that I had been downstairs – which cigar-case I found exactly where I left it this morning – and then went and groped my way into the hall and regained my room.

I met with no obstacle en route. I saw no one, but as I closed and double-locked my door I distinctly heard a low laugh outside the keyhole – a sort of suppressed, malicious titter, that made me furious.

I opened the door at once. There was nothing to be seen. I waited and listened – dead silence. I then undressed and went to bed, resolved that a whole army of butlers would fail to allure me once more to that Christmas feast. I was determined not to lose my night’s rest – ghosts or no ghosts.

Just as I was dozing off I remember hearing the neighbouring clock chime two. It was the last sound I was aware of – the house was now as silent as a vault. My fire burnt away cheerfully. I was no longer in the least degree inclined for reading, and I fell fast asleep and slept soundly till I heard the cabs and milk-carts beginning their morning career.

I then rose, dressed at my leisure, and found you, my good, faithful friend, awaiting me, rather anxiously, on the hall-door steps.

•   •   •   •   •

“I have not done with that house yet. I’m determined to find out who these people are, and where they come from. I shall sleep there again tonight, along with my bulldog; and you will see that I shall have news for you tomorrow morning – if I am still alive to tell the tale,” he added with a laugh.

In vain I would have dissuaded him. I protested, argued, and implored. I declared that rashness was not courage; that he had seen enough; that I, who had seen nothing, and only listened to his experiences, was convinced that number ninety was a house to be avoided.

I might just as well have talked to my umbrella! So, once more, I reluctantly accompanied him to his previous night’s lodging. Once more I saw him swallowed up inside the gloomy, forbidding-looking, re-echoing hall.

I then went home in an unusually anxious, semi-excited, nervous state of mind. I lay wide awake, tumbling and tossing hour after hour, a prey to the most foolish ideas – ideas I would have laughed to scorn in daylight.

More than once I was certain that I heard John Hollyoak distractedly calling me; and I sat up in bed and listened intently. Of course it was fancy, for the instant I did so, there was no sound.

At the first gleam of winter dawn, I rose, dressed, and swallowed a cup of good strong coffee to clear my brain from the misty notions it had harboured during the night. And then I invested myself in my warmest topcoat, and set off for number ninety. Early as it was – it was but half-past seven – I found the caretaker was before me, pacing the pavement, his face drawn with a melancholy expression.

I was not disposed to wait for eight o’clock. I was too uneasy, and too impatient for further particulars of the Christmas dinner-party. So I rang with all my might, and knocked with all my strength.

No sound within – no answer! But John was always a heavy sleeper. I was resolved to arouse him all the same, and knocked and rang, and rang and knocked, incessantly for fully ten minutes.

I then stooped down and applied my eye to the keyhole; I looked steadily into the aperture, till I became accustomed to the darkness, and then it seemed to me that another eye – a very strange, fiery eye – was glaring into mine from the other side of the door!

I removed my eye and applied my mouth instead, and shouted with all the power of my lungs:

“John! John Hollyoak!”

How his name echoed and re-echoed up through that dark and empty house! ‘He must hear that,’ I said to myself as I pressed my ear closely against the lock, and listened with throbbing suspense.

The echo of “Hollyoak” had hardly died away when I swear that I distinctly heard a low, sniggering, mocking laugh – that was my only answer – that; and a vast unresponsive silence.

I was now quite desperate. I shook the door frantically, with all my strength. I broke the bell; in short, my behavior was such that it excited the curiosity of a police officer, who crossed the road to know, “What was up?”

“I want to get in!” I panted, breathless with my exertions.

“You’d better stay where you are!” said the police officer; “the outside of this house is the best of it! There are terrible stories…”

“But there is a gentleman inside it!” I interrupted impatiently. “He slept there last night, and I can’t wake him. He has the key!”

“Oh, you can’t wake him!” returned the police officer gravely. “Then we must get a locksmith!”

But already the thoughtful caretaker had procured one; and already a considerable and curious crowd surrounded the steps.

After five minutes of maddening delay, the great heavy door was opened and swung slowly back, and I instantly rushed in, followed less frantically by the police officer and the caretaker.

I had not far to seek John Hollyoak! He and his dog were lying at the foot of the stairs, both stone dead!

THE RED BUNGALOW

It is a considerable time since my husband’s regiment (“The Snapshots”) was stationed in Kulu, yet it seems as if it were but yesterday, when I look back on the days we spent in India. As I sit by the fire, or in the sunny corner of the garden, sometimes when my eyes are dim with reading I close them upon the outer world, and see, with vivid distinctness, events which happened years ago. Among various mental pictures, there is not one which stands forth with the same weird and lurid effect as the episode of “The Red Bungalow.”

Robert was commanding his regiment, and we were established in a pretty spacious house at Kulu, and liked the station. It was a little off the beaten track, healthy and sociable. Memories of John Company and traces of ancient Empires still clung to the neighbourhood. Pig-sticking and rose-growing. Badminton and polo, helped the residents of the place to dispose of the long, long Indian day – never too long for me!

One morning I experienced an agreeable surprise, when, in reading the Gazette, I saw that my cousin, Tom Fellowes, had been appointed Quartermaster-General of the district, and was to take up the billet at once.

Tom had a wife and two dear little children (our nursery was empty), and as soon as I had put down the paper I wired to Netta to congratulate and beg them to come to us immediately. Indian moves are rapid. Within a week our small party had increased to six, Tom, Netta, little Guy, aged four, and Baba, a dark-eyed coquette of nearly two. They also brought with them an invaluable ayah – a Madrassi. She spoke English with a pretty foreign accent, and was entirely devoted to the children.

Netta was a slight young woman with brilliant eyes, jet black hair, and a firm mouth. She was lively, clever, and a capital helpmate for an army man, with marvellous energy, and enviable taste.

Tom, an easy-going individual in private life, was a red-hot soldier. All financial and domestic affairs were left in the hands of his wife, and she managed him and them with conspicuous success.

Before Netta had been with us three days, she began, in spite of my protestations, to clamour about “getting a house.”

“Why, you have only just arrived,” I remonstrated. “You are not even half unpacked. Wait here a few weeks, and make acquaintance with the, place and people. It is such a pleasure to me to have you and the children.”

“You spoil them – especially Guy!” she answered with a laugh. “The sooner they are removed the better, and, seriously, I want to settle in. I am longing to do up my new house, and make it pretty, and have a garden – a humble imitation of yours – a Badminton court, and a couple of ponies. I’m like a child looking forward to a new toy, for, cooped up in Fort William in Calcutta, I never felt that I had a real home.”

“Even so,” I answered, “there is plenty of time, and I think you might remain here till after Christmas.”

“Christmas!” she screamed. “I shall be having Christmas parties myself, and a tree for the kids; and you, dear Liz, shall come and help me. I want to get into a house next week.”

“Then pray don’t look to me for any assistance. If you make such a hasty exit the station will think we have quarrelled.”

“The station could not be so detestable, and no one could quarrel with you, you dear old thing,” and as she stooped down and patted my cheek, I realised that she was fully resolved to have her own way.

“I have yards and yards of the most lovely cretonne for cushions, and chairs, and curtains,” she continued, “brought out from home, and never yet made up. Your Dirzee is bringing me two men tomorrow. When I was out riding this morning, I went to an auction-room – John Mahomed, they call the man – and inspected some sofas and chairs. Do let us drive there this afternoon on our way to the club, and I also wish to have a look round. I hear that nearly all the good bungalows are occupied.”

“Yes, they are,” I answered triumphantly. “At present there is not one in the place to suit you! I have been running over them with my mind’s eye, and either they are near the river, or too small, or – not healthy. After Christmas the Watsons are going home; there will be their bungalow – it is nice and large, and has a capital office, which would suit Tom.”

We drove down to John Mahomed’s that afternoon, and selected some furniture – Netta exhibiting her usual taste and business capacity. On our way to the club I pointed out several vacant houses, and, among them, the Watsons’ charming abode – with its celebrated gardens, beds of brilliant green lucerne, and verandah curtained in yellow roses.

“Oh yes,” she admitted, “it is a fine, roomy sort of abode, but I hate a thatched roof – I want one with tiles – red tiles. They make such a nice bit of colour among trees.”

“I’m afraid you won’t find many tiled roofs in Kulu,” I answered; “this will limit you a good deal.”

For several mornings, together, we explored bungalows – and I was by no means sorry to find that, in the eyes of Netta, they were all more or less found wanting – too small, too damp, too near the river, too stuffy – and I had made up my mind that the Watsons’ residence (despite its thatch) was to be Netta’s fate, when one afternoon she hurried in, a little breathless and dusty, and announced, with a wild wave of her sunshade, “I’ve found it!”

“Where? Do you mean a house?” I exclaimed.

“Yes. What moles we’ve been! At the back of this, down the next turn, at the cross roads! Most central and suitable. They call it the Red Bungalow.”

“The Red Bungalow,” I repeated reflectively. I had never cast a thought to it – what is always before one is frequently unnoticed. Also it had been unoccupied ever since we had come to the station, and as entirely overlooked as if it had no existence! I had a sort of recollection that there was some drawback – it was either too large, or too expensive, or too out of repair.

“It is strange that I never mentioned it,” I said. “But it has had no tenant for years.”

“Unless I am greatly mistaken, it will have one before long,” rejoined Netta, with her most definite air. “It looks as if it were just waiting for us – and had been marked ‘reserved.’”

“Then you have been over it?”

“No, I could not get in, the doors are all bolted, and there seems to be no chowkidar. I wandered round the verandahs, and took stock of the size and proportions – it stands in an imposing compound. There are the ruins at the back, mixed up with the remains of a garden – old guava trees, lemon trees, a vine, and a well. There is a capital place at one side for two Badminton courts, and I have mentally laid out a rose-garden in front of the portico.”

“How quickly your mind travels!”

“Everything must travel quickly in these days,” she retorted. “We all have to put on the pace. Just as I was leaving, I met a venerable coolie person, who informed me that John Mahomed had the keys, so I despatched him to bring them at once, and promised a rupee for his trouble. Now do, like a good soul, let us have tea, and start off immediately after to inspect my treasure-trove!”

“I can promise you a cup of tea in five minutes,” I replied, “but I am not so certain of your treasure-trove.”

“I am. I generally can tell what suits me at first sight. The only thing I am afraid of is the rent. Still, in Tommy’s position one must not consider that. He is obliged to live in a suitable style.”

“The Watsons’ house has often had a staff-tenant. I believe it would answer all your requirements.”

“Too near the road, and too near the General,” she objected, with a gesture of impatience. “Ah, here comes tea at last!”

It came, but before I had time to swallow my second cup, I found myself hustled out of the house by my energetic cousin and en route to her wonderful discovery – the Red Bungalow.

We had but a short distance to walk, and, often as I had passed the house, I now gazed at it for the first time with an air of critical interest. In Kulu, for some unexplained reason, this particular bungalow had never counted; it was boycotted – no, that is not the word – ignored, as if, like some undesirable character, it had no place in the station’s thoughts. Nevertheless, its position was sufficiently prominent – it stood at a point where four ways met. Two gateless entrances opened into different roads, as if determined to obtrude upon public attention. Standing aloof between the approaches was the house – large, red-tiled, and built back in the shape of the letter “T” from an enormous pillared porch, which, with some tall adjacent trees, gave it an air of reserve and dignity.

“The coolie with the keys has not arrived,” said Netta, “so I will just take you round and show you its capabilities myself. Here” – as we stumbled over some rough grass – “is where I should make a couple of Badminton courts, and this” – as we came to the back of the bungalow – “is the garden.”

Yes, here were old choked-up stone water-channels, the traces of walks, hoary guava and apricot trees, a stone pergola and a dead vine, also a well, with elaborate tracery, and odd, shapeless mounds of ancient masonry. As we stood we faced the back verandah of the house. To our right hand lay tall cork trees, a wide expanse of compound, and the road; to our left, at a distance, more trees, a high wall, and clustered beneath it the servants’ quarters, the cookhouse, and a long range of stables.

It was a fine, important-looking residence, although the stables were almost roofless and the garden and compound a wilderness, given over to stray goats and tame lizards.

“Yes, there is only one thing I am afraid of,” exclaimed Netta.

“Snakes?” I suggested. “It looks rather snaky.”

“No, the rent; and here comes the key at last,” and as she spoke a fat young clerk, on a small yellow pony, trotted quickly under the porch – a voluble person, who wore spotless white garments, and spoke English with much fluency.

“I am abject. Please excuse being so tardy. I could not excavate the key; but at last I got it, and now I will hasten to exhibit premises. First of all, I go and open doors and windows, and call in the atmosphere – ladies kindly excuse.” Leaving his tame steed on its honour, the babu hurried to the back, and presently we heard the grinding of locks, banging of shutters, and grating of bolts. Then the door was flung open and we entered, walked (as is usual) straight into the drawing-room, a fine, lofty, half-circular room, twice as large and well-proportioned as mine. The drawing-room led into an equally excellent dining-room. I saw Netta measuring it with her eye, and she said, “One could easily seat thirty people here, and what a place for a Christmas-tree!”

The dining-room opened into an immense bedroom which gave directly on the back verandah, with a flight of shallow steps leading into the garden.

“The nursery,” she whispered; “capital!”

At either side were two other rooms, with bath and dressing-rooms complete. Undoubtedly it was an exceedingly commodious and well-planned house.

As we stood once more in the nursery – all the wide doors being open – we could see directly through the bungalow out into the porch, as the three large apartments were en suite.

“A draught right through, you see!” she said. “So cool in the hot weather.”

Then we returned to the drawing-room, where I noticed that Netta was already arranging the furniture with her mental eye. At last she turned to the babu and said, “And what is the rent?”

After a moment’s palpable hesitation he replied, “Ninety rupees a month. If you take it for some time it will be all put in repair and done up.”

“Ninety!” I mentally echoed – and we paid one hundred and forty!

“Does it belong to John Mahomed?” I asked.

“No – to a client.”

“Does he live here?”

“No – he lives far away, in another region; we have never seen him.”

“How long is it since this was occupied?”

“Oh, a good while—”

“Some years?”

“Perhaps,” with a wag of his head.

“Why has it stood empty? Is it unhealthy?” asked Netta.

“Oh no, no. I think it is too majestic, too gigantic for insignificant people. They like something more altogether and cosy; it is not cosy – it is suitable to persons like a lady on the General’s staff,” and he bowed himself to Netta.

I believe she was secretly of his opinion, for already she had assumed the air of the mistress of the house, and said briskly, “Now I wish to see the kitchen, and servants’ quarters,” and, picking up her dainty skirts, she led the way thither through loose stones and hard yellow grass. As I have a rooted antipathy to dark and uninhabited places, possibly the haunt of snakes and scorpions, I failed to attend her, but, leaving the babu to continue his duty, turned back into the house alone.

I paced the drawing-room, dining-room, the nursery, and as I stood surveying the long vista of apartments, with the sun pouring into the porch on one hand, and on the green foliage and baked yellow earth of the garden on the other, I confessed to myself that Netta was a miracle!

She, a new arrival, had hit upon this excellent and suitable residence; and a bargain. But, then, she always found bargains; their discovery was her metier!

As I stood reflecting thus, gazing absently into the outer glare, a dark and mysterious cloud seemed to fall upon the place, the sun was suddenly obscured, and from the portico came a sharp little gust of wand that gradually increased into a long-drawn wailing cry – surely the cry of some lost soul! What could have put such a hideous idea in my head? But the cry rang in my ears with such piercing distinctness that I felt myself trembling from head to foot; in a second the voice had, as it were, passed forth into the garden and was stifled among the tamarind trees in an agonised wail. I roused myself from a condition of frightful obsession, and endeavoured to summon my common sense and self-command. Here was I, a middle-aged Scotchwoman, standing in this empty bungalow, clutching my garden umbrella, and imagining horrors!

Such thoughts I must keep exclusively to myself, lest I become the laughing-stock of a station with a keen sense of the ridiculous.

Yes, I was an imaginative old goose, but I walked rather quickly back into the porch, and stepped into the open air, with a secret but invincible prejudice against the Red Bungalow. This antipathy was not shared by Netta, who had returned from her quest all animation and satisfaction.

