A Book of Ghosts: 8
Author: Various authors
Date: 1836-12-31T15:00:00+00:00
Keywords: Ghost Stories; Supernatural Fiction; Weird Fiction; Horror
Description: A collection of ten stories of the supernatural and the macabre by various authors, compiled by ECM.
Publisher: MobileRead.com
Rights: Public domain where copyright is “Life+70” or less, and in the USA

A BOOK OF GHOSTS
– 8 –

THINGS THAT GO BUMP
IN THE NIGHT

MobileRead Edition
2021

A collection of ten stories of the supernatural and the macabre by various authors, compiled by ECM.

Contents were originally published 1837 ~ 1913. This book is in the public domain where copyright is “Life+70” or less, and in the USA.

CONTENTS:

- The Lawyer and the Ghost –1837
by Charles Dickens
(1812–1870)

- The Spectre Bridegroom –1865
by Robert Hunt
(1807–1887)

- The Soul of Rose Dédé –1892
by M. E. M. Davis
(1844–1909)

- Mr. Gray’s Strange Story –1892
by Louisa Murray
(1818–1894)

- The Library Window –1896
by Margaret Oliphant
(1828–1897)

- The Haunting of White Gates –1900
by G. M. Robins
(1861–1939)

- The Vengeance of a Tree –1904
by Eleanor F. Lewis
(?–?)

- The Parlor-Car Ghost –1904
by Eleanor F. Lewis
(?–?)

- The Mass of Shadows –1908
by Anatole France
(1824–1944)

- His Day Back –1913
by Jack Brant
(?–?)

THE LAWYER AND THE GHOST

Charles Dickens

1837

I knew a man – forty years ago – who took an old, damp, rotten set of chambers, in one of the most ancient inns, that had been shut up and empty for years and years before. There were lots of old women’s stories about the place, and it certainly was very far from being a cheerful one; but he was poor, and the rooms were cheap, and that would have been quite a sufficient reason for him, if they had been ten times worse than they really were.

The man was obliged to take some mouldering fixtures, and, among the rest, was a great lumbering wooden press for papers, with large glass doors, and a green curtain inside; a pretty useless thing for him, for he had no papers to put in it; and as to his clothes, he carried them about with him, and that wasn’t very hard work, either.

Well, he moved in all his furniture – it wasn’t quite a truck-full – and had sprinkled it about the room, so as to make the four chairs look as much like a dozen as possible, and was sitting down before the fire at night, drinking the first glass of two gallons of whisky he had ordered on credit, wondering whether it would ever be paid for, and if so, in how many years’ time, when his eyes encountered the glass doors of the wooden press.

“Ah,” says he, speaking aloud to the press, having nothing else to speak to, “if it wouldn’t cost more to break up your old carcass, than it would ever be worth afterward, I’d have a fire out of you in less than no time.”

He had hardly spoken the words, when a sound resembling a faint groan, appeared to issue from the interior of the case. It startled him at first, but thinking, on a moment’s reflection, that it must be some young fellow in the next chamber, who had been dining out, he put his feet on the fender, and raised the poker to stir the fire.

At that moment, the sound was repeated; and one of the glass doors slowly opening, disclosed a pale and emaciated figure in soiled and worn apparel, standing erect in the press. The figure was tall and thin, and the countenance expressive of care and anxiety; but there was something in the hue of the skin, and gaunt and unearthly appearance of the whole form, which no being of this world was ever seen to wear.

“Who are you?” said the new tenant, turning very pale; poising the poker in his hand, however, and taking a very decent aim at the countenance of the figure. “Who are you?”

“Don’t throw that poker at me,” replied the form; “if you hurled it with ever so sure an aim, it would pass through me, without resistance, and expend its force on the wood behind. I am a spirit.”

“And pray, what do you want here?” faltered the tenant.

“In this room,” replied the apparition, “my worldly ruin was worked, and I and my children beggared. In this press, the papers in a long, long suit, which accumulated for years, were deposited. In this room, when I had died of grief, and long-deferred hope, two wily harpies divided the wealth for which I had contested during a wretched existence, and of which, at last, not one farthing was left for my unhappy descendants. I terrified them from the spot, and since that day have prowled by night – the only period at which I can revisit the earth – about the scenes of my long-protracted misery. This apartment is mine: leave it to me.”

“If you insist upon making your appearance here,” said the tenant, who had had time to collect his presence of mind during this prosy statement of the ghost’s, “I shall give up possession with the greatest pleasure; but I should like to ask you one question, if you will allow me.”

“Say on,” said the apparition sternly.

“Well,” said the tenant, “I don’t apply the observation personally to you, because it is equally applicable to most of the ghosts I ever heard of; but it does appear to me somewhat inconsistent, that when you have an opportunity of visiting the fairest spots of earth – for I suppose space is nothing to you – you should always return exactly to the very places where you have been most miserable.”

“Egad, that’s very true; I never thought of that before,” said the ghost.

“You see, Sir,” pursued the tenant, “this is a very uncomfortable room. From the appearance of that press, I should be disposed to say that it is not wholly free from bugs; and I really think you might find much more comfortable quarters: to say nothing of the climate of London, which is extremely disagreeable.”

“You are very right, Sir,” said the ghost politely, “it never struck me till now; I’ll try change of air directly.”

In fact, he began to vanish as he spoke; his legs, indeed, had quite disappeared.

“And if, Sir,” said the tenant, calling after him, “if you would have the goodness to suggest to the other ladies and gentlemen who are now engaged in haunting old empty houses, that they might be much more comfortable elsewhere, you will confer a very great benefit on society.”

“I will,” replied the ghost; “we must be dull fellows – very dull fellows, indeed; I can’t imagine how we can have been so stupid.”

With these words, the spirit disappeared; and what is rather remarkable, he never came back again.’

THE SPECTRE BRIDEGROOM

Robert Hunt

1865

Long, long ago a farmer named Lenine lived in Boscean. He had but one son, Frank Lenine, who was indulged into waywardness by both his parents. In addition to the farm servants, there was one, a young girl, Nancy Trenoweth, who especially assisted Mrs Lenine in all the various duties of a small farmhouse.

Nancy Trenoweth was very pretty, and although perfectly uneducated, in the sense in which we now employ the term education, she possessed many native graces, and she had acquired much knowledge, really useful to one whose aspirations would probably never rise higher than to be mistress of a farm of a few acres. Educated by parents who had certainly never seen the world beyond Penzance, her ideas of the world were limited to a few miles around the Land’s-End. But although her book of nature was a small one, it had deeply impressed her mind with its influences. The wild waste, the small but fertile valley, the rugged hills, with their crowns of cairns, the moors rich in the golden furze and the purple heath, the sea-beaten cliffs and the silver sands, were the pages she had studied, under the guidance of a mother who conceived, in the sublimity of her ignorance, that everything in nature was the home of some spirit form. The soul of the girl was imbued with the deeply religious dye of her mother’s mind, whose religion was only a sense of an unknown world immediately beyond our own. The elder Nancy Trenoweth exerted over the villagers around her considerable power. They did not exactly fear her. She was too free from evil for that; but they were conscious of a mental superiority, and yielded without complaining to her sway.

The result of this was, that the younger Nancy, although compelled to service, always exhibited some pride, from a feeling that her mother was a superior woman to any around her.

She never felt herself inferior to her master and mistress, yet she complained not of being in subjection to them. There were so many interesting features in the character of this young servant girl that she became in many respects like a daughter to her mistress. There was no broad line of division in those days, in even the manorial hall, between the lord and his domestics, and still less defined was the position of the employer and the employed in a small farmhouse. Consequent on this condition of things, Frank Lenine and Nancy were thrown as much together as if they had been brother and sister. Frank was rarely checked in anything by his over-fond parents, who were especially proud of their son, since he was regarded as the handsomest young man in the parish. Frank conceived a very warm attachment for Nancy, and she was not a little proud of her lover. Although it was evident to all the parish that Frank and Nancy were seriously devoted to each other, the young man’s parents were blind to it, and were taken by surprise when one day Frank asked his father and mother to consent to his marrying Nancy.

The Lenines had allowed their son to have his own way from his youth up; and now, in a matter which brought into play the strongest of human feelings, they were angry because he refused to bend to their wills.

The old man felt it would be a degradation for a Lenine to marry a Trenoweth, and, in the most unreasoning manner, he resolved it should never be.

The first act was to send Nancy home to Alsia Mill, where her parents resided; the next was an imperious command to his son never again to see the girl.

The commands of the old are generally powerless upon the young where the affairs of the heart are concerned. So were they upon Frank. He who was rarely seen of an evening beyond the garden of his father’s cottage, was now as constantly absent from his home. The house, which was wont to be a pleasant one, was strangely altered. A gloom had fallen over all things; the father and son rarely met as friends – the mother and her boy had now a feeling of reserve. Often there were angry altercations between the father and son, and the mother felt she could not become the defender of her boy, in his open acts of disobedience, his bold defiance of his parents’ commands.

Rarely an evening passed that did not find Nancy and Frank together in some retired nook. The Holy Well was a favourite meeting-place, and here the most solemn vows were made. Locks of hair were exchanged; a wedding-ring, taken from the finger of a corpse, was broken, when they vowed that they would be united either dead or alive; and they even climbed at night the granite-pile at Treryn, and swore by the Logan Rock the same strong vow.

Time passed onward unhappily, and as the result of the endeavours to quench out the passion by force, it grew stronger under the repressing power, and, like imprisoned steam, eventually burst through all restraint.

Nancy’s parents discovered at length that moonlight meetings between two untrained, impulsive youths, had a natural result, and they were now doubly earnest in their endeavours to compel Frank to marry their daughter.

The elder Lenine could not be brought to consent to this, and he firmly resolved to remove his son entirely from what he considered the hateful influences of the Trenoweths. He resolved to go to Plymouth, to take his son with him, and, if possible, to send him away to sea, hoping thus to wean him from his folly, as he considered this love-madness. Frank, poor fellow, with the best intentions, was not capable of any sustained effort, and consequently he at length succumbed to his father; and, to escape his persecution, he entered a ship bound for India, and bade adieu to his native land.

Frank could not write, and this happened in days when letters could be forwarded only with extreme difficulty, consequently Nancy never heard from her lover.

A babe had been born into a troublesome world, and the infant became a real solace to the young mother. As the child grew, it became an especial favourite with its grandmother; the elder Nancy rejoiced over the little prattler, and forgot her cause of sorrow. Young Nancy lived for her child, and on the memory of its father. Subdued in spirit she was, but her affliction had given force to her character, and she had been heard to declare that wherever Frank might be, she was ever present with him, whatever might be the temptations of the hour, that her influence was all powerful over him for good. She felt that no distance could separate their souls, that no time could be long enough to destroy the bond between them.

A period of distress fell upon the Trenoweths, and it was necessary that Nancy should leave her home once more, and go again into service. Her mother took charge of the babe, and she found a situation in the village of Kimyall, in the parish of Paul. Nancy, like her mother, contrived by force of character to maintain an ascendancy amongst her companions. She had formed an acquaintance, which certainly never grew into friendship, with some of the daughters of the small farmers around. These girls were all full of the superstitions of the time and place.

The winter was coming on, and nearly three years had passed away since Frank Lenine left his country. As yet there was no sign. Nor father, nor mother, nor maiden had heard of him, and they all sorrowed over his absence. The Lenines desired to have Nancy’s child, but the Trenoweths would not part with it. They went so far even as to endeavour to persuade Nancy to live again with them, but Nancy was not at all disposed to submit to their wishes.

It was All-Hallows’ eve, and two of Nancy’s companions persuaded her – no very difficult task – to go with them and sow hemp-seed.

At midnight the three maidens stole out unperceived into Kimyall town-place to perform their incantation. Nancy was the first to sow, the others being less bold than she.

Boldly she advanced, saying, as she scattered the seed—

“Hemp-seed I sow thee,

Hemp-seed grow thee;

And he who will my true love be,

Come after me

And shaw thee.”

This was repeated three times, when, looking back over her left shoulder, she saw Lenine; but he looked so angry that she shrieked with fear, and broke the spell. One of the other girls, however, resolved now to make trial of the spell, and the result of her labours was the vision of a white coffin. Fear now fell on all, and they went home sorrowful, to spend, each one, a sleepless night.

November came with its storms, and during one terrific night a large vessel was thrown upon the rocks in Bernowhall Cliff, and, beaten by the impetuous waves, she was soon in pieces. Amongst the bodies of the crew washed ashore, nearly all of whom had perished, was Frank Lenine. He was not dead when found, but the only words he lived to speak were begging the people to send for Nancy Trenoweth, that he might make her his wife before he died.

Rapidly sinking, Frank was borne by his friends on a litter to Boscean, but he died as he reached the town-place. His parents, overwhelmed in their own sorrows, thought nothing of Nancy, and without her knowing that Lenine had returned, the poor fellow was laid in his last bed, in Burian Churchyard.

On the night of the funeral, Nancy went, as was her custom, to lock the door of the house, and as was her custom too, she looked out into the night. At this instant a horseman rode up in hot haste, called her by name, and hailed her in a voice that chilled her blood.

The voice was the voice of Lenine. She could never forget that; and the horse she now saw was her sweetheart’s favourite colt, on which he had often ridden at night to Alsia.

The rider was imperfectly seen; but he looked very sorrowful, and deathly pale, still Nancy knew him to be Frank Lenine.

He told her that he had just arrived home, and that the first moment he was at liberty he had taken horse to fetch his loved one, and to make her his bride.

Nancy’s excitement was so great, that she was easily persuaded to spring on the horse behind him, that they might reach his home before the morning.

When she took Lenine’s hand a cold shiver passed through her, and as she grasped his waist to secure herself in her seat, her arm became as stiff as ice. She lost all power of speech, and suffered deep fear, yet she knew not why. The moon had arisen, and now burst out in a full flood of light, through the heavy clouds which had obscured it. The horse pursued its journey with great rapidity, and whenever in weariness it slackened its speed, the peculiar voice of the rider aroused its drooping energies. Beyond this no word was spoken since Nancy had mounted behind her lover. They now came to Trove Bottom, where there was no bridge at that time; they dashed into the river. The moon shone full in their faces. Nancy looked into the stream, and saw that the rider was in a shroud and other grave-clothes. She now knew that she was being carried away by a spirit, yet she had no power to save herself; indeed, the inclination to do so did not exist.

On went the horse at a furious pace, until they came to the blacksmith’s shop, near Burian Church-town, when she knew by the light from the forge fire thrown across the road that the smith was still at his labours. She now recovered speech. “Save me! save me! save me!” she cried with all her might. The smith sprang from the door of the smithy, with a red-hot iron in his hand, and as the horse rushed by, caught the woman’s dress, and pulled her to the ground. The spirit, however, also seized Nancy’s dress in one hand, and his grasp was like that of a vice. The horse passed like the wind, and Nancy and the smith were pulled down as far as the old Alms-houses, near the churchyard. Here the horse for a moment stopped. The smith seized that moment, and with his hot iron burned off the dress from the rider’s hand, thus saving Nancy, more dead than alive; while the rider passed over the wall of the churchyard, and vanished on the grave in which Lenine had been laid but a few hours before.