“The stables require repair, and some of the go-downs,” she said, “and the whole house must be recoloured inside, and matted. I will bring my husband round tomorrow morning,” she announced, dismissing the babu. “We will be here at eight o’clock sharp.”

By this I knew – and so did the babu – that the Red Bungalow was let at last!

“Well, what do you think of it?” asked Netta triumphantly, as we were walking home together.

“It is a roomy house,” I admitted, “but there is no office for Tom.”

“Oh, he has the Brigade Office. – Any more objections?”

“A bungalow so long vacant, so entirely overlooked, must have something against it – and it is not the rent—”

“Nor is it unhealthy,” she argued. “It is quite high, higher than your bungalow – no water near it, and the trees not too close. I can see that you don’t like it. Can you give me a good reason?”

“I really wish I could. No, I do not like it – there is something about it that repels me. You know I’m a Highlander, and am sensitive to impressions.”

“My dear Liz,” and here she came to a dead halt, “you don’t mean me to suppose that you think it is haunted? Why, this is the twentieth century!”

“I did not say it was haunted” – (I dared not voice my fears) – “but I declare that I do not like it, and I wish you’d wait; wait only a couple of days, and I’ll take you to see the Watsons’ bungalow – so sunny, so lived in – always so cheerful, with a lovely garden, and an office for Tom.”

“I’m not sure that that is an advantage!” she exclaimed with a smile. “It is not always agreeable to have a man on the premises for twenty-four hours out of the twenty-four hours!”

“But the Watsons—”

“My dear Liz, if you say another word about the Watsons’ bungalow I shall have a bad attack of the sulks, and go straight to bed!”

It is needless to mention that Tom was delighted with the bungalow selected by his ever-clever little wife, and for the next week our own abode was the resort of tailors, hawkers, butchers, milkmen, furniture-makers, ponies and cows on sale, and troops of servants in quest of places.

Every day Netta went over to the house to inspect, and to give directions, to see how the mallees were laying out the garden and Badminton courts, and the matting people and whitewashers were progressing indoors.

Many hands make light work, and within a week the transformation of the Red Bungalow was astonishing. Within a fortnight it was complete; the stables were again occupied – also the new spick-and-span servants’ quarters; Badminton courts were ready to be played upon; the verandah and porch were gay with palms and plants and parrots, and the drawing-room was the admiration of all Kulu. Netta introduced plants in pots – pots actually dressed up in pongee silk! – to the station ladies; her sofa cushions were frilled, she had quantities of pretty pictures and photos, silver knick-knacks, and gay rugs.

But before Netta had had the usual name-board – “Major Fellowes, A.Q.M.G.” – attached to the gate piers of the Red Bungalow, there had been some demur and remonstrance. My ayah, an old Madrassi, long in my service, had ventured one day, as she held my hair in her hand, “That new missus never taking the old Red Bungalow?”

“Yes.”

“My missus then telling her, please, that plenty bad place – oh, so bad! No one living there this many years.”

“Why – what is it?”

“I not never knowing, only the one word – bad. Oh, my missus! you speak, never letting these pretty little children go there—”

“But other people have lived there, Mary—”

“Never long – so people telling – the house man paint bungalow all so nice – same like now – they make great bargain – so pleased. One day they go away, away, away, never coming back. Please, please,” and she stooped and kissed my hand, “speak that master, tell him – bad bungalow.”

Of course I pooh-poohed the subject to Mary, who actually wept, good kind creature, and as she did my hair had constantly to dry her eyes on her sari.

And, knowing how futile a word to Tom would prove, I once more attacked Netta. I said, “Netta, I’m sure you think I’m an ignorant, superstitious imbecile, but I believe in presentiments. I have a presentiment, dear, about that Bungalow – do give it up to please and, yes, comfort me—”

“What! my beautiful find – the best house in Kulu – my bargain?”

“You may find it a dear bargain!”

“Not even to oblige you, dear Liz, can I break off my agreement, and I have really set my heart on your bête noire. I am so, so sorry,” and she came over and caressed me.

I wonder if Netta in her secret heart suspected that I, the Colonel’s wife, might be a little jealous that the new arrival had secured a far more impressive looking abode than her own, and for this mean reason I endeavoured to persuade her to “move on.”

However, her mind must have been entirely disabused of this by a lady on whom we were calling, who said:

“Oh, Mrs. Fellowes, have you got a house yet, or will you wait for the Watsons’? Such a—”

“I am already suited,” interrupted Netta. “We have found just the thing – not far from my cousin’s, too – a fine, roomy, cheerful place, with a huge compound; we are already making the garden.”

“Roomy – large compound; near Mrs. Drummond,” she repeated with knitted brow. “No – oh, surely you do not mean the Red Bungalow?”

“Yes, that is its name; I am charmed with it, and so lucky to find it.”

“No difficulty in finding it, dear Mrs. Fellowes, but I believe the difficulty is in remaining there.”

“Do you mean that it’s haunted?” enquired Netta with a rather superior air.

“Something of that sort – the natives call it ‘the devil’s house.’ A terrible tragedy happened there long ago – so long ago that it is forgotten; but you will find it almost impossible to keep servants!”

“You are certainly most discouraging, but I hope someday you will come and dine with us, and see how comfortable we are!”

There was a note of challenge in this invitation, and I could see with the traditional “half-eye” that Mrs. Dodd and Mrs. Fellowes would scarcely be bosom friends.

Nor was this the sole warning.

At the club a very old resident, wife of a Government employee, who had spent twenty years in Kulu, came and seated herself by me one morning with the air of a person who desired to fulfill a disagreeable duty.

“I am afraid you will think me presuming, Mrs. Drummond, but I feel that I ought to speak. Do you know that the house your cousin has taken is said to be unlucky? The last people only remained a month, though they got it for next to nothing – a mere song,”

“Yes, I’ve heard of these places, and read of them, too,” I replied, “but it generally turns out that someone has an interest in keeping it empty; possibly natives live there.”

“Anywhere but there!” she exclaimed. “Not a soul will go near it after nightfall – there is not even the usual chowkidar—”

“What is it? What is the tale? ”

“Something connected with those old mounds of brickwork, and the well. I think a palace or a temple stood on the spot thousands of years ago, when Kulu was a great native city.

“Do try and dissuade your cousin from going there; she will find her mistake sooner or later. I hope you won’t think me very officious, but she is young and happy, and has two such dear children, especially the little boy.”

Yes, especially the little boy! I was devoted to Guy – my husband, too. We had bought him a pony and a tiny monkey, and were only too glad to keep him and Baba for a few days when their parents took the great step and moved into the Red Bungalow.

In a short time all was in readiness; the big end room made a delightful nursery; the children had also the run of the back verandah and the garden, and were soon completely and happily at home.

An inhabited house seems so different to the same when it stands silent, with closed doors – afar from the sound of voices and footsteps. I could scarcely recognise Netta’s new home. It was the centre of half the station gaieties – Badminton parties twice a week, dinners, “Chotah Hazra” gatherings on the great verandah, and rehearsals for a forthcoming play; the pattering of little feet, servants, horses, cows, goats, dogs, parrots, all contributed their share to the general life and stir. I went over to the Bungalow almost daily: I dined, I breakfasted, I had tea, and I never saw anything but the expected and the commonplace, yet I failed to eradicate my first instinct, my secret apprehension and aversion. Christmas was over, the parties, dinners and teas were among memories of the past; we were well advanced in the month of February, when Netta, the triumphant, breathed her first complaint. The servants – excellent servants, with long and bond fide characters – arrived, stayed one week, or perhaps two, and then came and said, “Please I go!”

None of them remained in the compound at night, except the horse-keepers and an orderly; they retired to more congenial quarters in an adjoining bazaar, and the maddening part was that they would give no definite name or shape to their fears – they spoke of “It” and a “Thing” – a fearsome object, that dwelt within and around the Bungalow..

The children’s ayah, a Madras woman, remained loyal and staunch; she laughed at the Bazaar tales and their reciters; and, as her husband was the cook, Netta was fairly independent of the cowardly crew who nightly fled to the Bazaar.

Suddenly the ayah, the treasure, fell ill of fever – the really virulent fever that occasionally seizes on natives of the country, and seems to lick up their very life. As my servants’ quarters were more comfortable – and I am something of a nurse – I took the invalid home, and Netta promoted her understudy (a local woman) temporarily into her place. She was a chattering, gay, gaudy creature, that I had never approved, but Netta would not listen to any advice, whether with respect to medicines, servants, or bungalows. Her choice in the latter had undoubtedly turned out well, and she was not a little exultant, and bragged to me that she never left it in anyone’s power to say, “There – I told you so!”

It was Baba’s birthday – she was two – a pretty, healthy child, but for her age backward: beyond “Dadda,” “Mamma,” and “Ayah,” she could not say one word. However, as Tom cynically remarked, “she was bound to make up for it by and by!”

It was twelve o’clock on this very warm morning when I took my umbrella and topee and started off to help Netta with her preparations for the afternoon. The chief feature of the entertainment was to be a bran pie,

I found my cousin hard at work when I arrived. In the verandah a great bathtub full of bran had been placed on a table, and she was draping the said tub with elegant festoons of pink glazed calico – her implement a hammer and tacks – whilst I burrowed into the bran, and there interred the bodies of dolls and cats and horses, and all manner of pleasant surprises. We were making a dreadful litter, and a considerable noise, when suddenly above the hammering I heard a single sharp cry.

“Listen!” I said.

“Oh, Baba is awake – naughty child – and she will disturb her brother,” replied the mother, selecting a fresh tack. “The ayah is there. Don’t go.”

“But it had such an odd, uncanny sound,” I protested.

“Dear old Liz! how nervous you are! Baba’s scream is something between a whistle of an express and a foghorn. She has abnormal lung power – and today she is restless and upset by her birthday – and her teeth. Your fears—”

Then she stopped abruptly, for a loud, frantic shriek, the shriek of extreme mortal terror, now rose high above her voice, and, throwing the hammer from her, Netta fled into the drawing-room, overturning chairs in her route, dashed across the drawing-room, and burst into the nursery, from whence came these most appalling cries. There, huddled together, we discovered the two children on the table which stood in the middle of the apartment. Guy had evidently climbed up by a chair, and dragged his sister along with him. It was a beautiful afternoon, the sun streamed in upon them, and the room, as far as we could see, was empty. Yes, but not empty to the trembling little creatures on the table, for with wide, mad eyes they seemed to follow the motion of a something that was creeping round the room close to the wall, and I noticed that their gaze went up and down, as they accompanied its progress with starting pupils and gasping breaths.

“Oh! what is it, my darling?” cried Netta, seizing Guy, whilst I snatched at Baba.

He stretched himself stiffly in her arms, and, pointing with a trembling finger to a certain spot, gasped, “Oh, Mummy! look, look, look!” and with the last word, which was a shriek of horror, he fell into violent convulsions.

But look as we might, we could see nothing, save the bare matting and the bare wall. What frightful object had made itself visible to these innocent children has never been discovered to the present day.

Little Guy, in spite of superhuman efforts to save him, died of brain fever, unintelligible to the last; the only words we could distinguish among his ravings were, “Look, look, look! Oh, Mummy! look, look, look!” and as for Baba, whatever was seen by her is locked within her lips, for she remains dumb to the present day.

The ayah had nothing to disclose; she could only beat her head upon the ground and scream, and declare that she had just left the children for a moment to speak to the milkman.

But other servants confessed that the ayah had been gossiping in the cook-house for more than half an hour. The sole living creature that had been with the children when “It” had appeared to them, was Guy’s little pet monkey, which was subsequently found under the table quite dead.

At first I was afraid that after the shock of Guy’s death poor Netta would lose her reason. Of course they all came to us, that same dreadful afternoon, leaving the birthday feast already spread, the bran pie in the verandah, the music on the piano; never had there been such a hasty flight, such a domestic earthquake. We endeavoured to keep the mysterious tragedy to ourselves. Little Guy had brain fever; surely it was natural that relations should be together in their trouble, and I declared that I, being a noted nurse, had bodily carried off the child, who was followed by the whole family.

People talked of “A stroke of the sun,” but I believe something of the truth filtered into the Bazaar – where all things are known. Shortly after little Guy’s death Netta took Baba home, declaring she would never, never return to India, and Tom applied for and obtained a transfer to another station. He sold off the household furniture, the pretty knick-knacks, the pictures, all that had gone to make Netta’s house so attractive, for she could not endure to look on them again. They had been in that house. As for the Red Bangalow, it is once more closed, and silent. The squirrels and hoopoes share the garden, the stables are given over to scorpions, the house to white ants. On application to John Mahomed, anyone desirous of becoming a tenant will certainly find that it is still to be had for a mere song!

THE FIRST COMER

“Making night hideous.”

—Hamlet

I am an old maid, and am not the least ashamed of the circumstance. Pray, why should women not be allowed the benefit of the doubt like men, and be supposed to remain single from choice?

I can assure you that it is not from want of offers that I am Miss Janet MacTavish, spinster. I could tell – but no matter. It is not to set down a list of proposals that I have taken pen in hand, but to relate a very mysterious occurrence that happened in our house last spring.

My sister Matilda and I are a well-to-do couple of maiden ladies, having no poor relatives, and a comfortable private fortune. We keep four servants (all female), and occupy a large detached house in a fashionable part of Edinburgh, and the circle in which we move is most exclusive and genteel.

Matilda is a good deal older than I am (though we dress alike), and is somewhat of an invalid.

Our east winds are certainly trying, and last March she had a very sharp attack of bronchitis, brought on (between ourselves) by her own rash imprudence. Though I may not say this to her face, I may say it here.

She does not approve of fiction, though, goodness knows, what I am going to set down is not fiction, but fact; but any literary work in a gay paper cover (of course, I don’t mean tracts), such as novels and magazines, is an abomination in her eyes, and “reading such-like trash” she considers sinful waste of time.

So, even if this falls into her hands by an odd chance, she will never read it, and I am quite safe in writing out everything that happened, as I dare not do if I thought that Mattie was coming after me and picking holes in every sentence.

Matilda is terribly particular about grammar and orthography, and reads over all my letters before I venture to close them.

Dear me, how I have wandered away from my point! I’m sure that no one will care to know that I am a little in awe of my elder, that she treats me sometimes as if I were still in my teens. But people may like to hear of the queer thing that happened to me, and I am really and truly coming to it at last.

Matilda was ill with bronchitis, very ill. Bella (that’s our sewing-maid and general factotum, who has been with us twelve years this term) and I took it in turns to sit up with her at night. It happened to be my night, and I was sitting over the fire in a half-kind of doze, when Matilda woke up, and nothing would serve her but a cup of tea of all things, at two o’clock in the morning – the kitchen fire out, no hot water, and everyone in the house in their beds, except myself.

I had some nice beef-tea in a little pan beside the hob, and I coaxed her hard to try some of that, but not a bit of it. Nothing would serve her but real tea, and I knew that once she had taken the notion in her head, I might just as well do her bidding first as last. So I opened the door and went out, thinking to take the small lamp, for, of course, all the gas was out, and turned off at the meter – as it ought to be in every decent house.

“You’ll no do that!” she said, quite cross. Mattie speaks broad when she is vexed, and we had had a bit of argument about the tea. “You’ll no do that, and leave me here without the light! Just go down and infuse me a cup of tea as quick as ever you can, for I know I’ll be awfully the better of it!”

So there was just nothing else for it, and down I went in the pitch-black darkness, not liking the job at all.

It was not that I was afraid. Not I. But the notion of having to rake up and make the kitchen fire, and boil the kettle, was an errand that went rather against the grain, especially as I’m a terrible bad hand at lighting a fire.

I was thinking of this and wondering where were the wood and the matches to be found, when, just as I reached the head of the stairs, I was delighted to hear a great raking out of cinders below in the kitchen. Such a raking and poking and banging of coals and knocking about of the range I never did hear, and I said to myself,

“This is fine; it’s washing morning” (we do our washing at home) “and later than I thought; and the servants are up, so it’s all right;” and I ran down the kitchen stairs, quite inspirited like by the idea. As I passed the door of the servants’ room (where cook and housemaid slept), Harris, that’s the housemaid, called out—

“Who’s that?”