The smith took Nancy into his shop, and he soon aroused some of his neighbours, who took the poor girl back to Alsia. Her parents laid her on her bed. She spoke no word, but to ask for her child, to request her mother to give up her child to Lenine’s parents, and her desire to be buried in his grave. Before the morning light fell on the world Nancy had breathed her last breath.

A horse was seen that night to pass through the Church-town like a ball from a musket, and in the morning Lenine’s colt was found dead in Bernowhall Cliff, covered with foam, its eyes forced from its head, and its swollen tongue hanging out of its mouth. On Lenine’s grave was found the piece of Nancy’s dress which was left in the spirit’s hand when the smith burnt her from his grasp.

It is said that one or two of the sailors who survived the wreck related after the funeral, how, on the 30th of October, at night, Lenine was like one mad; they could scarcely keep him in the ship. He seemed more asleep than awake, and, after great excitement, he fell as if dead upon the deck, and lay so for hours. When he came to himself, he told them that he had been taken to the village of Kimyall, and that if he ever married the woman who had cast the spell, he would make her suffer the longest day she had to live for drawing his soul out of his body.

Poor Nancy was buried in Lenine’s grave, and her companion in sowing hemp-seed, who saw the white coffin, slept beside her within the year.

THE SOUL OF ROSE DÉDÉ

M. E. M. Davis

1892

The child pushed his way though the tall weeds, which were dripping with the midsummer-eve midnight dew-melt. He was so little that the rough leaves met above his head. He wore a trailing white gown whose loose folds tripped him, so that he stumbled and fell over a sunken mound. But he laughed as he scrambled to his feet – a cooing baby laugh, taken up by the inward-blowing Gulf-wind, and carried away to the soughing pines that made a black line against the dim sky.

His progress was slow, for he stopped – his forehead gravely puckered, his finger in his mouth – to listen to the clear whistle of a mocking-bird in the live-oak above his head; he watched the heavy flight of a white night-moth from one jimsonweed trumpet to another; he strayed aside to pick a bit of shining punk from the sloughing bark of a rotten log; he held this in his closed palm as he came at last into the open space where the others were.

“Holà, ’Tit-Pierre!” said André, who was half reclining on a mildewed marble slab, with his long black cloak floating loosely from his shoulders, and his hands clasped about his knees. “Holà! Must thou needs be ever a-searching! Have I not told thee, little Hard-Head, that she hath long forgotten thee?”

His voice was mocking, but his dark eyes were quizzically kind.

The child’s under-lip quivered, and he turned slowly about. But Père Lebas, sitting just across the narrow foot-way, laid a caressing hand on his curly head. “Nay, go thy way, ’Tit Pierre,” he said, gently; “André does but tease. A mother hath never yet forgot her child.”

“Do you indeed think he will find her?” asked André, arching his black brows incredulously.

“He will not find her,” returned the priest. “Margot Caillion was in a far country when I saw her last, and even then her grandchildren were playing about her knees. But it harms not the child to seek her.”

They spoke a soft provincial French, and the familiar thou betokened an unwonted intimacy between the hollow-cheeked old priest and his companion, whose forehead wore the frankness of early youth.

“I would the child could talk!” cried the young man, gayly. “Then might he tell us somewhat of the women that ever come and go in yonder great house.”

The priest shuddered, crossing himself, and drew his cowl over his face.

’Tit-Pierre, his gown gathered in his arm, had gone on his way. Nathan Pilger, hunched up on a low, irregular hummock against the picket-fence, made a speaking-trumpet of his two horny hands, and pretended to hail him as he passed. ’Tit-Pierre nodded brightly at the old man, and waved his own chubby fist.

The gate sagged a little on its hinges, so that he had some difficulty in moving it. But he squeezed through a narrow opening, and passed between the prim flower beds to the house.

It was a lofty mansion, with vast wings on either side, and wide galleries, which were upheld by fluted columns. It faced the bay, and a covered arcade ran from the entrance across the lawn to a gay little wooden kiosk, which hung on the bluff over the water’s edge. A flight of stone steps led up to the house. ’Tit-Pierre climbed these laboriously. The great carved doors were closed, but a blind of one of the long French windows in the west wing stood slightly ajar. ’Tit-Pierre pushed this open. The bedchamber into which he peered was large and luxuriously furnished. A lamp with a crimson shade burned on its claw-footed gilt pedestal in a corner; the low light diffused a rosy radiance about the room. The filmy curtains at the windows waved to and fro softly in the June night wind. The huge old-fashioned, four-posted bed, overhung by a baldachin of carved wood with satin linings, occupied a deep alcove. A woman was sleeping there beneath, the lace netting. The snow-white bedlinen followed the contours of her rounded limbs, giving her the look of a recumbent marble statue. Her black hair, loosed from its heavy coil, spread over the pillow. One exquisite bare arm lay across her forehead, partly concealing her face. Her measured breathing rose and fell rhythmically on the air. A robe of pale silk that hung across a chair, dainty lace-edged garments tossed carelessly on an antique lounge – these seemed instinct still with the nameless, subtle grace of her who had but now put them off.

On a table by the window, upon whose threshold the child stood a-tiptoe, was set a large crystal bowl filled with water-lilies. Their white petals were folded; the round, red-lined green leaves glistened in the lamp light. One long bud, rolled tightly in its green and brown sheath, hung over the fluted edge of the bowl, swaying gently on its flexible stem. ’Tit-Pierre gazed at it intently, frowning a little, then put out a small forefinger and touched it. A quick thrill ran along the stem; the bud moved lightly from side to side and burst suddenly into bloom; the slim white petals quivered; a tremulous, sighing, whispering sound issued from the heart of gold. The child listened, holding the fragrant disk to his pink ear, and laughed softly.

He moved about the room, examining with infantile curiosity the costly objects scattered upon small tables and ranged upon the low, many-shelved mantel.

Presently he pushed a chair against the foot of the bed, climbed upon it, lifted the netting, and crept cautiously to the sleeper’s side. He sat for a moment regarding her. Her lips were parted in a half-smile; the long lashes which swept her cheeks were wet, as if a happy tear had just trembled there. ’Tit-Pierre laid his hand on her smooth wrist, and touched timidly the snowy globes that gleamed beneath the openwork of her nightdress. She threw up her arm, turning her face full upon him, unclosed her large, luminous eyes, smiled, and slept again.

With a sigh, which seemed rather of resignation than of disappointment, the child crept away and clambered again to the floor.

.… Outside the fog was thickening. The dark waters of the bay lapped the foot of the low bluff; their soft, monotonous moan was rising by imperceptible degrees to a higher key. The scrubby cedars, leaning at all angles over the water, were shaken at intervals by heavy puffs of wind, which drove the mist in white, ragged masses across the shelled road, over the weedy neutral ground, and out into the tops of the sombre pines. The red lights in a row of sloops at anchor over against Cat Island had dwindled to faintly glimmering sparks. The watery flash of the revolving light in the lighthouse off the point of the island showed a black wedge-shaped cloud stretching up the seaward sky.

Nathan Pilger screwed up his eye and watched the cloud critically. André followed the direction of his gaze with idle interest, then turned to look again at the woman who sat on a grassy barrow a few paces beyond Père Lebas.

“She has never been here before,” he said to himself, his heart stirring curiously. “I would I could see her face!”

Her back was towards the little group; her elbow was on her knee, her chin in her hand. Her figure was slight and girlish; her white gown gleamed ghost-like in the wan light.