I went to the door and said, “It’s I, Miss Janet. I want a cup of tea for Miss MacTavish.”

In a moment Harris had thrown on some clothes and was out in the passage. She was always a quick, willing girl, and very obliging. She said (it was black dark, and I could not see her)—

“Never you mind, Miss Janet; I’ll light the fire and boil up the kettle in no time.”

“You need not do that,” said I, “for there’s someone at the fire already, cook, I suppose.”

“Not me, ma’am” said a sleepy voice from the interior of the bedroom. “I’m in my bed.”

“Then who can it be?” I asked, for the banging and raking had become still more tremendous, and the thunder of the poker was just awful!

“It must be Bella,” said Harris, feeling her way to the kitchen door and pushing it open, followed by me.

We stood for full half a minute in the dark, whilst she felt about and groped for the matches, and still the noise continued.

“Bella,” I said crossly, “what on earth-”

But at this instant the match was struck, and dimly lit up the kitchen. I strained my eyes into the darkness, whilst Harris composedly lit a candle. I looked, and looked, and looked again, but there was no one in the kitchen but ourselves.

I was just petrified, I can tell you, and I staggered against the dresser, and gaped at the now silent fireplace. The coals and cinders and ashes were exactly as they had gone out, not a bit disturbed; anyone could see that they had never been stirred.

“In the name of goodness, Harris,” I said in a whisper, “where is the person that was poking that fire? You heard them yourself!”

“I heard a noise, sure enough, Miss Janet,” she said, not a bit daunted; “and if I was a body that believed in ghosts and such-like clavers, I’d say it was them,” putting firewood in the grate as she spoke. “It’s queer, certainly. Miss MacTavish will be wearying for her tea,” she added. “I know well what it is to have a kind of longing for a good cup. Save us! what a cold air there is in this kitchen. I wonder where cook put the bellows.”

Seeing that Harris was taking the matter so coolly, for very shame I was forced to do the like; so I did not say a word about my misgivings, nor the odd queer thrill I had felt as we stood in the pitch darkness and listened to the furious raking of the kitchen grate.

How icy cold the kitchen had been! just like a vault, and with the same damp, earthy smell!

I was in a mighty hurry to get back upstairs, believe me, and did all in my power to speed the fire and the kettle, and in due time we wended our way above, Harris bearing the tea on a tray, and walking last.

I left her to administer the refreshment, whilst I went into Bella’s room, which was close by, candle in hand.

“You are awake, I see, Bella,” I remarked, putting it down as I spoke (I felt that I must unbosom myself to someone, or never close an eye that night). “Tell me, did you hear a great raking of the kitchen fire just now?”

“Yes, miss, of course. Why, it woke me. I suppose you had occasion to go down for something, Miss Janet; but why did you not call me?”

“It was not I who woke you, Bella,” I rejoined quickly. “I was on my way downstairs when I heard that noise below, and I thought it was cook or Harris, but when I got down Harris came out of the bedroom. Cook was in bed. Maggie, you know, is up above you, and we went into the kitchen, thinking it might be you or her, and lit a candle; but I give you my word of honour that, although the noise was really terrible till we struck a light, when we looked about us not a soul was to be seen!”

At this, Bella started up in bed, and became of a livid, chalky kind of colour.

“No one, Miss Janet?” she gasped out.

“Not a soul!” I replied solemnly.

“Then, oh!” she exclaimed, now jumping bodily out on the floor, and looking quite wild and distracted, “tell me, in Heaven’s name, which of you went into the kitchen first, you or Harris?” She was so agitated, she seemed scarcely able to bring out the words, and her eyes rested upon mine with a strange, frightened look, that made me fancy she had taken temporary leave of her wits.

“Harris went first,” I answered shortly.

“Thank Heaven for that!” she returned, now collapsing on the edge of her bed. “But poor Kate Harris is a dead woman!”

I stared hard at Bella, as well I might. Was she talking in her sleep? or was I dreaming?

“What do you mean, Bella Cameron?” I cried. “Are you gone crazy? Are you gone clean daft?”.

“It was a warning,” she replied, in a low and awe-struck voice. “We Highlanders understand the like well! It was a warning of death! Kate Harris’s hour has come.”

“If you are going to talk such wicked nonsense, Bella,” I said, “I’m not going to stop to listen. Whatever you do, don’t let Matilda hear you going on with such foolishness. The house would not hold her, and you know that well.”

“All right, Miss Janet; you heard the commotion yourself – you will allow that; and you will see that the kitchen grate is never raked out for nothing. I only wish, from the bottom of my heart, that what I’ve told you may not come true; but, bad as it was, I’m thankful that you were not first in the kitchen.”

A few more indignant expostulations on my part, and lamentations on Bella’s, and then I went back to Matilda, and it being now near three o’clock, and she inclined to be drowsy, I lay down on the sofa, and got a couple of hours’ sleep.

A day or two afterwards I was suddenly struck with a strange thrill of apprehension by noticing how very, very ill Kate Harris looked. I taxed her with not feeling well, and she admitted that she had not been herself, and could not say what ailed her. She had no actual pain, but she felt weak all over, and could scarcely drag herself about the house, “It would go off. She would not see a doctor – No, no, no!-It was only just a kind of cold feeling in her bones, and a sort of notion that a hand was gripping her throat. It was all fancy; and Dr. Henderson (our doctor) would make fine game of her if he saw her by way of being a patient. She would be all right in a day or two.” Vain hope! In a day or two she was much worse. She was obliged to give in – to take to her bed. I sent for Dr. Henderson – indeed he called daily to visit Mattie – so I had only to pilot him down below to see Kate. He came out to me presently with a very grave face, and said—

“Has she any friends?” – pointing towards Kate’s door with his thumb.

“Friends! To be sure,” I answered. “She has a sister married to a tram conductor in Wickham Street.”

“Send for her at once; and you had better have her moved. She can’t last a week.”

“Do you mean that she is going to die?” I gasped, clutching the balusters, for we were standing in the lower hall.

“I am sorry to say the case is hopeless. Nothing can save her, and the sooner she is with her own people the better.”

I was, I need scarcely tell you, greatly shocked – terribly shocked – and presently, when I had recovered myself, I sent off, post-haste, for Kate’s sister.

I went in to see her. She, poor creature, was all curiosity to know what the doctor had said.

“He would tell me nothing, miss,” she observed smilingly. “Only felt my pulse, and tried my heart with a stethoscope, and my temperature with that queer little tube. I only feel a bit tired and out of breath; but you’ll find I’ll be all right in a day or two. I’m only sorry I’m giving all this trouble, and Bella and Mary having to do my work. However, I’ll be fit to clean the plate on Saturday.”

Poor soul, little did she dream that her work in this world was done!

And I, as I sat beside the bed and looked at her always pale face, her now livid lips and hollow eyes, told myself that already I could see the hand of Death on her countenance. I was obliged to tell her sister what the doctor had said; and how she cried – and so did I – and who was to tell Kate? We wished to keep her with us undisturbed – Matilda and I – but her people would not hear of it, and so we had an ambulance from the hospital and sent her home.

She just lived a week, and, strange to say, she had always the greatest craving for me to be with her, for me to sit beside her, and read to her, and hold her hand. She showed far more anxiety for my company than for that of any of her own people.

Bella alone, of all the household, expressed no astonishment when she heard the doctor’s startling verdict. Being in Mattie’s room at the time, she merely looked over at me gravely, and significantly shook her head.

One evening Bella and I were with her; she had lain silent for a long time, and then she said to me quite suddenly—

“Miss Janet, you’ll remember the morning you came downstairs looking for Miss MacTavish’s tea?” (Did I not recollect it, only too well!) “Somehow, I got a queer kind of chill then; I felt it at the time, to the very marrow of my bones. I have never been warm since. It was just this day fortnight. I remember it well, because it was washing Monday.”

That night Kate Harris died. She passed away, as it were, in her sleep, with her hand in mine. As she was with me on that mysterious night, so I was now with her.

Call me a superstitious old imbecile, or what you like, but I firmly believe that, had I entered that kitchen first, it would have been Janet MacTavish, and not Kate Harris, who was lying in her coffin!

Of course Matilda knows nothing of this, nor ever will. Perhaps – for she is one of your strong-minded folk – she would scoff at the idea, and at me, for a daft, silly body, and try to explain it all away quite reasonable like. I only wish she could!

JACK STRAW’S CASTLE

“I have supp’d full with horrors.”

—Macbeth

Major Blewe, of the Honourable East India Company’s Service, hated all manner of men and loved all blends of whisky; the result of this idiosyncrasy was that, after suffering many things from him for many years, the officers of the South Nellore Regiment revolted en masse. Endurance has its limits. If a comrade is a smart soldier and a good fellow, much is overlooked; but Major Blewe was neither, and, after an outrageous scene at an inspection dinner, he received a strong official hint to go.

He left, with a substantial pension. He was not “broke” – and carried away with him the detestation of a large body of men, an unparalleled grievance, and a deathless thirst for strong waters. The Major did not return to his native land, but settled down on a hill station in Madras – whether it was on the Nilgherries, the Pulneys, the Shevaroys, or elsewhere, is immaterial. Suffice to say, that he rented a four-roomed bungalow near a small station. It was cheap, in good repair, out of the way, and solitary – standing on a bare hillside, almost surrounded and concealed by rows of funereal pines, and known by the name of “Jack Straw’s Castle.” Here Major Blewe took up his abode, and made, as was his custom, life a purgatory to his miserable retainers. He had joined the Service in the days when, among a certain set, cursing and beating one’s servants was a fashionable and laudable action, and he prided himself that he was conservative, had never discarded old habits, and that every domestic in his employment had been conscientiously and soundly thrashed. He failed, however, to mention the one grand occasion on which, having dragged an able-bodied chokra into his bathroom – there to belabour him privately and at ease – that too vigorous young man had administered to his employer such a drubbing that he was unable to leave his bed for weeks – and meanwhile the delinquent had decamped with the major’s gold watch, silver spoons, and his pet cane!

This had not been a lesson, and was an old story now. Major Blewe was a notoriously bad master; his name was well noted in various bazaars. Why, then, did Hassan, his butler, and Ahmed, his cook (brothers), remain with him year after year? It was true that the wages were considerable, but what wages can repay a man for blows, kicks, curses, and insults? Major Blewe had the gift of tongues, and his invectives were as glib and as coarse as those of any old Tamil grass-cutter. The waterman and dhoby had a better time than the indoor domestics, not being so constantly en evidence, but no horse-keeper born of woman would remain two days, and the major kept no pony – fortunately for that quadruped.

He invariably began the day with a hoarse, savage roar, when his early morning peg was first introduced to him. As the hours went by, these roars increased and multiplied – accompanied by kicks and blows. Attendance on him was almost as dangerous as waiting on a wild beast. In fact, he was worse than some, for he threw bottles with a deadly aim – also lamps, and scalding water. Rash, indeed, the bill collector who ventured within his reach. To be brief, Major Blewe was a degraded old savage, and yet some people declared “that he could be a gentleman when he chose.” Now and then he appeared in the local reading-room and at church – red-faced, beetle-browed, blustering – but clothed, not to say dressed, and dapper, and in his right mind. But what about those other – alas! too frequent – occasions when he was to be met, singing and staggering along the high-road, with the top button of his coat fastened in the lowest buttonhole of the said garment, and a guilty black bottle protruding from his pocket?

He had no occupation; he made no attempt at gardening, beyond cultivating some red chilis; and his reading was confined to the local paper, which often accumulated unopened for weeks. He spent his days in swallowing strong pegs, smoking rank “Trichys,” and harrying his staff by night and day. Foolhardy, indeed, the man who dared to call his soul his own!,

The owner of Jack Straw’s Castle was a slender, narrow-chested Eurasian, named Ezra Pedro. He collected his rents monthly, and in person. Occasionally he arrived at Major Blewe’s at some desperate domestic crisis; and once, when he found his tenant tearing off the butler’s turban and coat, he ventured to expostulate, and privately asked the major “if he was not afraid of appearing before the cantonment magistrate – not afraid of law proceedings?”

“Law action? I’d like to see them try to bully old Joe Blewe! I am in my own house, where I do as I please! My house is my castle – Joe Blewe’s Castle!”.

“If I were you, my honoured sir, I would send away your cook and butler, and the water-man. I have heard things” – lowering his voice – “in the bazaar – hints, whispers—”

“That they rob me? Of course they do!”

“If I may humbly venture to suggest, I would counsel more gentle and polite treatment, honourable sir; and I implore you to get rid of your present servants at once. You may be sorry if you keep them – and – so may I. I do not wish to lose an excellent tenant, now you have been here thirteen years.”

“Who the devil said I was going to leave?” bawled the major. “Wait till I give you notice! Keep your opinions to yourself, you snivelling, meddling, pudding-faced black brute! Here! get out of the place at once, or I’ll help you!” .

And poor, timid, well-meaning Mr. Ezra Pedro was fain to retire with undignified celerity.

After a short time, there were whispers and vague rumours that Major Blewe – Blue Devil, as he was called – had been worse than usual with respect to violence, language, and liquor. He had broken the water-man’s head, kicked the cook’s wife’s mother, and drowned the butler’s beloved and only dog. Of late he had not been encountered slanting about the highways, and his absence was a relief; nor had he appeared in church or reading-room. The individual most interested in his welfare was his landlord, who arrived punctually on the first day of the month, receipt in hand.

He rapped timidly – no answer. Then he hammered boldly. After all, there was a month’s rent due, and it was his house. Still dead silence. He called to a passing acquaintance, and together they peeped around, listened, whispered, wondered, and finally climbed in through an ill-secured window.

The bungalow proved to be as neat as a new pin, and in apple-pie order (it was let furnished, as are all hill houses). The major’s bedroom was beautifully tidy; long double rows of empty bottles stood as if “dressed” on parade; his clothes were folded up, his topee and cap hung below his sword-scabbard; his shaving apparatus (razor included) was arranged in tempting order; and a clock was briskly ticking on the chimney-piece. The tiny sitting-room was chiefly filled by a long chair, a teapoy, pipes, and peg tumblers. It was vacant. The little dining-room – ah! here was a promising sign. The cloth was laid in preparation for a meal. There were appointments for two, a cruet-stand and well-filled decanter were set by the major’s seat, and a good-sized covered dish was placed before it. The flies were swarming around this, and some rash impulse of curiosity tempted Pedro to raise the electroplated lid. He gave a shrill, wild scream as he let it fall with a frightful clang; for, grinning at him, on the dish, was Major Blewe’s head!

The landlord and his companion tore out of the bungalow, and, in the language of old story-books, they ran, and they ran, and they ran. They ultimately brought the police, and a vast and excited crowd, to inspect that ghastly dinner-table. The police looked wise – as usual – asked questions, examined the premises, and made copious entries. But from that day to this – a matter of thirty years and more – no trace has ever been found of Major Blewe’s servants, or of Major Blewe’s body.

Jack Straw’s Castle was to let, a bargain, for many seasons; and for many seasons it “has stood, a roofless ruin.”

THE RED WOOLLEN NECKTIE

“I had a dream which was not all a dream.”

—Byron

When this century had reached the age allotted to man, and I was but yet in my teens, we lived in a rambling old place in the west, called Coolnafinn. My father, Colonel Mardall, succeeded to this property at a truly propitious moment; for just as he was “kicked out” of the service, for age, another career opened its arms to him – one almost as exciting and uncertain – in short, the career of an Irish landlord.

We found Coolnafinn in surprisingly good repair, surrounded by a fine well-timbered
demesne, and, imposing as it was isolated, the house stood at the junction of the back and front avenues, which were each a mile in length. We were four miles from church, ten from our post town, and fifteen from a station; neighbours were few and far between, but we were a host in ourselves – seven motherless boys and girls – and the roomy old mansion, great walled gardens, orchards and grounds, proved a delightful change from barrack quarters, and the narrow limits of the conventional furnished house of a garrison town.

The experience that I am about to relate occurred when I was nineteen, that is to say, when chignons and croquet were the fashion. In spite of my years I was credited with an old head on young shoulders, and was the mistress of my father’s establishment, and keeper of the keys – no easy post, considering that I had to deal with six boisterous and critical young relatives.