“Naw, I bain’t complainin’, nor nothin’,” said the old sailor, dropping the cloud, as it were, and taking up a broken thread of talk; “hows’ever, it’s tarnation wearyin’ a-settin’ here so studdy year in an’ year out. Leas’ways,” he added, shifting his seat to another part of the low mound, “fer an old sailor sech as I be.”

“If one could but quit his place and move about, like ’Tit-Pierre yonder,” said André, musingly, “it would not be so bad. For myself, I would not want—”

“The child is free to come and go because his soul is white. There is no stain upon ’Tit-Pierre. The child hath not sinned.” It was the priest who spoke. His voice was harsh and forbidding. His deep-set eyes were fixed upon the tall spire of Our Lady of the Gulf, dimly outlined against the sky beyond an intervening reach of clustering roofs and shaded gardens.

André stared at him wonderingly, and glanced half furtively at the stranger, as if in her presence, perchance, might be found an explanation of the speaker’s unwonted bitterness of tone. She had not moved. “I would I could see her face!” he muttered, under his breath. “For myself,” he went on, lifting his voice, “I am sure I would not want to wander far. I fain would walk once more on the road along the curve of the bay; or under the pines, where little white patches of moonlight fall between the straight, tall tree trunks. And I would go sometimes, if I might, and kneel before the altar of Our Lady of the Gulf.”

Nathan Pilger grunted contemptuously. “What a lan’lubber ye be, Andry!” he said, his strong nasal English contrasting oddly with the smooth foreign speech of the others. “What a lan’lubber ye be! Ye bain’t no sailor, like your father afore ye. Tony Dewdonny hed as good a pair o’ sealegs as ever I see. Lord! if there wa’n’t no diffickulties in the way, Nathan Pilger ’ud ship fer some port a leetle more furrin than the shadder of Our Lady yunder! Many’s the deck I’ve walked,” he continued, his husky voice growing more and more animated, “an’ many’s the vige I’ve made to outlandish places. Why, you’d oughter see Arkangel, Andry. Here’s the north coast o’ Rooshy” – he leaned over and traced with his forefinger the rude outlines of a map on the ground; the wind lifted his long, gray locks and tossed them over his wrinkled forehead; “here’s the White Sea; and here, off the mouth of the Dewiny River, is Arkangel. The Rooshan men in that there town, Andry, wears petticoats like women; whilse down here, in the South Pacific, at Taheety, the folks don’t wear no clo’es at all to speak of! You’d oughter see Taheety, Andry. An’ here, off Guinea—”

“All those places are fine, no doubt,” interrupted his listener, “Arkangel and Taheetee and Guinee” – his tongue tripped a little over the unfamiliar names – “but, for myself, I do not care to see them. I find it well on the bay shore here, where I can see the sloops come sailing in through the pass, with the sun on their white sails. And the little boats that rock on the water! Do you remember, Silvain,” he cried, turning to the priest, “how we used to steal away before sunrise in my father’s little fishing-boat, when we were boys, and come back at night with our backs blistered by the sun and our arms aching, hein? That was before you went away to France to study for the priesthood. Ah, but those were good times!” He threw back his head and laughed joyously. His dark hair, wet with the mist, lay in loose rings on his forehead; his fine young face, beardless but manly, seemed almost lustrous in the pale darkness. “Do you remember, Silvain? Right where the big house stands, there was Jacques Caillion’s steep-roofed cottage, with the garden in front full of pinks and mignonette and sweet herbs; and the vine-hung porch where ’Tit-Pierre used to play, and where Margot Caillion used to stand shading her eyes with her arm, and looking out for her man to come home from sea.”

“Jack Caillion,” said Nathan Pilger, “was washed overboard from the Suzanne in a storm off Hatteras in ’11 – him and Dunc Cook and Ba’tist’ Roux.”

“The old church of Our Lady of the Gulf,” the young man continued, “was just a stone’s-throw this side of where the new one was built; back a little is our cottage, and your father’s, Silvain; and in the hollow beyond Justin Roux has his blacksmith’s forge.”

He paused, his voice dying away almost to a whisper. The waves were beating more noisily against the bluff, filling the silence with a sort of hoarse plaint; the fog – gray, soft, impenetrable – rested on them like a cloud. The moisture fell in an audible drip-drop from the leaves and the long, pendent moss of the live-oaks. A mare, with her colt beside her, came trotting around the bend of the road. She approached within a few feet of the girl, reared violently, snorting, and dashed away, followed by the whinnying colt. The clatter of their feet echoed on the muffled air. The girl, in her white dress, sat rigidly motionless, with her face turned seaward.

André lifted his head and went on, dreamily: “I mind me, most of all, of one day when all the girls and boys of the village walked over to Bayou Galère to gather water-lilies. Margot Caillion, with ’Tit-Pierre in her hand, came along to mind the girls. You had but just come back from France in your priest’s frock, Silvain. You were in the church door when we passed, with your book in your hand.” A smothered groan escaped the priest, and he threw up his arm as if to ward off a blow. “And you were there when we came back at sunset. The smell of the pines that day was like balm. The lilies were white on the dark breast of the winding bayou. Rose Dédé’s arms were heaped so full of lilies that you could only see her laughing black eyes above them. But Lorance would only take a few buds. She said it was a kind of sin to take them away from the water where they grew. Lorance was ever—”

The girl had dropped her hands in her lap, and was listening. At the sound of her own name she turned her face towards the speaker.

“Lorance!” gasped André. “Is it truly you, Lorance?”

“Yes, it is I, André Dieudonné,” she replied, quietly. Her pale girlish face, with its delicate outlines, was crowned with an aureole of bright hair, which hung in two thick braids to her waist; her soft brown eyes were a little sunken, as if she had wept overmuch. But her voice was strangely cold and passionless.

“But … when did you … come, Lorance?” André demanded, breathlessly.

“I came,” she said, in the same calm, measured tone, “but a little after you, André Dieudonné. First ’Tit-Pierre, then you, and then myself.”

“Why, then—” he began. He rose abruptly, gathering his mantle about him, and leaned over the marble slab where he had been sitting. “‘Sacred to the memory of André Antoine Marie Dieudonné,’” he read, slowly, slipping his finger along the mouldy French lettering, “‘who died at this place August 20th, 1809. In the 22d year of his age.’ Eighty years and more ago I came!” he cried. “And you have been here all these years, Lorance, and I have not known! Why, then, did you never come up?”

She did not answer at once. “I was tired,” she said, presently, “and I rested well down there in the cool, dark silence. And I was not lonely … at first, for I heard Margot Caillion passing about, putting flowers above ’Tit-Pierre and you and me. My mother and yours often came and wept with her for us all – and my father, and your little brothers. The sound of their weeping comforted me. Then … after a while … no one seemed to remember us any more.”

“Margot Caillion,” said Nathan Pilger, “went back, when her man was drownded, to the place in France where she was born. The others be all layin’ in the old churchyard yander on the hill … all but Silvann Leebaw an’ me.”

She looked at the old man and smiled gravely. “A long time passed,” she went on, slowly. “I could sometimes hear you speak to ’Tit-Pierre, André Dieudonné; … and at last some men came and dug quite near me; and as they pushed their spades through the moist turf they talked about the good Père Lebas; and then I knew that Silvain was coming.” The priest’s head fell upon his breast; he covered his face with his hands and rocked to and fro on his low seat. “Not long after, Nathan Pilger came. Down there in my narrow chamber I have heard above me, year after year, the murmur of your voices on St. John’s eve, and ever the feet of ’Tit-Pierre, as he goes back and forth seeking his mother. But I cared not to leave my place. For why should I wish to look upon your face, André Dieudonné, and mark there the memory of your love for Rose Dédé?”

Her voice shook with a sudden passion as she uttered the last words. The hands lying in her lap were twisted together convulsively; a flush leaped into her pale cheeks.