I shared the same room with my sister Fanny. It was the best bedroom – a great lofty apartment with three bow windows. One hot July night, I could not sleep for ages – I tumbled and tossed; I got up and drank water; I counted the prescribed “hundred sleep;” I watched the moonlight steal in between the blinds, and touch each separate object on which it fell, with a pale, weird light; I felt cold, shivering, frightened – but why? I did not believe in ghosts. I was not alone, for there was Fanny in an opposite bed, breathing regularly, and evidently far away in the land of dreams. What ailed me? Why was I conscious of a beating heart, accompanied by a scarcely defined, but undeniable dread? At last I “fell off,” and I dreamt – though all the time, even in my dream, I said to myself, “This is not a dream; it is real.”

It seemed as if the house, for some unexplained reason, was empty; I was absolutely alone, sitting reading in the drawing-room with my back to one of the long French windows which opened to the ground. Suddenly a dark shadow came between me and the light, and, turning round, I beheld a tall, powerful man, with his head pressed closely against the glass; his face was shaded by a weather-beaten wide-awake, or caubeen; he was dressed like a tramp, and the only thing I particularly noticed about him was a pair of very large, dirty hands, and a red worsted necktie.

He remained for some seconds leaning against the sash, and gazing intently into the room; then I started to my feet, and called out

“What do you want?”

“Is the colonel within?” he asked, in a hoarse voice.

“No, he is out,” I screamed in reply.

“I want to see him badly. I served under him wance. Is Master Robin, or Master Ted, in?”

I shook my head. “I’ve come a terrible long way”-holding up a large foot in a dusty broken shoe – “and I’m dying on my feet wid hunger and the wakeness.”

“Wait, then,” I cried, on a sudden impulse. “Go round to the front entrance.”

I hurried into the hall – intent on benevolence and broken victuals – and flung the door wide open. Quick as I had been, the tramp was already on the steps.

“Are they all out, miss?” he panted, in a husky voice.

“All,” I replied, and I was about to add “except myself;” but ere I could utter another syllable he had sprung at me, seized me by the throat with brutal ferocity, and pressing me hard against a stone pillar, he proceeded to strangle me. I could not move, struggle, or scream. I felt his foul breath on my face, his savage, wolfish eyes fastened on mine. Everything was becoming black, the world reeled, a strange sound of the sea roared in my ears; I was suffocating, dying, dead! No, for here I awoke, and found myself sitting up and shrieking – shrieking like a maniac.

I saw Fanny jump out of bed by the light of a pale summer night, and come running over to me. She held me tightly, whilst I gasped and panted, precisely as if I had been really choked. Meantime all my relatives in all sorts of costumes) poured into the room, believing (not unnaturally) that murder was being done.

Presently I recovered my voice, and in faint, broken sentences stammered out my tragic tale, which same tale was received with angry derision by father, and yells of laughter by my kindred. Robin, my eldest brother, who had been the first to arrive upon the scene, armed with an ancient horse pistol, was particularly indignant.

“If you are taken like this again, Cis, you will have to sleep in the far greenhouse, or in the back-yard; your yells sounded for all the world like a pig being killed.”

Then, with as much dignity as was compatible with a pair of long bare legs and a short military cape, he made his exit.

When all the kind inquirers had departed, I flung myself into Fanny’s sympathetic arms, and enjoyed a thoroughly luxurious cry, and sobbed myself to sleep. “Cissy’s friend with the red tie,” and “Cissy’s dream,” became a sort of family joke and a byword with the boys for many, many months. At last other events thrust the jest into the background, and it was eventually forgotten, even by myself, though for weeks and weeks at night I had seemed to feel an iron grip upon my throat, and to meet in the dark the intolerable glare of a pair of wolfish eyes.

Two whole years had passed since I experienced that hideous vision. Robin was in India, with his regiment; Fanny was in Switzerland – on her honeymoon. We were quite a small party at home now – only five. It was a lovely day in the month of September; father and every one of the family, also the servants, and almost every soul about the place, had departed at daybreak to the great annual fair, held at our nearest town. They had set out at three o’clock, and were not expected home until dark; father had horses to sell and cattle to buy, and each of the domestics required something, for besides a market for multitudes of sheep and oxen, this fair boasted merry-go-rounds, shows and booths. No one remained, save the cook, who might reasonably have been exhibited as “the fat woman,” Scanlan the butler, and myself. Scanlan was an ancient retainer, formerly father’s soldier servant, an old bachelor, with a close fist, and a crusty temper, who still insisted on treating me as if I were but six years of age.

I spent the long hours busily; I had presided at the breakfast by candle-light; it was not often that I had a day to myself totally undisturbed, and I made the most of it.

I wrote letters, mended garments, rearranged the smoking-room (a daring liberty), made two family cakes, and gathered and arranged a quantity of flowers. Then I prepared to enjoy a well-earned rest – and “Oliver Twist.” I drew my chair into a French window in the drawing-room, and sat with my back to the light, thrilled by the murder of poor Nancy. My nerves were strung to their highest tension, as I followed the awful career of Bill Sikes; my silly little heart was beating tumultuously; a mere mouse in the wainscot had actually made me jump. Judge, then, of my feelings, when suddenly a black shadow fell across the page, and turning, I beheld the man of my dream – red necktie and all!

Yes, there he was; and – no, I was not asleep, I was wide awake. His hulking body leant heavily against the sash, his frowsy hat was pulled over his eyes, whilst his great hands fumbled awkwardly for the handle of the window. I fastened the bolt precipitately, glanced quickly at the other windows; thank God, they were all closed! I then screamed out—

“What do you want?”

“Is the colonel within?”

“No; he is out.”

“I want to see him badly. I served under him—”

“Wait,” I cried. Then I darted across the room. I tore at the bell; how it clanged and reverberated through the empty lower regions! I held the door ajar, and saw as it were, unconsciously, a gaunt, slouching figure pass to the front at a shambling run.

Scanlan’s well-drilled military step was oh! what a sweet sound to me! I spoke to him, still holding the door, ready to fly at an instant’s notice.

“There is a dreadful-looking man about, a tramp. Put the chain upon the hall door, and don’t let him in,” I cried out hysterically.

“All right, miss,” replied Scanlan, departing with loud, leisurely footsteps. I heard him put up the chain and open the door with his usual flourish. Presently he closed it and came back, saying very peevishly

“There’s not a soul there, Miss Cissy. Ye were up early, and ye fell asleep without doubt and ye dreamt it.”

“No, not this time,” was my enigmatic answer. “I expect he is hidden in the laurels. Keep the door locked and barred, for Heaven’s sake! and, Scanlan”-in my most coaxing key – “if you don’t mind, would you sit in the hall till they come back. I – I – feel dreadfully nervous—”

Scanlan had no sympathy with “nerves;” nevertheless, he remained within call, biding in the dining-room and library.

They – meaning the family and servants – returned about eight o’clock, all full of their day’s doings and in the highest spirits; they discoursed volubly of their bargains in colts, yearlings, calves, ribbons, shawls – and even “ginger-bread husbands.”

“And you, of course, saw no one; you stick-at-home, Cis,” said my brother Ted. “You have nothing to tell us?”

“You are mistaken for once,” I answered, tremulously; “the tramp I dreamt about, called – the man with the red necktie.”

“Well, that is news. Did he leave his card for me?”

“I did not go to receive him this time, as you may imagine,” I continued, with ill-assumed composure. “I called Scanlan, and when he opened the door, there was no one to be seen!”

“You don’t say so!” cried Teddy, sarcastically. “I should have been rather surprised if there was; you were dreaming again. How does old pipe-clay like attending on your visionary callers? I thought he looked rather black.”

“But it was no dream this time,” I repeated. “I saw the tramp as plainly as I see you; the dream was a warning, and saved my life.”

“Saved your grandmother! Upon my word, Cissy, it is getting serious, you and your visitor with the red tie;” and he roared with laughter, as rudely as any brother in Great Britain.

Nevertheless, the next morning, he and every one looked grave enough, when news was brought by Pat, the post-boy, that old Pat and Mrs. Kelly, who lived at that lonely spot, the Back Lodge, and were credited with considerable savings, had been found with their house pillaged, and their throats cut. Their spoons, watch, and money, had been carried off, although the poor old couple had evidently made a desperate struggle for their lives and property. The furniture was upset, and the walls splashed with blood. However, the only clue to the murderer’s identity was part of a red woollen necktie, found in the dead woman’s rigid clutch; the other half was subsequently picked up in the wood: but the tramp, its owner, was never seen again; no, not even in my dreams.

HER LAST WISHES

“Rest, rest, perturbed spirit.”

—Hamlet

The Rev. Eustace Herbert was one of the most indefatigable labourers among the poor of a densely crowded parish in the East of London. Slumming with him was not a mere transient caprice, the fashion of a season, a novel page for idle fingers to scan and turn over – it was his life’s work, and an inexorable and ever-present duty. His energy was tireless, his zeal inexhaustible, they laid upon his weak, mortal frame more than it could support. Long hours of work and struggle, short hours of sleep, and scanty meals – all these had their due effect on mind and body, and both succumbed. The active, eloquent, indomitable priest emerged from a fever a shattered wreck – a prey to depression, insomnia, and delusions.

He was ordered away to new climes and countries; commanded to forget misery, squalor, crime, cruelty; to cease to puzzle over social problems, and to exchange grey days and grim scenes for mental idleness and golden sunshine.

A sea voyage restored sleep and appetite to the invalid; fresh characters and gay surroundings thrust shabby old tenants from his thoughts, and when he landed in Calcutta the Rev. Eustace Herbert was already a new man!

He travelled much and far, and was confronted on every side by old religions and shameless, gaudy idolatry. He beheld with amazed eyes the stern piety of the Mahomedans; their prompt answers to summons to prayer. He listened to the sonorous eloquence of a turbaned missionary, preaching the Prophet, at the corner of the street. Religion was an all-important ingredient in daily life, its observance a matter of course, in this vast heathen land! The fact was unpleasantly brought home to him when his hired coachman suddenly dropped from his box, at sundown, and, leaving his horses (a splendid instance of simple faith), prostrated himself on his face in a public thoroughfare.

What would a Londoner think (or say) if his driver were to behave in a like manner? The great pilgrimages were another revelation to the stranger – the fierce, unshaken belief of thousands, as testified by their toilsome journeys and incredible hardships.

The young priest measured with envious eyes the vast multitude which blackened the banks of the Ganges, and recalled with a glow of shame the dimensions of his own scanty flock, whose attendance was often due to a carnal desire for further donations of port wine, beef tea, and fuel.

He penetrated south – to old Madras, to out-of-the-world, teeming cities – fastnesses of Brahminism – on which one glimmer of nineteenth-century thought has never shed a ray! Here he witnessed, as a man in a dream, many curious ceremonies – the sacrifice in high places of sheep and oxen (precisely as in the days of Moses), and half-maddened wretches gashing themselves with knives, like the priests of Baal – and even beheld at a great distance that revolting spectacle known as “hook swinging.” Truly, he had many awakening experiences, not the least of which occurred on the platform of Pothanore Railway Station. Here he was suddenly accosted by a fair, long-haired European, in native dress (turban and dothi all complete), who thrust a copy of the War Cry into his astonished hands, and eagerly demanded if he was “saved.”

This, as well as every other incident, the Rev. Herbert Eustace carefully inscribed in a large Letts’s diary, which he wrote up conscientiously before retiring for the night. All his experiences were entered, with one notable exception – an experience he did not venture to set down in black and white, lest it should be read by unbelievers, discredited, and mocked at! It therefore falls to another to repair the omission, and to record the Rev. Eustace Herbert’s curious adventure on the Glenvale Coffee Estate in Mysore.

•   •   •   •   •

During his ramblings in the Madras Presidency, the clerical explorer found himself within easy reach – that is to say, within a hundred miles of the home of an old schoolfellow, who had failed for the army, married beneath him, and settled down in India for life.

Mr. St. Maur had heard of his friend’s arrival in the country, and had urged him to pay him a visit, in the following terms:

Glenvale, via Oonoor, Mysore.

Dear Eustace,

I understand that you are globe-trotting, for your health.

One of our planters heard you preach at Trichinopoly last Sunday – I am glad you don’t exceed fifteen minutes – and told me of your whereabouts. You must come and pay me a visit; we are only forty miles from Oonoor Station, where I will meet you. It is whispered that you are writing a book of travels. If so, it is your bounden duty to see everything, including an old worn-out coffee estate, and you may put us all in print, if you choose!

Bar jokes, I will take no refusal, old fellow. I want to see a familiar face from home, to talk over Winchester days, and to get you to christen our son and heir. We have no padre in these regions, and there are several little jobs for you in the way of joining couples together in holy matrimony.

I have been five years on the Glenvale coffee plantation, and am rubbing along fairly well, considering the awful state of the rupee, and one or two wretched seasons. I bought the property for a mere song. It was said to be worked out, and the owners were sick of it and this remote part of the earth. However, I find that some pickings are still to be had. A cheap, healthy, outdoor life suits me. I am my own master, though a married man, and I get some first-class shooting, and have several capital fellow planters in the neighbourhood. I can promise you a hearty welcome, a comfortable room, and the best coffee you ever tasted!

Give me two days’ notice, and you will be met at Oonoor Station by your old friend,

J. St. John St. Maur.

Ten days after the receipt of this epistle, the Rev. Eustace Herbert alighted from the train, about sunrise, at an insignificant little platform, with an enormous name board, on which huge English and Tamil characters contended for space. A stalwart Englishman, whose eager eyes looked out between a mushroom topee and a monstrous beard, welcomed the new arrival with a blow on the back, that nearly landed that frail person in the middle of the track. A tonga and pair of peevish, wiry ponies were in waiting, and as soon as the conveyance had been loaded up with parcels, boxes, stores of sorts, and Mr. Herbert’s modest luggage, he and his host started off, clattering down a steep village street, and away towards the foot of the adjacent Blue Mountains. The road was fair – the “tats” travelled rapidly, by open plain, then dense forest jungle, by rising winding ways, through luxurious tropical scenery, leaving gradually behind them palms, banana-trees, cacti, and sweltering little mud hamlets. On, on, to higher latitudes and colder air – on, up among the coffee and the tea-meeting only lumbering, laden bullock carts, drowsily descending to the low country

During his forty mile drive the Rev. Eustace Herbert found ample employment for eyes, ears, and tongue. He had much to hear, and yet more to tell.

There was a relay of fresh ponies half-way, and the journey was almost accomplished ere it seemed well begun, so pleasantly had the time – and the miles – flashed by.

The steep, wooded, winding ghaut road had been exchanged for the open plateau, where bright-green downs, dark-green coffee bushes, and the delicate tea plant, divided the soil.

“Here we are on the Glenvale Estate, at last,” said St. Maur, as they turned down a by-road to the left. “There is the bungalow-it faces due south; we approach it at the back, as you see.”

“It’s a big place!” remarked his guest, “like an English country house.”

“Yes, it is big – too big for us. It was built fifty years ago, when people did things on a large scale, and lived out in India all their lives. The Mortons owned miles up here – labour was cheap, coffee was dear; they made their pile – at least, old Morton did; the property was divided and split up. I bought this bit with the house – I got it dirt cheap, from a chap called Fleming; he only stayed here a couple of years – he could not stand the life, and bolted.”

“It looks a most delightful retreat,” cried his friend, as they rapidly drew near a great stone, flat-roofed bungalow, with a deep pillared verandah, embowered in passion flowers. It was not engulfed to the very steps in coffee bushes, like many a planter’s house, but haughtily held the business, plant, and premises, at a distance, and was surrounded by at least twenty acres of short grass, dotted with cinchona trees and clumps of firs. A well-kept avenue wound up to the verandah; there was no particular hall door, but a dumpy, little woman, in a washed-out print gown, stood on the steps to receive them. This was Mrs. St. John St. Maur – late Miss Jane Bodd, factory hand, of Lancashire, England – who awkwardly welcomed her guest in an exceedingly broad provincial dialect. Yes, and she was fat, freckled, and ordinary. What had possessed St. Maur! thought his schoolfellow. His wife must have some brilliant qualities, to atone for such lamentable deficiencies – in grace, manners, beauty, and fortune. (She was a cheerful, even-tempered person, a notable housekeeper – this in the jungle is a valuable accomplishment, and covers a multitude of shortcomings.)