“Rose Dédé!” echoed André, amazedly. “Nay, Lorance, but I never loved Rose Dédé! If she perchance cared for me—”

“Silence, fool!” cried the priest, sternly. He had thrown back his cowl; his eyes glowed like coals in his white face; he lifted his hand menacingly. “Thou wert ever a vain puppet, André Dieudonné. It was not for such as thou that Rose Dédé sinned away her soul! Was it thou she came at midnight to meet in the lone shadows of these very live-oaks? Hast thou ever worn the garments of a priest? … They shunned Rose Dédé in the village … but the priest said mass at the altar of Our Lady of the Gulf … and the wail of the babe was sharp in the hut under the pines … and it ceased to breathe … and the mother turned her face to the wall and died … and my heart was cold in my breast as I looked on the dead faces of the mother and the child.… They lie under the pine-trees by Bayou Galère. But the priest lived to old age; … and when he died, he durst not sleep in consecrated ground, but fain would lie in the shadows of the live-oaks, where the dark eyes of Rose Dédé looked love into his.”

His wild talk fell upon unheeding ears. ’Tit-Pierre had come out of the house. He was nestling against Nathan Pilger’s knee. He held a lily-bud in one hand, and with the other he caressed the sailor’s weather-beaten cheek.

“’Tit-Pierre,” whispered the old man, “that is Lorance Baudrot. Do you remember her, ’Tit-Pierre?” The child smiled intelligently. “Lorance was but a slip of a girl when I come down here from Cape Cod – cabin-boy aboard the Mary Ann. She was the pretties’ lass on all the bay shore. An’ I – I loved her, ’Tit-Pierre. But I wa’n’t no match agin Andry Dewdonny; an’ I know’d it from the fust. Andry was the likelies’ lad hereabout, an’ the harnsomes’. I see that Lorance loved him. An’ when the yaller fever took him, I see her a-droopin’ an’ a-droopin’ tell she died, an’ she never even know’d I loved her. Her an’ Andry was laid here young, ’Tit-Pierre, ’longside o’ you. I lived ter be pretty tol’able old; but when I hed made my last vige, an’ was about fetchin’ my las’ breath, I give orders ter be laid in this here old buryin’-groun’ some’er’s clost ter the grave o’ Lorance Baudrot.”

His voice was overborne by André’s exultant tones. “Lorance!” he cried, “did you indeed love me? – me!”

Her dark eyes met his frankly, and she smiled.

“Ah, if I had only known!” he sighed – “if had only known, Lorance, I would surely have lived! We would have walked one morning to Our Lady of the Gulf, with all the village-folk about us, and Silvain – the good Père Lebas – would have joined our hands.… My father would have given us a little plot of ground; … you would have planted flowers about the door of our cottage; … our children would have played in the sand under the bluff.…”

A sudden gust of wind blew the fog aside, and a zigzag of flame tore the wedge-shaped cloud in two. A greenish light played for an instant over the weed-grown spot. The mocking-bird, long silent in the heart of the live-oak, began to sing.

“All these years you have been near me,” he murmured, reproachfully, “and I did not know.” Then, as if struck by a breathless thought, he stretched out his arms imploringly. “I love you, Lorance,” he said. “I have always loved you. Will you not be my wife now? Silvain will say the words, and ’Tit-Pierre, who can go back and forth, will put this ring, which was my mother’s, upon your finger, and he will bring me a curl of your soft hair to twist about mine. I cannot come to you, Lorance; I cannot even touch your hand. But when I go down into my dark place I can be content dreaming of you. And on the blessed St. John’s eves I will know you are mine, as you sit there in your white gown.”

As he ceased speaking, Père Lebas, with his head upon his breast, began murmuring, as if mechanically, the words which preface the holy sacrament of marriage. His voice faltered, he raised his head, and a cry of wonder burst from his lips. For André had moved away from the mouldy gravestone and stood just in front of him. Lorance, as if upborne on invisible wings, was floating lightly across the intervening space. Her shroud enveloped her like a cloud, her arms were extended, her lips were parted in a rapt smile. Nathan Pilger, with ’Tit-Pierre in his arms, had limped forward. He halted beside André, and as the young man folded the girl to his breast, the child reached over and laid an open lily on her down-drooped head.

The priest stared wildly at them, and struggled to rise, but could not. As he sank panting back upon the crumbling tomb, his anguish overcame him. “My God!” he groaned hoarsely, “I, only I, cannot move from my place. The soul of Rose Dédé hangs like a millstone about my neck!”

Even as he spoke, the cloud broke with a roar. The storm – black, heavy, thunderous – came rushing across the bay. It blotted out, in a lightning’s flash, the mansion which stands on the site of Jacques Caillion’s hut, and the weed-grown, ancient, forgotten graveyard in its shadow.

… And a bell in the steeple of Our Lady of the Gulf rang out the hour.

MR. GRAY’S STRANGE STORY

Louisa Murray

1892

What may this mean.…

So terribly to shake our dispositions

With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls.

– Hamlet, Act 1, Scene IV.

I am a minister of the Presbyterian Church of Canada, fifty years old, in sound health of body and mind. I have never had any belief in spiritualism, clairvoyance or any similar psychical delusions. My favourite studies at college were logic and mathematics, and no one who knew me could suspect me of belonging to that class of enthusiasts in which ghosts and other preternatural manifestations have their origin. Yet I have had one strange experience in my life which apparently contradicts all my theories of the universe and its laws, nor have I ever been able to explain it on any rational hypothesis. That there is some reasonable explanation I believe, and as there is no one living now, except myself, whom the facts concern, I have determined to give them to the world for the benefit of those who are interested in abnormal phenomena.

Twenty-five years ago I was minister of a newly built church, in a village on the shore of Lake Erie. The village had sprung up round the saw mills of Mason and Company, lately erected to turn the giant pines that grew on the sandy borders of the lake into lumber. When the pines were all worked up, the great saw mills and lumber yards sought another locality, and the village which had never had any individuality of its own dropped out of existence.

There was no manse, and I boarded in the house of the chief member of my congregation, Mr. Michael Forrest, who owned a fine farm of four hundred acres dose to the village.

The Red House Farm, as it was called from the colour of the paint Michael Forrest liberally bestowed on his buildings and fences, was in those days a pleasant place. There peace and plenty reigned, and everything within and without testified to good management, order and comfort.

My story opens in the parlour of the Red House, where, in the early afternoon of a splendid Indian summer day, a young man was writing at a desk placed under an open window that looked into a spacious verandah enclosed by cedar posts round which climbing plants were twined in picturesque profusion. This “best room” was never used by the family except on Sundays and festal occasions, and at other times was given up to the minister, the Rev. Gilbert Gray, who writes this narrative.

The hurry and bustle of dinner were over, the dinner things cleared away and the kitchen and dining-room made tidy. Mrs. Forrest was sitting in her rocking chair by the sunny kitchen window, and, her knitting in her lap, was taking her afternoon nap, her cat curled up at her feet. All was quiet in the house till light steps came tripping down stairs, and two pretty girls entered the verandah, sitting down on the high-backed bench of rustic work, each holding some bit of light needlework in her hands. One was the only child of Farmer Forrest and his wife; the other a niece, brought up by Mrs. Forrest from infancy, and filling the place of a second daughter.

I have said they were two pretty girls, but Marjory Forrest was beautiful. She was a tall, graceful blonde, fair and pale, with rose-red lips, violet eyes, and hair the very colour of sunlight. She looked like the heroine of some happy love poem – happy, I say, for there was no hint of tragedy in her pure, serene face. Celia Morris had a Hebe-like face and form, with bright chestnut hair, merry brown eyes and a laughing mouth, showing two rows of pearly teeth. She was just eighteen; two years younger than Marjory.