“Joe, did you bring the bacon?” she demanded breathlessly. “Did ye find all the things at the station?”

“Yes; all but the books from Higginbotham.”

“Ah, well, them’s no matter; but we couldn’t well want the lamp oil, and beer, and champagne. Come in, Mr. Herbert; come in do, ye must be starving. Joe here will show you your room, and tiffin is just ready.”

“My wife is not literary,” explained St. Maur with a smile. “You won’t find any yellow asters, lilac sun bonnets, or green carnations lying about our diggings, but she will make you comfortable. Now tell me, what do you think of this?” and he flung wide a door.

His companion uttered an involuntary exclamation of surprise – the immense room which he entered opened straight into a wide verandah that overlooked the most exquisite prospect his eyes had ever rested upon.

A long valley, sloping away to the misty blue plains, and bounded on either hand by majestic purple mountains; the immediate foreground was filled by a flower garden laid out in true old English fashion, with neat box borders, and gravelled paths, blooming with luxuriant rose bushes, myrtles, heliotropes, gigantic fuchsias, and fragrant orange-trees. A shallow flight of stone steps led from it to a gentle descent of greensward, a kind of wild pleasure ground, with clumps of rhododendrons, acacias, and oaks. This, in turn, gradually lost itself in the surrounding jungle of boulder stones, forest trees, and tree ferns.

The sweet scent of flowers, the balmy afternoon air, penetrated the spare room, which was spacious, lofty, and scrupulously neat; it was, moreover, unexpectedly luxurious, being furnished with handsome, old, carved, black wood furniture – a bed, bureau, wardrobe, and toilet-table. The floor was covered with a thick but faded Indian carpet, and the huge rosewood cheval-glass and velvet couch claimed the visitor’s respect.

“I took over the bungalow, lock, stock, and barrel,” explained St. Maur. “This room is just as it stood in old Morton’s time; it was his daughter’s, I believe, and that was her garden. I hope you will find it comfortable.”

To this query the Reverend Eustace gave an enthusiastic assent; this guest chamber, with its windows opening into a lovely pleasure-ground, and commanding an unsurpassed view, was a room in which to entertain happy or noble thoughts, and to dream enchanting dreams. The visitor was charmed with everything he was introduced to – from the quaint old bungalow, with its air of age and better days, to the great white pulping-house and the small red baby.

Worn out by his journey, and soothed by the perfume-laden air, the Rev. Eustace Herbert feel asleep almost as soon as he laid his head on the pillow. It was a full moon that sailed in the sky, and her light was as bright as day. One of the windows stood wide open that warm April night; gradually the traveller’s eyes closed on his surroundings, on the shrubs in the garden, throwing sharp black shadows on the vague objects in the room – on the whole world. He slept profoundly for some time, when all at once, and for no apparent reason, he found himself distinctly wide awake! It seemed to him that he heard a faint, but distinctly audible, sigh. Surely there was someone in the room?

Yes. A woman in a white gown was sitting at the dressing-table, leaning her head on her hand. He raised himself stealthily on his elbow, and saw that she was absorbed in a volume which lay open before her. It was his own Prayer-book. Presently he sat up, and gave a gentle cough of expostulation.

The lady slowly turned her head, and looked at him. She had a pair of deep pathetic eyes, and a pretty young face – but it was wan and sad.

Then she rose wearily, as if she was extremely tired, passed through the open window, and walked out into the garden without sound of footfall. Who could she be?-he had not seen her the previous evening. He jumped from his bed, rushed to the verandah, and gazed up and down – there was no one within sight. Then he glanced at his open Prayer-book, and gave a violent and involuntary start, for it lay wide open at “The Service for the Burial of the Dead.”

•   •   •   •   •

The next morning her visitor discovered Mrs. St. Maur bustling about among her stores and servants – excessively busy with preparations for the christening, and two weddings, which were to take place that same afternoon.

She, however, found time, between voluble orders in the Tamil language, to ask him how he had slept, and she eyed him a little anxiously.

“Like a top, thank you.”

“That’s all right” – turning away.

“But,” he added, “everyone else is not so fortunate.”

Mrs. St. Maur paused, and stared.

“Surely you have a somnambulist on the premises. Have you not?”

“Laws – no! I never heard of that sort of religion – but my cook says he is a Baptist!”

“Oh, I don’t mean that – but someone who walks in their sleep, don’t you know?”

Mrs. St. Maur gaped at him open-mouthed.

“I never heard of the like – no one walks here! Happen you’d a nightmare – we had pork for dinner. You think someone was tramping round?”

“Yes, I am sure of it.”

“It might have been the chowkidar. Last time young Forbes slept in that room, he complained of him, and said he saw him poking about the dressing-table. I did give it to the old gentleman, though he declared he never was that side of the house all night.”

As the Reverend Eustace turned to greet her husband, he distinctly heard her mutter to herself, in a querulous aside, “There’s always complaints about that room.”

The christening and the two weddings (one of a planter’s assistant, and the other of a Eurasian clerk) took place at Glenvale, with great éclat. There was a cake from D’Angelis, champagne, quantities of real orange blossoms, and a large and merry company who had assembled from all the surrounding estates, in order to make holiday.

By ten o’clock, however, the last tonga, the last lazy bullock bandy, and the last reluctant pony, had departed, and peace, silence, and moonlight once more fell upon the Glenvale estate.

And once more towards the small hours, the reverend guest was aroused, and again he saw the lady reading at his dressing-table, a young lady, who raised her head and gazed at him with eyes of haggard reproach, then arose deliberately, sauntered through the open window, passed down the garden towards the slope, and with a quick, beckoning wave of her hand, disappeared amidst a clump of far-distant rhododendrons. Yes. There was the Prayer-book wide open in the same place; the whole occurrence was exceedingly mysterious. There was no use in questioning Mrs. St. Maur, but over a morning pipe in the verandah he unfolded his experience to her husband.

“At first I thought it was one of my old delusions, but my head is clear enough, and I never was better in my life. What does it mean, Joe? Can you explain it in any reasonable way?”

“No; but perhaps old Murphy, who was overseer here for twenty years, can throw some light on it. He was born and bred on these hills and lived with his daughter in Coimbatore. He happens to be up now, with his son, who has a small tea estate, the other side of the ghaut. He is coming round this afternoon, I know, to drink the kid’s health, and look at the new crop. If anyone can tell us yarns about this place, he can, and he will be willing enough – for he is the greatest talker in the Presidency. You say you distinctly saw the girl pass through the garden, down the slope, and then turn and beckon to you before she disappeared among the trees? I must confess that I wonder you did not follow her.”

“Yes – but I was in my sleeping suit and bare feet, you see, and I must confess that I never had the least impulse to do so; quite the contrary, in fact.”

“Suppose we go and make a search now; you can tell me the bearings of whereabouts she vanished?”.

“Of course I can; it was quite a long way down – near a rhododendron clump. Come on.”

The two old schoolfellows turned off to the slope, and to where it was bounded by the greedy, ever insatiable jungle. They pushed aside some straggling branches of a great overgrown rhododendron, and there discovered a long, significant mound – in short, a grave. As they stood looking at one another across it, a loud hearty voice exclaimed:

“So you have it at last! I always knew it would be found someday – I mean where Miss Nellie Morton was buried!”

“Hullo, Murphy, is that yourself?” cried St. Maur. “Glad to see you. Who was Miss Nellie Morton, and why was she buried here?”

“She was buried here because she died here, of cholera, poor dear child! and she was young Morton’s only sister. She lived with him and his wife. The black cholera was raging round, and the coolies, and servants, and every living soul, fled the place – just ran for their dear lives – never stopped to pack a bundle, or to turn a key. It was awful bad in these hills, that season! Miss Nellie got it from nursing her ayah – she was took herself in a couple of hours. Young Morton and one of his assistants buried her – no one knew when or where and then he and his wife cleared out that same hour; but he and his assistant got cholera too, and died on their way down the Seegor Ghaut; you may see the graves by the roadside any day. His wife never came back here; she always hated the place, for she was main fond of balls and society, and used to sit crying, for amusement and company, for hours together! But Miss Nellie, she loved every inch and stone of Glenvale. You see, she was born here, but eddicated at home; she knew every path for miles. It was she made the flower garden and the seat under the orange tree, and she was a great horsewoman, and a real beauty too. Young Norris, across the valley, was her intended husband, and he was away in Madras on business; and when he came back again here, and found the whole place deserted, the cattle and fowl straying wild, and her dead, he nearly went mad, and no wonder. He could never find her grave – not though he searched for days and days – and no one knew where she was laid by her brother, seeing as he was gone too; but you discovered it easily enough, sir”-nodding at the clergyman.

“Yes,” he replied, with a meaning look at his friend; “I had no difficulty at all.”

“Mr. Norris is not young Norris now, but he has never married – he lives alone across the valley, and I am sure he would be very thankful to know where she lies at long last.”

“Yes,” assented St. Maur, “we will send him word, but the news need not be given out elsewhere. Don’t tell Janie” – addressing his guest; “she is awfully superstitious. She would not stay here an hour if she suspected that there was a ghost in the house. I knew that the bungalow stood empty for years before Fleming came, and I did hear that the reason he cleared out was that he could not stand a girl who came and cried and beckoned to him at the door; but as I knew he had had D.T. several times, and made the same complaints of sheep, and cockatoos, and snakes, I thought nothing of it. However, I now remember that one or two planter fellows said they could never sleep properly in that room; it was too big, so they declared – but the truth is, I suppose, they were ashamed to confess that they had seen her!”

That same evening the christening and wedding ceremonies were supplemented by another, which was held privately at sundown – over the grave among the rhododendrons. Only Mr. Norris, Old Murphy, Mr. St. Maur, and his friend were present. And it is an unquestionable fact that, after this service, the figure in the spare room was never seen again.

The Rev. Eustace Herbert duly published his book, “Six Months among Strange Sights;” it has appeared in neat six-shilling form, but its pages may be searched in vain for the most thrilling of his experiences – the fact that he had complied with an unspoken request from an apparition in the Glenvale guest-chamber, and had personally carried out the last wishes of a ghost!

THE HELPER

“THE POWER BEHIND THE PEN”

When the Reverend Maurice Hay died suddenly of heart failure, his parishioners were full of solicitude and sympathy for his orphan girls. Rose and Josephine, who, in spite of youth and good looks, were very popular in Dullditch and its neighbourhood. As it was understood that they had no fortune beyond their pretty faces, no investments, except certain paltry accomplishments, their affairs naturally furnished a subject of burning interest; the villagers laid their heads together, and wondered what on earth the Hay girls were to do! Lady helps, lady nurses, companions, typists, these attractive and genteel posts were urged upon them, but the Hays decided that they would go together to London, and endeavour to find work as artists. The community disapproved and remonstrated – singly, in couples, and by letter. When these good-natured efforts proved unavailing, it was remembered that the Vicar’s daughters had foreign blood in their veins; their mother’s father was an Italian, and an Italian painter – two facts much to be deplored. His queer, roving, Bohemian ideas were manifesting themselves in his descendants; yet it was admitted that the Hay girls had some taste for drawing. Rose’s clever black-and-white sketches decorated most of her friends’ albums; Josephine painted quite recognisable miniatures – gratis. She had curly brown locks, a merry, round face, a pink-and-white complexion, and resembled one of Cosway’s masterpieces.

Rose, with her dark hair and eyes, and ivory skin, was like her own particular branch of art, a charming study in black and white.

The sisters had no near relatives, no one to advise, help, or control them; with regard to their future plans, they were not merely determined, but sanguine. It was their intention to settle in London, and with a few good introductions, and plenty of hard work, they expected to make their fortune, and by and by fly down to visit dear old Dullditch, in a splendid 45 h.p. motor-car!

Those who had interest through friends – or even friends’ friends – wrote letters, and did their utmost to give the orphans a start; and before very long, armed with introductions and fortified with advice, they departed full of hope and ambition. At first they dispatched glowing descriptions of their “upper part,” the cheapness of London, the numbers and quality of their invitations – and orders; but two years had now passed, correspondence had languished, letters had ceased to arrive at Dullditch, and there was no sign whatever of the 45 h.p. motor-car!

The truth was, the young amateurs had ceased to be a novelty – other more interesting strangers had arrived. London likes a change, the Hays had lost their hold on their little circle; their spirits and good looks were clouded, orders and invitations had become painfully rare, and in the pushing, hustling world the two pretty sisters were thrust aside, and forgotten.

•   •   •   •   •

It was a wet November evening, and Josephine Hay sat by a fire of cheap, bad coal, awaiting her sister’s return from an errand in the City. Their home was the upper part of a shabby little house in West Kensington; here they rented two rooms, back and front, as well as a den on the stairs, which served for cooking – when there was anything to cook. The front apartment was dining-, sitting-room, and studio combined; a deal table, covered with drawing materials, stood in either window, a decrepit horsehair sofa and a deformed cane chair were drawn up to the fire, and between them was placed a tray, with tea-things, as well as half a stale loaf and a pot of apple and blackberry jam.

By the capricious gleams of the smouldering coals, Josephine was counting the contents of her lean leather purse; count as she would, including coppers and one stamp, the grand total came to one pound, three shillings, and seven pence.

She hastily snapped the purse, and turned on the light, as the door opened to admit her sister, who v;as a wet and miserable spectacle.

“Oh, Rosie, you are drowned!” she cried.

“Not quite” – coming forward and putting down a flat parcel; “it is a dreadful night.” As she spoke, she peeled off her damp gloves with tender care, and then proceeded to remove her boots. Meanwhile Josephine prepared to make tea.

“There’s a boot for you!” Rose said, exhibiting a small dilapidated specimen; “it’s like a colander – they both are; no charwoman would own them!”

“And your stockings are soaking!”

“Oh, they will dry on,” was the courageous answer, and she held her well-darned hose to the fire.

“No luck, I suppose?” said Josephine after a moment’s silence.

“None – I’ll tell you all about it, as soon as I’ve had my tea. I’m so thirsty, and so hungry – and—”

Here she reached for the loaf and began to cut it.

“And tired,” said her sister, concluding the sentence; “you walked home, Rose, and it’s five long miles.”

“No, I took a penn’orth of bus – instead of a bun – and now I’ll take it out of the loaf, O housekeeper. Ah!” raising a cup of tea to her lips, “this is delicious. I was thinking of this happy moment, as I paddled along in the rain. – What have you done, Joe?”

“I went to Queen’s Gate with the miniatures, and saw Miss Wiggin. She was so disagreeable, and cross and dissatisfied. She said it was not the least like her – or if it is, she had no idea she was so plain.”

“I could have told her that,” declared Rose.

“And – she supposed, as it was an order – and she muttered something about charity, which I could not afford to hear – that she must take it – when it was altered to her satisfaction. She insists on a better complexion, and a new nose; so I have brought it home instead of the three guineas – and I know I shall never please her. How did you fare?”

“Much the same! It has been a bad day altogether. I took my illustrations of ‘A Drowned Girl’s Diary” to Puffit & Smack, and the Art Editor, a superior young man, with a pince-nez and a high-pitched nose, received the sketches between two disdainful fingers, and then examined them through his glasses, and said:

“‘Dear me. Miss Hay! These will never do. You have no idea of anatomy; this girl has two elbows in her arm – and the man is a freak! The editor has complained of your work, and – er – I’m really afraid we cannot – er – accept any more of it; you might try the comic papers.’”

“Oh dear!” ejaculated the housekeeper.

“Fancy his attempting to be funny, whilst he took the bread out of my mouth. The Week End is my only employer, since the Kestrel dropped me – and died.”

“And Miss Wiggin assured me that I need not expect any further orders from her friends; she was in earnest, and a temper, so what are we to do?”

“Ask old Mrs. Mote to lend us five pounds – or go out and sell matches?”

“Oh, Joe, I’d rather sell matches. I should hate to borrow, though she is a dear old thing. Our affairs would be all over Dullditch.”

“If we are found in a garret starved to death, and the fact is printed in scare lines in the Daily Mail, our affairs will also be the talk of the village; however, never say die! I’ve brought back the sketches, and I’ll have another try – it means twenty-five shillings.”

“And the rent,” said Josephine. “I cannot understand how we do so badly – we got on swimmingly at first; visitors, orders, promises, payment, theatre tickets, invitations – and now!”

“People were kind. We were new, unsophisticated, fresh and green from the country; but only a pair of clever, self-confident amateurs. We have done our best; it is not in us to do more – to excel.”

“Unless we could go over to Paris, and work there.”

“Might as well talk of going to heaven.”

“Goodness knows I work hard,” continued Josephine, with a catch in her breath; “I study all the pictures I can, I run into the National Gallery on free days, and stare, and ponder, and wish, and wonder; but it’s all something so far above me – Genius – Genius – Genius!”

Her sister nodded a grave assent.

“I hear girls talking of effect, and atmosphere, and technique, but there is something spiritual in Art, and in the work of great masters; it seems such a waste of a precious gift, when they die, and their marvellous power is lost to the world for ever. Oh, if they could only bequeath their faculties as they bequeath their riches! How grateful I should be for a tiny legacy – even for a crumb.”

“And so should I,” agreed Rose, “the smallest contribution thankfully received; unfortunately there is no use in wishing. We are just a dull, plodding, stupid couple, who have exhausted our resources, and the patience of our – friends. I begin to see myself returning to ‘the Ditch,’ as mother’s help to Mrs. Gull, the baker’s wife; there I shall at least be sure of a roof and bread. Well, there is no use in looking at the worst side of a picture. Tomorrow I intend to make a fresh start; I shall copy your figure, and if you like you may borrow my nose,for the miniature. It is nice and straight – my best feature.”

“Really, Rose, you are wonderful!” exclaimed her sister. “What spirits you have! – no matter what happens, they never seem to sink.”

“I hope we shall both swim – someday,” she answered, rising as she spoke. “And now that my petticoats and stockings are dry, I am going to bed.”

•   •   •   •   •

“’Pon my word – eh – it’s really – er – yes, quite good!” exclaimed the Art Editor. “Comes all right this time, Miss Hay; it only wanted a little pains, you see! You were getting slack. This is one of your best drawings – so much life in it – the anatomy .correct – excellent. Did anyone help you?” and he gave her a sharp glance over his glasses.

“Oh no, indeed,” she replied eagerly, “it is entirely my own work.”

“Is that so?” he answered dubiously. “I must confess that people would hardly credit that this lifeless performance,” drawing out a former sketch, “and this,” tapping her latest production, “were the work of the same hand. One is the well-meant attempt of an amateur, the other is the – ah, I will not flatter you to your face – it is capital.”

“I am so glad you are pleased,” said Rose, with a tinge of colour in her pale face – praise and encouragement were indeed rare. “Am I to do the remainder?” she added timidly.

“Oh yes, but in your later style; you may always depend upon commissions if you stick to that. I expect you would like a little cheque,” and he sat down and scribbled one for twenty-five shillings; then, as he handed it to her, he cleared his throat, and said, “To be quite frank, this was intended to have been your last payment – but now that you have shown what you can accomplish, when you try, I hope we shall continue to do business together. It,” and he smiled, “was rather a narrow squeak, I cannot think why you have hitherto hid your light under a bushel. This sketch,” once more examining it, “is – er – really quite good.”

Here, as the telephone rang passionately, he offered his hand with an air of graceful dismissal, and bowed her to the door.

“Twenty-five shillings and compliments,” announced’ Rose, as she handed the little cheque to her sister.

“Three guineas – and gush!” rejoined Josephine, with a delighted laugh. “Miss Wiggin is enchanted with your nose – highly flattered, and said it was so admirably truthful to life! She took the miniature away to the drawing-room, and exhibited it to some friends – then she called me in. A man who was an artist talked of ‘fine technical achievement,’ ‘a subtle interpretation of a personality,’ and other grand terms. The main thing was, he liked it; and I received two orders. Miss Wiggin was so fascinated with her picture, she kept looking, and looking at it, and could not bear to put it down. She has ordered another copy, and she asked me such an odd question.”

“Your age? – your dressmaker’s address?”

“No, you silly, silly girl, but if I had painted it myself?”

“And you replied, ‘Of course – who else?’”

“Yes, but she said, ‘The reason I ask is, that it is so very superior to your general work – such dash – and yet such finish.’ I can see that myself. When I was working on it I felt as if I were inspired, and influenced; I was in a sort of raging fever – my brush flew here and there, and instead of making a hideous muddle, every stroke told!”

“Imagine drawing inspiration from the face of a Miss Wiggin!” exclaimed Rose.

“Imagine it, indeed! The miniature is to be exhibited. It may make my fortune. It is good – I feel it in my bones.”

“Poor dear Joe – your bones are prominent enough!”

“At any rate, I believe we have turned the corner. We have four pounds five in hand, and the rent – how shall we spend it?”

“A good lunch, and a matinée?” suggested Rose.

“Certainly not. We spend it – but on boots, real boots, not brown paper – and gloves, the signs of gentlefolk. Perhaps hats – I know a very cheap place, and appearances are so important.”

“So is food,” broke in her sister; “let us celebrate our good luck with something for supper – sausages on toast, strawberry jam, and sponge-cakes? A feast for the gods!”

•   •   •   •   •

The artists continued to prosper; their tide of success flowed steadily – fortune increased with fame. Miniatures by J. Hay were much sought for; Josephine had more orders than she could execute – her reputation was firmly established. As for Rose – the name of “R. Hay” on a black-and-white sketch was a guarantee of excellence; she illustrated important books, and where once she was thankful for shillings, she now received sovereigns. Former acquaintances recalled the sisters – and their own active benevolence to a couple of struggling strangers – and prided themselves on their perspicuity. They looked up the Hays, deluged them with invitations, and enquired “where they had been hiding for the last twelve months?”

“Nothing succeeds like success.” The portraits of the sister artists appeared in popular papers and magazines, their names in paragraphs, and in lists of guests at various famous houses.

They no longer rented an “upper part,” but a smart and commodious fiat in a fashionable locality, and employed two servants, and a Court dressmaker. Their strides in their art were amazing, even to themselves. Once, as Rose completed a spirited sketch, she exclaimed:

“Now this really is good! So good, that I can hardly believe I have drawn it myself, but that I am a mere automaton, worked by – a – a – certain – something – a hidden power!”

“Do you know, I have often felt that too,” said Josephine, “as if some masterful personality helped me – a peculiar inspiration directed my hand, guided it rapidly, and resolutely, to unerring achievement and success!”

Her sister looked at her with an air of grave surprise. “I wonder if this could be so?” she murmured.

The pen in Josephine’s fingers suddenly wrote on the margin of her work the words:

“Yes, it is so.”

She stared at the sentence in fascinated silence, then turning hastily about, said:

“Oh, Rose, do come and see what the pen has just written of itself! What can it mean? I declare on my honour I did not originate this.”

“I see… I believe it is what is called automatic writing,” said Rose, after a significant pause. “I have heard of it. Do try if it will write more. See, here is a sheet of clean paper – now write a question.”

“Do you help my sister?” Josephine wrote obediently.

“Yes, and yourself,” came the reply.

“We are most grateful to you. Were you a great artist?”

“I am – a great artist,” wrote the power behind the pen.

“May we know your name?”

“No.”

“What may we call you?”

“Helper.”

“Can we do anything for you?”

“Pray.”

“Will you continue to help us?”

“Yes. Good-bye.”

“Is it not uncanny?” said Josephine. “Do you think I wrote this? – or the artist? – or is it one of the modern discoveries – my subconscious self coming to the surface?”

“Perhaps,” replied Rose, “but it explains all my success, and yours. The help arrived precisely when we were at our wits’ end. Don’t you remember, that wet November night – how we talked of lost gifts, and inspiration? I believe he came then.”

“Yes, I remember that night well.”

“We were two wretched little painstaking amateurs, without one spark, or glimmer, of genius. Now we are ‘true artists’; even the wickedest critic admits this. The Helper has been our master, has taught us, and set his own work once more before the public, drawn by our feeble fingers; it is the hand of the dead reincarnated in ours – we are in tune with some unknown mystery.”

“Yes, and we had better keep the mystery to ourselves,” said Rose the practical, and she stood up, and put the sheet of paper in the fire.

“Do you think it wrong, Rosie? – are we what is called ‘possessed’?”

“No – did he not ask us to pray? And we will. Why should not a departed spirit show kindness, and give charity to others? You and I are the objects of his benevolence – but for him, God knows what would have become of us!”

After this experience, it became an everyday matter to carry on a little correspondence with the Helper, who proved to be the Hays’ mainstay for many months; but at last he gave notice of his departure, in these words:

“You can now walk, and work alone – and another sorely needs assistance.”

“For a picture?” wrote Josephine.

“Yes, an important picture, which may make his fortune. A picture like this,” and with a few telling strokes the pen rapidly sketched a desert scene, a sunset, and a great caravan, with many kneeling figures; in the foreground two horses and two men; in the far distance, a passing sandstorm. Under this sketch the pen wrote, “Good-bye.”

“How we shall miss him,” said Rose, with a sigh; “though it is true that we are able to walk alone, – especially since we have had those lessons in Paris.”

“I shall always treasure the sketch,” said her sister, “our Helper’s last writing, and message. I shall lock it away in my desk.”

Two years elapsed, and ‘R. and J. Hay’ continued to prosper; they visited Dullditch – but not by motor – and during a holiday on the Continent happened by chance to enter a fine exhibition of modern paintings.

As she moved along slowly and conscientiously, catalogue in hand. Rose was accosted by Josephine, who looked so agitated and pale, that she was justly alarmed.

“Are you ill?” she asked. “What is it?”

“The picture is here,” she whispered excitedly. “Come, it is in the next room – the Helper’s picture of the desert. Oh, it is a masterpiece! – I could scarcely get near it for the crowd.”

Then, when at last an opening was obtained, Rose beheld the finished result of the sketch in her sister’s desk – correct in every particular.

There was the vast desert, the passing of a great sandstorm, the setting of a red sun, and a halted caravan. It was the hour of prayer and thanksgiving; a multitude of the faithful had prostrated themselves towards Mecca; in the foreground, two Europeans, dismounted, held their Arab horses, as they stood bare-headed, gazing towards the east.

On referring to the catalogue, the sisters read:

“409. – After the Sirocco. Anon.”

THE NORTH VERANDAH

A chance meeting in the hall of a Swiss hotel, in the vicinity of the visitors’ book, a polite “After you,” and a similarity of surnames led to our acquaintance with two charming Americans. The acquaintance ripened into friendship, and ultimately my sister Lucy and self discovered that Mrs. Washington-Dormer and her son Philip were connected with our family, and that we, the Dormers of Ashley Gardens, Victoria, London, S.W., were cousins (several times removed) of our namesakes of Rochelle, near Lexington, Kentucky, U.S.A.

Mrs. Dormer was a widow with a good figure, snow-white hair, and a bright, intelligent face. She had also a cheerful manner, and an air of suppressed energy. Having confessed to the national passion for old places, old curiosities and old pedigrees, she set to work to examine our family tree, from which it appeared that a certain relative had emigrated in the year 1810, settled, married and founded a dynasty in that State, so worthily celebrated for its thoroughbred horses and blue grass.

In company of “Cousin” Carolina and “Cousin” Philip, we travelled through Northern Italy and the Tyrol with mutual enjoyment, and before we separated in Paris had entered into a solemn league and covenant to visit our Kentucky cousins in the early “fall.” I was rather astonished at the alacrity with which Lucy accepted this invitation – knowing that she was a hopelessly bad sailor and how she hated the sea! It, however, dawned on me that she liked Cousin Philip, and the least observant could see that he worshipped her.

Behold us therefore arrived and happily established at Rochelle, a stately old “colonial” house which, with its pillared verandahs on all four sides, presented a dignified appearance in the midst of spreading turf lawns (the beautiful blue grass), avenues of walnut trees, and clumps of oak and hickory.

In former days, Rochelle had been surrounded by an immense estate, worked by slaves who raised and gathered vast crops of hemp, tobacco, and corn; but now the shrunken acreage was chiefly devoted to the breeding and rearing of horses; for these Cousin Philip enjoyed a reputation that extended from New York to New Orleans. My sister Lucy was in her element, being a fearless rider and a capital whip; Cousin Carolina, too, was an admirable horsewoman, despite her fifty years. The days were spent in driving racing trotters, galloping – young thoroughbreds, visiting distant runs, and inspecting rival stables.

These joys were not for me! I am naturally timid, a shameless coward where horses are concerned, distrustful of distant cows, and all strange dogs. I believe mine is what is termed “the artistic temperament” (I paint and write poetry), yet I have a certain queer courage of my own. For instance, I am not afraid to discharge a servant, to venture alone into a dark room, and have no belief in ghosts. When my sister, cousins, and their friends scoured the neighbourhood, I remained contentedly at Rochelle, sketching the best “bits” of scenery, the little black “piccaninnys,” and the interior of the house itself. Mr. and Mrs. Gossett, Cousin Carolina’s niece and nephew, were a gay young couple also of the party, which included Cousin Carolina’s old schoolfellow. Miss Virginia Boone, a lineal descendant of the founder of the State. She was an interesting woman, and had a fund of stories relating to Kentucky and the Civil War, which rent the State in two. One day Lucy asked her to tell us something about Rochelle itself; it was so mellowed and solid, and in its way delightful, with an atmosphere of age and peace. Surely it had a history?

“Well, you see,” said Miss Boone, clearing her throat, “Carolina has not lived here long – it’s not her family place. It belonged to the Taylors a great while back, and it was standing empty for quite a spell. The grass is said to be the best in the world for young horses, and Philip was crazy to come here, so he routed his mother out at last; Rochelle was a dead bargain loo, and though Carolina was loath to move, now she likes it.” Then, as if to herself, she added, “She comes from a distance – or maybe she’d never have come at all!”

This was a dark saying, and I hastened to beg for some enlightenment.

Miss Boone seemed to hesitate before she answered rather vaguely, “Well, of course, all great plantations are the same.”

“The same?” I echoed.

“Yes, where numbers of slaves have been employed. See,” pointing to a row of lines or negro quarters to the north of the house. “I expect in Taylor’s time there were hundreds there. The estates were some of the largest in Kentucky.”

“Cousin Carolina still has black servants,” I remarked.

“Oh yes – Uncle Pete, Mammy, and Jane were born in the family, the children of children, of slaves, yet devoted to the Dormers.”

“Do you know, I saw such a forbidding looking nigger staring in through the breakfast-room window?” said Lucy. “I’ve never noticed him as one of the servants or hands, and he looked anything but devoted! He was coal black and big, and he pressed his hideous face close up against the glass door and scowled at me and muttered something; when I got up., and went to find out what he wanted, he was gone.”

“A tramp,” I suggested.

“Possibly. I hope I shan’t see him again!” said Lucy, rising. “Here come the horses and the buggy; you,” to me, “will have the house to yourself for the whole afternoon.”

“So much the better,” I answered; “I intend to make a sketch of Taffy, and there will be no one to distract his attention.”

Taffy was a handsome fox-terrier, remarkable for a very short tail and great independence of character.

I watched the cavalcade turn down the avenue, Cousin Carolina and Miss Boone driving, followed by two mounted couples, and then set to work to persuade Taffy to sit for his portrait. By and by the fierce glare of the setting sun compelled me to retreat with my block, paint-box, and model into the north verandah. This overlooked from a respectful distance the servants’ quarters – and, possibly for this reason, was but little frequented. It proved delightfully shady and almost empty, save for a few roomy old cane chairs, but now that I had obtained a satisfactory light my sitter began to fail me; he became restless, fidgety and disobedient, turning his head, pricking up his ears; finally he trotted off bodily. His attitude implied grave suspicion of something, or somebody – and his air was so uneasy that he almost gave the impression of there being an intruder in our vicinity – visible only to him!