They made a charming picture in their pretty print dresses, fresh and spotless, their bright heads bending over their work, and catching the changing lights and shades coming in through the autumn-tinted leaves. But the picture darkened and dissolved as a handsome young man stood in the open arch of the doorway. The girls smiled a welcome, and, taking off his hat, he stepped in and threw himself down on a pile of mats made of the husks of Indian corn. He was the son of the head of the great lumber firm of Mason and Company. His father was a hard-working, self-made man, but he prided himself on bringing up his son to be a gentleman. Not an idle gentleman, however, and he had lately sent the young man to the mills to gain some practical knowledge of business before admitting him to a junior partnership. As there had been many satisfactory dealings between Mr. Mason and Farmer Forrest, Leonard Mason was made welcome at the Red House, and speedily established himself on a friendly footing. His frank, unaffected manner, and freedom from what Mrs. Forrest called “city airs,” pleased the farmer and his wife; his knowledge of music and light literature charmed Marjory and Celia. The young people were on the most familiar and friendly terms, but Leonard’s attentions were so equally divided between them that if he had a preference only a very close observer could have discerned it.

Today he did not respond as readily as usual to Celia’s lively chatter, and he soon got up from his seat on the mats, and, placing himself against one of the posts, from which point of vantage he could better see Marjory’s face, said, “I am going to Hamilton.”

Marjory looked up with a startled glance. Celia laughed a quick little laugh as she asked, “not this very minute, are you?”

“I am going tomorrow; my father wants me.”

“Well, I suppose you mean to come back again,” said Celia lightly.

“Yes, but not for a week. Shall you miss me very much while I am away?”

“Why, of course; there won’t be any one to sing ‘Come into the garden, Maud.’ Will there Marjory?”

“No, indeed,” said Marjory.

“I wonder which of you will miss me most. If I knew, I would ask her to give me a lock of her hair to wear round my wrist as a keepsake.”

Celia’s eyes were fixed on Leonard with an eager questioning expression, but he was looking at Marjory, who kept her eyes steadily on her work, though a faint blush was stealing over her face.

“I’ll tell you what we must do,” said Leonard. “I’ll get two long and two short lots, and you must both draw. Whoever draws two long lots loses a lock of her hair to me.

“I know you won’t refuse me,” he continued pleadingly, “because there may be an accident to the train I am going on, and I may be killed, and then you’d be sorry for having been so unkind.”

“What nonsense,” cried Celia.

“Not at all,” said Leonard, “wise men of old believed in the judgement of lots.” And breaking off a slender vine-tendril he divided it into two long and two short lots, arranging them with some mysterious manipulations between his fingers. Then, kneeling on one knee, he held them to Marjory.

Slowly, with tremulous fingers and blushing cheeks, Marjory drew a long lot. Leonard seemed going to say something, but checking himself held out the lots to Celia. Celia did not blush; she grew deathly pale as she drew out her lot. It was a short one.

“I see you don’t intend to lose, Miss Celia,” said Leonard.

I think I hear now the wild, hysterical laugh with which she answered him. Then, I did not heed it.

“If you draw a short one this time,” said Leonard, as he again held the lots to Marjory, “we shall have to try again,” but as he spoke the second long lot was in her hand.

“Oh, kind fortune!” cried Leonard.

He tried to make Marjory look at him, but she would not meet his eyes. Still, those subtle signs that lovers learn to read the flickering flame on her cheek, the quivering of her lips and eyelids, who can say what – gave him courage. Snatching up her scissors, he held them over her head. “May I?” he asked beseechingly. With shy, timid grace she bent her fair head still lower; he felt the mute consent, and the next moment one long braid was severed from the rest and lying in his hand.

“Fasten it round my wrist with a true lover’s knot,” he whispered, softly touching her fingers with the braid. She took it at once, and as he pushed up his sleeve she wound it round his wrist, Leonard helping her to tie the mystic knot. Holding her hand, which did not try to escape, he drew her gently towards him and kissed the virgin lips that confidingly met his.

At that moment a shadow, as if from the wild flight of a bird, passed before the window at which I sat, and swift as an arrow from a bow Celia darted out of the verandah. Till then I had seen and heard all that passed in a sort of stupor, like that which sometimes takes possession of one who listens to his death sentence, though every word is indelibly written on the tablets of his memory. Unwittingly I had been playing the part of an eavesdropper. Now consciousness returned, and, like a man coming out of a trance, I got up and left the room and the house.

•   •   •   •   •

I had walked fast and far before I returned to the Red House, and the moon, a brilliant hunter’s moon, was flooding earth and heaven with light as I came in sight of the verandah. The inmates seemed all standing outside, among them a tall, finely-made young man, whom I at once recognized as Archie Jonson, farmer Forrest’s nephew, generally supposed to be the heir to the Red House Farm. A marriage between him and Celia had been planned by the farmer and his wife while the cousins were children. Archie had always been devoted to Celia, and she had been fond of him till he tried to win her for his wife. Then, either from coyness or coquetry, she became cold and unresponsive. His entreaties for an immediate marriage were indignantly refused, and the utmost concession she would make was that after she was one and twenty she might think about it. A quarrel ensued, and, deeply wounded, Archie left his home. He was passionately fond of the water, and being known as a brave and skilful sailor he found no difficulty in obtaining the place of mate on one of the best schooners on the lakes.

I was surprised at seeing him, as he was not expected home until after the close of navigation, but still more astonished when he came to meet me before I reached the house.

“Where’s Celia?” he called out as he came near.

“Celia?” I exclaimed, with a sudden feeling of alarm, “Isn’t she at home?”

“No; Marjory thought she went with you to the village.”

“She hasn’t been with me. I haven’t seen her.”

“My God!” he burst out passionately; “where can she be?”

“Perhaps she’s hiding from you, for fun,” I said.

“No; they had missed her before I got here.”

The farmer was calling us to come on, and, as soon as we were near enough, he told us that shortly after dinner he had seen Celia running down the road to the bush. “But you see,” he said, “I was so taken aback by Leonard coming to ask me for Marjory, that I forgot I had seen her till this minute.”

“She must have gone to get maple leaves for her Christmas wreath,” said Marjory.

“But what keeps her so late?” said Mrs. Forrest.

“Why, you needn’t be scared about her,” said the farmer; “there’s nothing to harm her. There hasn’t been a bear or a wolf, or even a rattlesnake, seen in these woods for forty years; nor no such vermin as tramps, neither.”

“There’s that swamp,” rejoined his wife; “she’s always hunting for some sort of weeds in it, and I often think she’ll fall in and get drowned.”

“She couldn’t be drowned if she didn’t walk into the middle of it on purpose,” said the farmer. “But where’s Archie going?”

“To bring home Celia,” Archie called back, as he walked off at a pace that soon took him out of sight.

“I’m sure I’m glad he’s gone after her,” said Mrs. Forrest. “She might have hurt her foot on a stub or a stone, and not be able to walk.”

I suggested that Leonard and I had better follow Archie, and Leonard said he was going to make the same proposal.

“Archie won’t want you,” said the farmer. “If Celia has hurt herself, he can carry her home as easy as a baby; and like the job, too, I guess.”

“Oh, let them go, father!” said Marjory. “You see how anxious mother is, and so am I.”

“All right, let them go if they like,” said the farmer; adding in an irritable tone, that showed he was himself getting uneasy, “women are always making a fuss about nothing.”