This of course was a ridiculous idea, but as nothing would induce Taffy to “sit,” I relinquished the hope of finishing my sketch, and fetching a book from the drawing-room, settled myself comfortably in one of the cane chairs and prepared to pass an hour of undisturbed enjoyment. The story of “Uncle Tom” proved to be absorbing; I had almost lost consciousness of my surroundings, when I was startled by a very peculiar sound quite close to me, a strange inarticulate gurgling noise, as if someone was being choked. I looked about; there was not a soul in the verandah, and I came to the conclusion that Taffy had swallowed a fly, which had gone the wrong way. I called to him; he was not fly-catching, but seemed to be staring intently at a certain closed door, and entirely unconscious of my presence.

I resumed my book, only to be again disturbed by this peculiar choking noise, and Taffy, with all his hair bristling on his back, now sought refuge under my chair, uttering low growls. At the same moment I noticed, coming directly from the servants’ lines, a gigantic negro, whom I never remembered to have seen before. His head was bare, his face lowering and sullen; he wore a ragged blue and white stripped jacket, trousers turned up to his knees, and a pair of clumsy boots. As he advanced, with a deliberate, purposeful air, I became conscious of a sensation of fear, which increased with every stride.

The evening was still and warm, not a breath of air was stirring, the very leaves were motionless. Taffy was dumb, and the only sound to be heard was these doggedly approaching footsteps.

A door in the verandah was suddenly flung open and, to my amazement, there came forth a middle-aged lady, who was a complete stranger; she wore a flowing white dressing-gown, with wide sleeves; her reddish hair, of which she had a quantity, hung loosely to her waist, her figure was tall and slight, her sallow face – this I only saw in profile – looked hard as flint; the expression of her sharply-cut features was fiercely determined, and aggressive. She hurried across the verandah with light, pattering footsteps, and reached the railings that enclosed it, almost at the same moment as the huge black. I gathered that she addressed him angrily – her face expressed violent fury – but I could not distinguish a single word. I sat there motionless, an amazed and nervous spectator. Presently Taffy crawled out from under my chair, and with one piercing howl fled from the scene like a creature possessed.

I observed that the negro listened to his mistress with downcast eyes, and an air of stolid indifference, also that, as he waited, he held one hand against his back; grasped in that hand – invisible to the woman – was a shining blade about two feet long, which I recognised as the knife used for cane-cutting, and called a “machete.”

As the two figures stood, one on the verandah, the other immediately beneath, I became aware that an enormous crowd had assembled outside the quarters, hundreds of coloured people – and a sudden hoarse hum arose, resembling the buzzing of angry bees. Finally the lady raised her clenched fist with a fierce, threatening gesture, and turned away.

As she did so, the negro gave a deep guttural laugh, reached out his arm, caught her violently by the hair, and dragged her head backwards over the edge of the railing. I saw her long thin throat, fully exposed, and it was with a shock of unexampled horror that I beheld the descent of a gleaming blade. With one swift stroke the wretched woman’s head was severed from her body, and I heard the previous gurgling and choking sound, as it fell with a heavy thud upon the lawn, while the trunk collapsed in a hideous heap upon the boards of the verandah – which were instantly deluged with blood. The dreadful tide was flowing towards me, but I was unable to stir hand or foot – I felt as if I were paralysed.

As the murderer, stooping, lifted the head by its hair, I had a view of the blanched and ghastly face, and the wide-open eyes fixed in wild astonishment. He held it up towards the lines, and in response there rose strange, fierce, and prolonged yells of jubilation – such, I imagine, as are uttered by savages, when exulting over some fallen enemy. Then with his horrible trophy in one hand and a dripping knife in the other, the negro turned, and looked straight at me. Instantly everything became blurred, black darkness descended, and I remember no more!

When I came to myself, the clear imperative voice of Cousin Carolina was saying:

“My dear Marion, do you know that it is very imprudent to sleep out of doors at sundown – even in our exquisite climate?”

“Sleep!” I repeated, with an involuntary shudder; “I’ve not been sleeping,” and with a painful effort I rose and tottered into a lighted sitting-room.

“What has happened to you, Marion?” cried my sister; “you look simply awful. Are you ill? – or have you seen a ghost?”

“Yes,” I answered, looking round at six expectant faces, “I have seen two in the verandah!”

I noticed that Miss Boone gave me a quick, sharp look, but the rest of the company wore indulgent smiles, and Cousin Carolina said:

“No such thing as ghosts, my dear – it’s only ignorant people like the negroes that believe in them now. You have Scotch blood in your veins, your mother was a Highlander, and no doubt you are a bit superstitious, and you have such imagination, dearest child, and are so highly strung. You have just dozed off and had a nightmare.”

“Tell me, what do you think you saw?” enquired Philip, who had brought me a glass of wine.

I sipped this before I answered:

“A horrible sight, a lady in a white gown – I believe the owner of the estate – was beheaded in the verandah by a huge negro, and all the slaves – hundreds of them – shouted, and yelled for joy.”

Mrs. Gossett, who was young and giddy, began to giggle, and then apologised, adding:

“It sounds so screamingly funny – a public execution in the Rochelle verandah!”

“It was just a bad nightmare, the combined result of crab salad at lunch, and ‘Uncle Tom’s Cabin,’” declared Cousin Carolina, “and nothing else. I believe there is a place – somewhere near Lexington – that has a story, but it is certainly not Rochelle, and sensible folk don’t believe in such tales.”

“No,” I answered, now fortified by company and port wine. “But you will admit that seeing is believing. I’ve heard that my mother had second sight, and I’m afraid she has bequeathed it to we.”

“My dear, you are a little upset,” said Cousin Carolina; “don’t think of your dream, and you will soon forget it. I daresay it was very vivid. I implore you not to repeat it to any of the servants, or we shall have the place in an uproar. Now just go and lie down, and get a rest before supper-time; Lucy will look after you. Another time, we won’t leave you to keep house all alone.”

Cousin Carolina was a despotic lady in her way, and would never suffer my nightmare in the back north verandah to be discussed. I still stuck to my opinion, but was as one to six – for even my own sister had deserted me and preached about imagination, and crab salad. It seemed impossible that a mere nightmare could ever be so vivid in its horror, and its realism. For several days I felt ill and nervous, and it was only my pride. Cousin Carolina’s forcible character, and Mrs. Gossett’s wild giggle, that restrained me from removing myself to an hotel at Lexington.

I never sat alone, and preferred a crowd to solitude. I even thrust my company on Phil and Lucy, now an engaged couple. Taffy and I were fast friends; we two had shared a unique experience – an experience apart. I was sensible of this bond in his manner, and I read it in the expression of his wistful and expressive eye.

A suspicion, nay, a conviction, took root in my mind. Miss Boone knew more about Rochelle than she pretended. More than once, I found her gazing at me, with an air of peculiar interest, and, more than once, curiosity had urged her to angle (very cautiously) for some particulars of the tragedy I thought I had seen; but I declined to indulge her. She was an unbeliever – and I held my tongue.

In the month of January, Lucy once more faced the Atlantic, accompanied by Miss Boone, Philip, and myself., She was obliged to arrange about her trousseau, and money affairs. We travelled by a big liner, and had on the whole a capital trip. Miss Boone found several friends among the passengers, and one afternoon as we sat in the library in the idle hour which follows tea, an old lady, her son and daughter joined our small circle. We discussed a variety of topics and impressions, and at last came to Kentucky State, Lexington, and Rochelle.

“Rochelle,” repeated the lady’s daughter. “Is not that the haunted house, Momma?”

“Yes, the Taylors’ place,” she answered briskly; “there is a dreadful story about it, but I fancy it is more or less forgotten by this time. For years and years it could not be let – the house, I mean; the land of course is most valuable.”

“What is the story?” I enquired, and I glanced with some significance at Lucy and Philip.

“I remember hearing of it from my mother,” continued the old lady, “and it’s gospel truth. The Taylors were wealthy, and had a great estate, and hundreds of slaves, and were well thought of by all, till the time of Mrs. Herman Taylor, a widow, who inherited it from her husband. She was very strange – some said crazy – and lived alone; hoarded her money, flogged her slaves, and worked them to death. There were stories of terrible scenes at Rochelle – that lovely old place, so dignified and admired, had become a sort of negroes’ hell! People could only talk – they did not dare to interfere. Marcella Taylor was a rich woman, and a vindictive enemy, and had overseers as cruel and hard as herself, and she got more out of her slaves in the way of return than any mistress or master in the State. When it was moonlight, it was said, she worked them all night, and her crops were extraordinary.

“At last the situation became intolerable; beyond the endurance of flesh and blood. A field hand who had been cruelly flogged took the law into his own hands, and one evening, in the sight of the entire community, executed Mrs. Taylor in her own verandah! He had been summoned to receive a punishment, and the story is, that he suddenly drew a long knife, which he had concealed, dragged her backwards by the hair, and beheaded her on the spot. He took the head with him, escaped to the woods, and was never seen or heard of again.

“It was also said that every anniversary the scene was re-enacted in the same verandah – but fortunately was only visible to some. The Villiers, who succeeded to the estates, hated the place, and got rid of it, and so for two generations the house has had a bad name, but now it is apparently recovering its character. I suppose the supernatural has a time-limit?”

She glanced at me interrogatively, but Miss Boone threw me an imploring look and I suffered silence to pass for assent. In this extraordinary and unexpected fashion my experience was confirmed, my truthfulness vindicated, there was an end to gibes about dreams, and crab salad. Subsequently Miss Boone confessed to me that the tale of the north verandah was not new to her, but that she had not wished to frighten Cousin Carolina. As if anything could frighten Cousin Carolina! She has nerves of cast-iron.

As for Lucy, she assured me with a rather unsteady laugh that when, as Mrs. Philip Dormer, she returned to Rochelle, nothing that could be offered would ever induce her to spend an afternoon there alone.

THE CREAKING BOARD

Bramleigh Place, a fine specimen of an early Jacobean dwelling, had been in the Millard family for nearly three centuries, but of late years the Millards had fallen on evil days. There was no money to maintain the property in fitting state, the farms were let, as well as the shooting; graziers rented the park to the borders of the pleasure ground; the house was closed, and abandoned to dust and spiders; the garden was free to weeds and birds. An elderly couple had been installed in “The Place” as caretakers, but these looked’ upon it as nothing more or less than a lonesome, draughty, inconvenient abode – a whole mile from the village and a glass of whisky.

Now and then, in summertime, lodgers at farms, or in the village, would walk over to the stately old mansion, and bribe Mrs. Pilcher to show them around; and she was not inaccessible. Odd shillings, also the price of tea and bread and butter, made a nice little addition to her weekly wages. She opened the tall doors and the heavy shutters, and invited paying visitors into the great saloon, there to gaze upon the Bramleigh Vandyke – a handsome cavalier, with a satin coat and long fair locks – as well as many other valuable paintings and family portraits by Reynolds and Lely, old lacquered cabinets and Chippendale chairs, wonderful settees, card-tables, and screens. Most of the great lofty rooms were half empty, for on the bankruptcy of the late Sir Aubrey Millard there had been a sensational auction, but the residue happened to be heirlooms, and as such, fixtures; and the house was in the curious condition of being neither unfurnished nor yet furnished. Mrs. Pilcher, as she ushered her customers in and out of apartments, and up and down stairs, related many surprising tales of the Millards, and gave the house the reputation of being badly haunted. She was a clever old body, with a loose tongue and a warm imagination, and such were her powers of description, that more than one of her listeners, passing late on the distant highroad, looked down upon the dignified Place, standing in a hollow, with a sensation of fearsome awe.

Young Millard, the owner, was with his regiment in India; there he made the acquaintance of a wealthy American family on tour, and subsequently married the daughter – a charming girl, with a fabulous fortune. Young Lady Millard fell in love with Bramleigh at first sight – it was a place after her own heart! – and she hurried from room to room, exclaiming in raptures as she made discoveries of pictures, tapestries, and furniture – hailing these, one by one, as delightful possessions and priceless treasures. The prompt and energetic new mistress commanded that Bramleigh was to be set in order without delay; the aged Pilchers were dismissed with a pension, and replaced, first by an army of workmen and upholsterers, and then by a staff of gardeners, grooms, and indoor servants. Soon there were horses and motors in the great empty yard, as well as new stables, and a garage. The mouldy Justice Room was turned into a lounge, and long-deserted Bramleigh was transformed by the enchanted wand, which is known as “Money.”

Lady Millard and her husband were young, gay, and popular; they entertained parties for shooting, cricket, and weekends, as London was only forty miles away; they also were entertained, and frequently from home – or spending a week or two in town. On these occasions, the large number of unemployed servants had ample time to themselves – and Satan was not idle.

Among the women, Fanny Lappage, second housemaid, was the ringleader in mischief and fun; moreover, a remarkably pretty girl and a shameless flirt, with half the men at her beck and call. For all her giddiness, she was a first-rate housemaid, and never shirked work – only for this, the housekeeper would have dismissed her; she was too flighty, too saucy, and too pretty; but there never was a better girl for polishing furniture or turning out a room – and besides, her ladyship liked Fanny.

Chief among Fanny’s slaves was James Hegan, a tall, fine-looking footman, Irish by descent, with jet-black hair, and deep-set dark blue eyes. Naturally smart, silent, and impassive, he was an admirable servant – though plagued out of his wits by Fanny Lappage and her vagaries. She was continually teasing him, and ridiculing him in the servants’ hall, or the still-room, and the long stone passages often echoed with her ringing laugh at Hegan’s expense; whilst he could only stare stupidly, marvel at her cleverness,.and admire her bewitching little face.

Trail, the butler, and Mrs. Madden, housekeeper, had often and vainly remonstrated with giddy Fanny – sometimes she really went too far. By a curious instinct, she had discovered that Hegan was nervous and superstitious – on this subject she chaffed him constantly and mercilessly; yet, strange to say, the more she flouted and tormented him, the more ardently he adored her. He was of a naturally silent and melancholy disposition, and it was Fanny’s amazing liveliness that appealed to him. As for superstition – superstition was in his blood (as a child, he had listened to many a weird tale from the lips of an Irish grandmother), and this characteristic was kept alive, and even fanned, by conversations he overheard at his master’s table whilst he waited automatically – listening with all his ears.

Lady Millard had imbibed the modern taste for the occult and psychical speculations; and some of the experiences he overheard were so vividly described as to be almost hair-raising. Hegan’s hand shook as he handed dishes and plates. Certain subjects lay beyond his mental reach, but one was easily comprehended. He understood a genial gentleman – a neighbour – who, with a jovial laugh, remarked:

“I suppose, Lady Millard, you know that you have something here! – an apparition – and, by all accounts, it’s pretty bad too; it is—”

Here Lady Millard made a quick little sign, and then she too laughed, and said something in French, and the guest replied:

“Oh yes; by Jove! – all right, then – another time!”

But all the same, the seed had taken root in Hegan’s mind – “Something” had assumed alarming and sinister proportions.

•   •   •   •   •

The family were yachting at Cowes; it was an unusually warm and sultry July, and the staff at Bramleigh, with nothing to do, and an ample allowance of animal food and beer, felt more or less lazy – not to say comatose. The visit of Mrs. Pilcher (late caretaker) effected an agreeable diversion; this old body was full of stimulating local gossip and housewives’ tales, and always well worth her tea! The maids encouraged her to talk; they drew her out, and she entertained them with amazing stories, and “they says” of the Millard family.

“You lived here fifteen year, Mrs. Pilcher,” said the vivacious Fanny, “and never saw anything worse nor yourself – eh? – come now! Why, surely there must be a ghost in a big rambling old place like this? Don’t you tell me there ain’t!”

“There may be,” rejoined Mrs. “Pil,” nursing her teacup as she spoke, “but I never went about after dark. Tom and me allus sat in the library, and slep’ in the morning-room – us hadn’t the breath for stairs – and them above rampaged about as they liked; no need for us an inter-meddling – and them passages and corridors for wind would skin you alive!”

“Didn’t you never see anything?” persisted Fanny. “Come, now, we’re all friends here.”

“Only rats in plenty – the kitchen was black wid ’em – and them as big as rabbits.”

“Rats like rabbits – but nothing more? Come, now, Mrs. Pil; surely someone has seen a ghost – try and remember, and I’ll give you a nice little present. I do love to hear of horrors.”

“Well, then, Fanny Lappage, since you are so set on and eager, I did hear summat – summat as was told me by the folk as was here afore us – and left.”