The moon was at the full, and the sky without a cloud. Every cluster of golden rod and purple aster along the fences, every stick and stone on the road were as dearly seen as at noonday. Leonard and I hurried on filled with an unspoken dread. The road was at first in a straight line, but on coming to a piece of marshy land it turned away to the bush; a path from this turning led to the swamp, a few yards distant.

These swamps are often places of surpassing beauty. There every species of wild fowl make their nests and rear their young broods, and the brilliant flowers and luxuriant leaves of all kinds of water plants form lovely aquatic gardens, richly coloured with ever-varying tints from April to December, and always the delight of an artist’s eye. Round the edges of the swamp the water is usually shallow enough for the hunters to wade through in pursuit of their game, but in the centre it is often dangerously deep, and only to be crossed in a skiff or canoe.

Where the road divided, Leonard would have kept a straight course to the bush, but a terrible fear dragged me in the other direction. “No; come this way!” I cried, and he turned and followed me in silence. Faster and faster we hurried on till we reached the swamp. There a heart-rending sight met our eyes. Archie Jonson was struggling through the beds of water-lilies, reeds and rushes that obstructed his way, clasping Celia in his arms. Her long hair fell down dank and dripping, her arms hung stiff and lifeless, her face gleamed ghastly white under the strong moonlight. She was dead! “Drowned! drowned!”

As he ran towards him, Archie laid her on a grassy mound. Her limbs were not distorted and her face was composed, except that her eyes were wide open as if in startled surprise. “You are a doctor as well as a minister,” Archie said to me, hoarsely; “see if there is any life left.”

There was none. She had been dead for hours. As I said so, Archie sprung up from his kneeling attitude beside Celia, and turned to Leonard with a deadly rage and hatred in his eyes.

“This is your doing,” he said.

“Mine!” exclaimed Leonard. “Are you mad?”

“I am not mad. There is Celia, the girl I loved better than my life, lying dead before my eyes, and you are her murderer!”

“Good Heavens!” cried Leonard, “What do you mean?”

“The shock has been too much for him,” I said. “Archie, my poor fellow, you don’t know what you are saying.”

“I know very well what I am saying. he – that man there – fooled Celia, poor little innocent child, with his fine flattering manners till she thought he was making love to her, and when she found out he had only been play-acting with her, she couldn’t bear it. It made her crazy, and she came down to the swamp and drowned herself. Oh, my God, she drowned herself. But it was he made her do it.”

“I never made love to Celia in my life,” said Leonard. “I loved Marjory from the first hour I saw her.”

“Oh, I dare say. You were only playing with Celia, but she thought you were in earnest. Listen to me, minister,” he continued, controlling his passion with wonderful self-command; “I had a warning, but I was a blind idiot and did not take it. Three nights ago, I dreamed that I saw Celia standing on a bank sloping down to a big piece of water, and a man was standing beside her, and while I was looking on in a stupid kind of wonder, I saw she was slipping down towards the water and not able to stop herself, and she held out her hand to the man and cried to him to help her, but he turned right round and went up the bank. Then I woke, and the dream seemed so real it made me feel queer; but I never had any belief in dreams, and when I got up and went out into the daylight, I laughed at myself for being frightened at a nightmare and thought no more about it. But the next night the dream came again; and this time I saw Celia throw herself into the water; and the man stood on the bank and looked on. Then I knew the dream was sent to warn me of some danger to Celia, though I couldn’t tell what it meant, and I came home as quick as I could. And the first person I saw was the man I had seen in my dream – the man I am looking at now, and I heard he was going to marry Marjory; and Celia could not be found. Then when aunt Forrest mentioned the swamp, the meaning of the dream came to me like a flash, and I made for the swamp, but I had come too late – too late to save her, but not too late to revenge her wrongs.”

I attempted to reason with him as well as I could, and tried to show him how wicked and absurd it was to let a dream – a nightmare, as he had himself called it – put such wild fancies into his head.

“And you cannot know that she drowned herself; it may have been an accident,” I said.

“It was no accident; she drowned herself in her madness. When I got to the swamp I saw a bit of ribbon hanging on the reeds, and I went on till I came to the deep water; there I found her. She had not sunk very far down because her skirt had caught on a stake that stood up there, and I got her out easily enough. But she was dead; and you, Leonard Mason, will have to answer to me for her death.”

“I tell you I am innocent of her death as you are!”

“Can you swear it?” cried Archie. “Can you swear it while she lies there before your eyes?”

“I can, I never had any love for Celia, and I never tried to make her think I had. I swear it before the God that hears me!”

As Leonard uttered this oath, Archie kept his eyes fixed on him with piercing intensity; but Leonard met the searching gaze without flinching.

“If you have sworn to a lie,” Archie said, “your sin will find you out, and you will have to answer to me for what you have done when you least expect it.”

Then he wheeled round, and going to his dead sweetheart, took her in his arms. “Go before me, minister,” he said – “go before me, and tell them what is coming.”

He would not allow me to help him, so Leonard and I walked on before, and Archie followed with his piteous burden. He was a tall powerful young man, besides being under such a strong excitement as gives threefold strength to every nerve, and he carried poor Celia’s death-weight, as if she had been a living child.

But I can write no more of that night of grief and anguish. When the dismal morning came, Archie had gone.

•   •   •   •   •

Three days after her death Celia was laid in the village graveyard; a peaceful spot away from all noise or traffic, on the side of a gentle hill within site of the Red House. No one but Archie Jonson, Leonard Mason and myself ever suspected the manner of her death. It was naturally supposed that while gathering flowers in the swamp she had fallen into some hidden pool from which the water plants that covered it would prevent her escape.

Archie was not at her funeral, nor had he returned to the farm, but, two days after she was buried, he wrote to Mrs. Forrest telling her that he had rejoined his vessel, the White Bird, which was going up Lake Superior with a cargo, the last trip she intended to make that season. The letter made no mention of Celia and was very brief, but it was calmly and coherently written, and the Forrests hoped he intended to come home when the schooner was laid up. But this gleam of light was soon lost in deeper darkness. In the middle of November a letter from the owners of the White Bird came to Michael Forrest, informing him that the vessel with all her crew had been lost on Lake Superior in one of those sudden storms which, after a long period of fine weather in the fall, sometimes break over the lakes. Her figure head, on which her name and that of the firm to which she belonged were carved, had been found floating, and recognized by another vessel, confirming the fears for her fate that had been felt. The bodies of the crew were never found, for the ice-cold depths of Lake Superior never give up their dead.

The winter passed slowly and sadly at the Red House, but with the spring came the promise of new hope and joy. Mr. Mason had built a pretty house for Leonard and his bride near the Mills, of which Leonard was to be chief manager. They were to be married in May, and the month famous for its caprice wore its fairest aspect that year. The sorrows which Marjory had gone through seemed only to have deepened the tender sweetness of her delicate beauty, and purified the happiness that illumined her lovely eyes. Leonard, as handsome and charming as ever, had grown more manly and thoughtful, and, if possible, was more in love with Marjory than ever. The old people gained new life from Marjory’s happy prospects, and if I had not known what depths of regret sad remembrance can lie silent and secret in the human heart I might have thought that Celia and Archie were forgotten.

The wedding day came in warm and bright, and as full of opening buds and blossoms as if it had been expressly made for the occasion. The ceremony was to take place in the Red House parlour at six o’clock in the evening. The supper was to follow immediately. The bride and bridegroom were then to be driven to the nearest station to meet the train for Hamilton where they were to stay a few days and then go on to Niagara Falls to spend the remainder of their honeymoon there.

It was a busy day at the Red House. Two or three young girls from the village came to help in the pleasant task of putting all the rooms in festal array, and in preparing the dainties liberally provided for the wedding feast.