“Did they see anything? Oh, Jim!” beckoning to Hegan, “and Rosie, Ethel, and George and Tom – do come along and listen – it’s awful fun. Mrs. Pil is going to tell us about the ghost that’s here – she will make our flesh creep. Won’t it be lovely!”

“I’m not so sure,” muttered Jim, turning to Mrs. Pilcher. “What’s it all about, mother?”

Mrs. Pilcher appreciated an audience; she wiped her mouth deliberately with a spotted handkerchief, rubbed her hands on her knees, nodded at the circle which had gathered about her, and cleared her throat.

“You all know the old wing – the long passage, and the swing-door?”

There was a chorus of “Yes, yes, yes – why, to be sure!”

“The three big low rooms looking south over the shrubberies and into the park – main old, they say – well, it’s there!” and she paused dramatically. Mrs. “Pil” was a gifted story-teller. “Afore our time” (she spoke as if they had been deposed sovereigns) “the caretaker and wife and girl lived in that wing, as it were warm and convenient. They allowed they heard walking and talking, but were never properly frightened, till one hot summer night when the man was late in the village. There was a full moon, and it was that stifling they had the doors and windows open – ’twas the middle room, d’ye see? Mother and girl was a-making ready for bed, and the house locked up. All of a sudden they fell in a terrible taking, a sort of fright as threw ’em into a cold sweat – and they could not say for why, or wherefore; but hot as it was, they felt like two blocks of ice. Then they heard the swing-door slam, and someone in high heels come a-pattering along the passage – nearer and nearer. There it must be in the doorway, for the floor had a loose board and creaked. They was awful afraid to look, as they knew in their bones something not right was standin’ there, and yet look they had to! And sure enough, right on the creakin’ board was a lady in a queer, puffed-out sort of dress, awful old-fashioned. She had a long, shiny knife in her hand, and they two felt turned to stone. At the moment they heard the man below shoutin’ for the key of the side door, and the wife had just strength to tie it in her apron and throw it out of the window. Then the lady went off; they heard her a-patterin’ quick down the passage, and the swing-door a-slammin’ behind her. After that, they lived down below – but never saw her again, nor ever give her a chance, as they did not venture above after dusk. They say she had black eyes and looked awful wicked – just set on ill-doing, but young, and handsome. When the man died – he was found dead, they do say – the wife and daughter come away and were thankful – and we took the place; but if it was my last breath, though I heard what I heard – I never saw nothing’!”

“And so it’s the middle room in the old wing,” said Fanny briskly. “I know – it has a high chimney-piece and three windows.”

“Aye, that’s it; and they give out the noises and the trouble is allus worser in summertime, and full o’ the moon, and that whenever you hear a board creak in these old floors, she is not far off!”

Mrs. Pilcher suddenly rose to her feet, shook the crumbs from her gown, and took leave; she understood the value of a brief and effective departure.

At supper that evening there was an animated discussion respecting the creaking board, and the lady with the shining knife. Fanny, in the wildest spirits, challenged George, James, Tom, or Mr. Trail himself, to go and meet the ghost in the middle room – she even offered them a vague reward. But no one came forward to pick up her gage, in spite of her jeers and gibes. The household was, however, profoundly interested to recognise among the family portraits in the library the identical lady, as described by Mrs. Pilcher, with a long thin face, black eyes, white powdered hair, and a mole on her chin.

The days that followed were dull and drowsy. Fanny invested all her superfluous energies in incessantly tormenting James Hegan. At last he became desperate, and said:

“Well, look here. Fan; as you say the moon is near the full, it’s summer – now’s my chance for the ghost! But if I go alone to the middle room in the oak corridor at twelve o’clock, leave the door open, and bring your thimble from off the mantelpiece, and stay there for an hour, you will marry me – come, now. I’ll go for that – and no less, I swear!”

To this ultimatum Fanny, after much sparring and giggling, eventually agreed. Jim was a handsome fellow; though he had no talk, he had more inches and broader shoulders than anyone in the house – not to speak of considerable savings.

Sir Eldred and Lady Millard were not expected for a week, and the ordeal was fixed for a certain day and hour. Fanny was unusually lively, talkative, and irresponsible, and a,ll die under-servants were agog with keen anticipation.

When the great evening arrived, Jim, who was secretly in a deadly fright (and had fortified himself with two glasses of beer), was conducted to the swing-door, and seen off about eleven o’clock by all his associates, with many jokes, and good wishes for the success of his adventure. He was too early – his friends had been so anxious to speed him; he felt a sense of dull resentment as he pulled the baize door behind him, walked down the corridor, and entered the middle room, now flooded by moonlight. First of all he went over to the chimney-piece and appropriated Fanny’s dainty little thimble. Then for a long time he stood by the window gazing on the sleeping woods, and waiting – for what? he asked himself. The night air was hot and breathless, every sound was audible, from the flutter of a bat’s wings or the hoot of an owl to the far-away barking of a dog or the hum of a belated motor on the distant highroad.

Gradually he became aware of a stillness, a chilliness, and a silence – as if Nature were holding her breath prior to some prodigious effort. He was also sensible of a cold sensation of creeping uneasiness, and began to realise that his Dutch courage had evaporated, and that he felt sickeningly nervous. Tales from his grandmother, and tales from the dinner-table, invaded his memory, and repeated themselves with a vividness of detail, and a plausibility befitting the hour, the locality, and the man.

Yet, so far, nothing had happened! Possibly it was all nonsense and rot, urged another cheerful mental voice; his spirits stirred, and rose. But what was that?

A sudden reckless slamming of the swing-door – yes, and footsteps – quick, light footsteps, coming along the corridor! Hegan’s heart flew into his throat; he felt almost suffocated with terror as he backed into the window, and stared at the entrance.

But the noise had entirely ceased – ceased for five immensely long minutes; for ten – there was nothing to be seen! With an extraordinary sensation of relief he turned away, leant his elbows on the open sash, and once more gazed down into the moonlit park. In ten minutes more he would be free to go! As he stood listening anxiously for the striking of the stable clock, his senses were strung to the utmost – his ears alive to every sound.

Suddenly he heard the sharp creaking of a board, and flung round. She stood in the doorway! A lady with a powdered head and bunchy petticoats; by one hand she held a handkerchief to her face, in the other was a long and glittering knife!

And – she was coming in – she was approaching. Panic seized upon him, and seemed to gnaw his knees. In a spasm of mortal fear – the frenzy of the trapped animal that turns on its destroyer – he snatched up a heavy old chair. Hegan was a powerful man – it was as a straw to him in his present desperation – and he dashed at the figure in a fury of terror, struck it twice with all his force, and felled it to the ground.

The thing gave a stifled shriek, and moaned – yes – but he threw down his weapon, and fled as for his very life.

When he gained the hall, ghastly and breathless, he found an eagerly expectant crowd. The first footman, noticing his face, exclaimed:

“Hallo! Jimmy, old boy – you look as if you’d seen her!”

“Yes,” he gasped out, “she was there – knife and all!”

“And what did you do?”

“I picked up a chair and struck at her, and ran!” He was still livid and panting for breath.

Several of the women looked at one another significantly, and at last the cook said:

“Why, James, don’t you know it was all a bit of a joke?”

“Joke!” he repeated, and his eye travelled swiftly round the circle, in speechless quest of Fanny. “Where’s Fanny?” he asked abruptly.

“You’ve just seen her; the ghost was Fanny herself. We dressed her up, and floured her hair – and—”

“And,” he added in a loud, hoarse voice, “I believe – I’ve done for her! I – I hit her a terrible blow! Fanny! Fanny!” he shouted, and he raced up the stairs, followed by all the inmates of the Place.

They crowded through the swing-door and streamed along the passage into the middle room. There on the floor lay a little dressed-up figure with a horrible wound in her head – a knife clutched in her grasp – stone dead!

Nor was this the worst. When Hegan realised that he had unintentionally killed his pretty, mocking sweetheart, he kissed her, rose from beside her, and, before anyone had guessed his intention, sprang on the sill, hurled himself out of the window, and, with a crash among branches, fell heavily on the lawn with a broken neck.

Sir Eldred and Lady Millard, hastily summoned from Cowes, were horrified to find on their return home that two of their household lay awaiting an inquest in the old unused laundry – their fate the result of a practical joke – and for many months Lady Millard deserted the Place, and made her home in Continental hotels.

At Bramleigh the middle room in the oak corridor has long been closed; but the double tragedy has left its mark. After dusk, the maids go about in couples; a creaking board throws them into a paroxysm of terror, and they snatch at one another, and whisper, “She’s somewhere about!” for Bramleigh enjoys the unique reputation of being haunted by the ghost – of a ghost!

THE SWORD OF LANBRYDE

Rusholme Place, a fine old mansion in the Midlands, is seated in a picturesque and well-wooded park, and surrounded by the usual accompaniments of lawns, pleasure-grounds, and gardens. The exterior of Rusholme, although it presents a most attractive appearance, is as nothing compared with the treasures within.

The large entrance hall, and billiard-room, which opens out of it, are said to be an admixture of the Natural History and the Victoria and Albert Museums of South Kensington! The walls of both are covered with trophies of the chase (their owner was a dead-shot, and went far afield for sport). A magnificent bull-moose from Nova Scotia faces a life-like bison, late from Southern India; fine heads of deer surmount the doorways; and along the walls are high glass cases, containing specimens of rare birds, and small animals, such as snow-white hares, weasels, etc. This is the natural history department; there are also displayed in these rooms inlaid damascened Indian arms; Afghan guns; old Spanish chairs upholstered in Cordova leather; a stand of rare books – which include a beautifully illustrated Koran, picked up on a battlefield. A wonderful Chinese embroidered curtain drapes a wall, in front of which stands a table holding a Russian samovar, and a Japanese incense-burner in bronze, of the most terrifying description. In the hall is an ancient carved chest, said to have been washed ashore from the Spanish Armada. Here are also several exquisite figures of Grecian type, about two feet high – these had been dug up on the banks of the Indus, and were said to have been left behind by the hosts of Alexander the Great. Wherever you looked within these two rooms, there was something interesting to see, but it was at night that – astonishing fact – there was something interesting to hear.

After the genial party of billiard players had departed, when the lights were extinguished, the house closed and buried in silence, the collection from all parts of the world exchanged experiences – personal or otherwise, and held discussions – but these were not always attended with success. The stag and the tiger had high words; it had been found necessary to interrupt and silence the stoat and the white hare. It was considered more prudent to confine the evening entertainments to the harmless form of storytelling. The great moose was chairman of the company; the bison, his vis-a-vis, vice-chairman; the Chinese incense-burner and an Afghan jazail occasionally interposed remarks, but, on the whole, peace reigned supreme.

“I now call upon the Ferrara Blade,” said the deep bass of the moose; “let us hear your tale.”

After a moment’s silence, a thin, sharp voice from a corner began without further preamble: “My story, good listeners, is ancient history, but it is true. I will merely relate one incident – no need to more than touch on my own life, for to tell my adventures would take hours. I am a well-tempered Andrea Ferrara blade, married to a Spanish handle of great value. By chance, I entered a military family, and descended from father to son. I have seen desperate fighting in the Low Countries – aye, and in the New World. After a long time came peace – there was no work for me, and I was hung up in my scabbard over a fireplace in the library of the ancient mansion of my Lord of Lanbryde. His home was right in the north of Scotland – its lands were lipped by an ocean that had its further shore in the Arctic Circle. The wind was fine and strong – the sunsets recalled the tropics; air and land bred bold fishermen, and big-boned folk, who held themselves high, and knew not the word ‘fear.’ It was recorded that the race came from the Danes.

“Blairvie, my Lord, was heir to great estates, a tall old man, with a high, hooked nose and bushy brows, a famous swordsman and gamester in his day – which was over. Now he had nought to do but mind his property and harry his tenants. He was a hard landlord – hard to all the world except himself. Married to a lord’s daughter, he had two children – a son in a Highland regiment, and one girl. Blairvie was a tyrant to them, and to everyone within his reach; he turned out folk from places where they and their forebears had lived for generations.

“One very old woman crawled to his door and begged for mercy, but he was as stone. She went down on her knees, and said:

“‘Blairvie, let me die in my ain wee housie. I pray you to leave me where I was born and bred – my time must now be short.’

“But it was all of no use – Blairvie was adamant – so she uprose, and cursed him to his face.

“‘Ye have ta’en away the land from us, aye, and from many – ye that has plenty. See now,’ she said, ‘I lay my malison on you: the land will be ta’en away from you and yours – for ever and ever. Your descendants will not own a yard of green turf, and will die beggars!’ and then she fell in a sort of fit, and was thrown out.

“For some time afterwards there was great talk of the old witch and her curse, and the ‘weird’ pronounced against Blairvie; but by degrees the whole thing died away. The lands of Lanbryde were fertile, for much of the soil was old and rich; the sheep, cattle, and orchards were beyond anything for excellence. The place, a great big house, square to the winds, lay back in a bay between two big horns of shingle – but the whole beach was covered with beautiful sand, so fine that it could run through an hourglass.

“By gradual degrees, it was noticed that the sea was encroaching; huge mounds of sands had accumulated – some of them one hundred feet in height – and the sand seemed scarcely ever at rest. In strong westerly gales it drifted about, and seemed so violent and tormented, one might have supposed that the furies were locked in mortal combat. The size and increase of the dunes were so imperceptibly stealthy, that it was scarcely noticed by those who lived in the neighbourhood, but chiefly spoken of by people who had been absent for some time. By and bye, the old coast-line began to break up, the sea made extensive inroads, and there was a certain wasting of the foreshore. These high banks of sand afforded but a feeble barrier to the power of storms from the north – which forced them further and further inshore; and still no one minded, for a gale from the south usually blew them back to their former position.

“One November night a fearful gale descended on the coast. A sand-flood overwhelmed the fields, the orchards, the gardens of Lanbryde – here was a deluge that nothing could arrest. Ghostly clouds of white sand, falling and whirling, above, below – in short, everywhere. The torrent seemed to be a living force; it poured over the mansion, and down its chimneys, burst the doors and windows, and blocked the stairs. The storm was as sudden as it was violent – it approached with a howling, mighty wind, sheets and clouds of a thin, white substance, tons – millions of tons – of sand. The people of the house had barely time to escape with their lives, before the doors and stairs were choked. The young heir – who happened to be home on leave – as he rushed out last, bethought himself of the family sword – in short, of me! He ran back, fought his way to the fireplace, while the wind roared and the sand poured, wrenched me from the wall, and sped forth. But in the doorway a blast met him and knocked him prostrate – the cruel sand fell on him, and choked him where he lay; he struggled and fought – it was like being in the heart of a quick-sand. After desperate efforts he gave up the ghost, and so perished miserably – and there he and I rested together for eighty long years. By midday, after the gale, such was the result of shifting dunes, that the very situation of the mansion was lost – and the whole property, a vast expanse of sand, was pointed out to newcomers as the grave of the house, and estates, of Lanbryde.

“At last, after nearly a century had elapsed, a furious western hurricane suddenly altered the figures of many sandhills. Another violent storm arose, a whirlwind equal to the first, and it raged all night with a ruthless force. At sunrise, when the folk began to stir, they rubbed their eyes, and wondered if they were still asleep. Then they recalled the story of Lanbryde. The mansion had reappeared – had arisen, like a great, gaunt skeleton, from the mass of sand in which it had been entombed, its rows of empty windows, like eyeless sockets, dominating the scene.

“Naturally the news spread, and Lanbryde was immediately visited, and, as far as possible, entered. But the interior was still choked. The body of the unfortunate heir was discovered – that is to say, his bones – and I, who lay unscathed in my scabbard, was carried away as prize by a searcher, and sold for a few shillings to an armourer in Inverness, who sent me south, where I fetched, as I deserved, a noble price. Great efforts were made to recover furniture and pictures that were known to be in Lanbryde, but beyond a few silver spoons and the whorls of a distaff, nothing could be reclaimed, for before any active steps could be taken, another furious sand-drift struck the coast, and the ancient mansion of Lanbryde disappeared for ever.

“When the last owner’s daughter died in poverty abroad, the family became extinct, and of their great fame, and high place in the world, nothing now remains but an old Italian sword. – Good-night!”