As the time for the ceremony drew near, the day’s excitement rose higher and higher. The bridesmaids were dressing the bride, Mrs. Forrest and two favourite assistants were setting out the supper table. The farmer had taken most of the guests to see his new peach orchard. Two young men, one a cousin of Leonard’s who had come from Hamilton to be the best man, were chatting and laughing through an open window with two pretty girls who were decorating the wedding cake with dainty little flags bearing embroidered mottoes placed among loves and doves and other appropriate devices in sugar. Leonard and I were standing in the doorway of the verandah, and the eager bridegroom was looking at his watch.

“It only wants twelve minutes to six,” he said, “I hope Marjory is ready.”

“Your watch is too fast,” I said, laughing. “Mine wants fully a quarter.”

As I spoke a boy employed to do “chores” came round the barnyard and said, “There’s a man wants to see Mr. Leonard Mason.”

“A man – what man?” asked Leonard impatiently.

“Dun know. He says he must see you for a minute.”

“Oh, hang it!” said Leonard. “Well, I suppose I can give him a minute,” and he stepped out of the verandah. Then, looking back at me, he exclaimed, “I hope the day is not going to change.”

It was already changing. Grey clouds coming up from the lake were creeping over the sun. An icy wind followed them, chilling me to the bone, and I heard a distant peal of thunder. Farmer Forrest came hurrying his guests into the verandah. “Is all ready, minister?” he enquired. “Where’s Leonard?”

“He went to the yard to speak to a man that wanted to see him,” I answered.

“Well, we’d best go into the parlour now, and receive the bride and bridegroom in state,” said the farmer leading the way.

As Leonard did not come at once, I went to meet him, wondering at his delay. The clouds were growing darker; there was a sharp gleam of lightning, and the thunder that followed showed it was nearer. The storm was certainly coming up, but it might be only a shower.

I looked all round the horizon, and while I was noting the darkening clouds, two men going up the road to the graveyard came into my view; a gleam of the fading sunlight making them distinctly visible. The one in front was more than commonly tall, and led the way with swift, vigorous strides. He was dressed in what seemed a sailor’s rough jacket and trousers, and a sailor’s glazed hat with floating ribbons. His companion followed him with curiously unequal steps, as if dragged by some invisible chain. It was easy to recognize in this last Leonard in his new wedding suit; and as I gazed the conviction flashed upon me that the man in front was Archie Jonson. After all, then, Archie had not been drowned when the White Bird was lost. But by what strange power had he compelled Leonard to leave his waiting bride and follow him to the graveyard?

Such an extraordinary proceeding was both mysterious and alarming, and might be dangerous for Leonard; and on the impulse of the moment I followed them as fast as I could. I was a rapid walker, but they had a start of some minutes, and I could not overtake them.

When I entered the graveyard the whole sky was wrapped in a black pall except a little space above the plot of ground, bordered with periwinkles, in which Celia’s grave lay. The white stone at the head of the grave and the figures of two men beside it stood vividly out under that clear space, while the black cloud came swiftly on as if to swallow them up. The tall man had his hand on the gravestone, his face was turned towards me and I could see every feature. It was Archie Jonson’s face, lividly pale; or it might have been the shadow of the thunder cloud that made it appear so. Leonard’s back was towards me, and he confronted Archie – if Archie it was – in a fixed and moveless attitude. I saw them distinctly for a moment; the next the black cloud that seemed almost to touch the ground covered them, and all was hidden from eyes. Then a bolt of blue flame with a red light in its centre shot from the cloud, and an awful crash seemed to rend the heavens. A blinding torrent of rain succeeded, but it ceased in a minute or two; the cloud passed on, and the sun, now near its setting, shone clear in the western sky. Anxiously I looked round for Leonard and his mysterious companion. Leonard was lying stretched on Celia’s grave; Archie, or his avenging ghost, or whatever had assumed his likeness, had disappeared.

Going up to Leonard, I found him dead; killed by the lightning I supposed, though I saw no sign of its having touched him. As I was still stooping over, half stunned by the shock, his cousin and two or three other young men came round me. They had heard a confused account of our having gone to the graveyard, and while others were looking for us in the barns and out-buildings, they had come to see if it could be true. We made a rough litter of pine boughs on which we laid poor Leonard, the young men carrying the bier while I walked before, wondering how it would be possible for me to tell the awful tidings it was my hard fate to bring.

But it was not left to me. Marjory, who had been waiting and watching in an agony of terror at Leonard’s absence, had seen the ominous procession coming down the hill, and before anyone could prevent her she was flying madly to meet it. Desperately I tried to stop her, but she broke away from me, saw her lover’s dead body lying on the bier, and fell at the feet of the bearers in a deathlike swoon; her dainty wedding dress and fair hair wreathed with flowers, lying in the muddy pools the thunder-storm had made.

It was long before she could be brought back to life, and then her mind was gone. She remembered nothing of the past, she had no recognition of the present; she knew no more, not even her mother; she never spoke, and did not seem conscious of anything said to her. She lingered a few days in this state, and then died so quietly that the watchers did not know when she passed away.

The poor old people did not long survive the wreck of all their earthly hopes. The Red House farm was sold, and Michael Forrest’s property was divided among relations he had never known.

Leonard Mason’s death was, of course, attributed to lightning. The “chore” boy’s description of the man with whom Leonard had gone to the grave was so fanciful, and so mixed with improbable incidents, that his tale was not credited by anyone. From some dreamy, incoherent utterances of Mrs. Forrest’s, it was afterwards believed that Leonard had gone to the graveyard at Marjory’s desire to lay a wreath of flowers on Celia’s grave; and when the conjecture was added that the unknown man must have been an express messenger from Hamilton, bringing the wreath that had delayed by some mistake, the mystery was supposed to be explained. As for the strange things connected with this tragedy that had come to my knowledge, I kept them hidden in my breast.

I have never seen or heard anything of Archie Jonson since his inexplicable appearance on that fatal day; and I have been informed that it was absolutely impossible the best sailor that ever lived could have escaped in such a storm as that in which the White Bird, with her crew, foundered.

THE LIBRARY WINDOW

Margaret Oliphant

1896

I

I was not aware at first of the many discussions which had gone on about that window. It was almost opposite one of the windows of the large old-fashioned drawing-room of the house in which I spent that summer, which was of so much importance in my life. Our house and the library were on opposite sides of the broad High Street of St. Rule’s, which is a fine street, wide and ample, and very quiet, as strangers think who come from noisier places; but in a summer evening there is much coming and going, and the stillness is full of sound – the sound of footsteps and pleasant voices, softened by the summer air. There are even exceptional moments when it is noisy: the time of the fair, and on Saturday nights sometimes, and when there are excursion trains. Then even the softest sunny air of the evening will not smooth the harsh tones and the stumbling steps; but at these unlovely moments we shut the windows, and even I, who am so fond of that deep recess where I can take refuge from all that is going on inside, and make myself a spectator of all the varied story out of doors, withdraw from my watchtower. To tell the truth, there never was very much going on inside. The house belonged to my aunt, to whom (she says, Thank God!) nothing ever happens. I believe that many things have happened to her in her time; but that was all over at the period of which I am speaking, and she was old, and very quiet. Her life went on in a routine never broken. She got up at the same hour every day, and did the same things in the same rotation, day by day the same. She said that this was the greatest support in the world, and that routine is a kind of salvation. It may be so; but it is a very dull salvation, and I used to feel that I would rather have incident, I whatever kind of incident it might be. But then at that time I was not old, which makes all the difference.

At the time of which I speak the deep recess of the drawing-room window was a great comfort to me. Though she was an old lady (perhaps because she was so old) she was very tolerant, and had a kind of feeling for me. She never said a word, but often gave me a smile when she saw how I had built myself up, with my books and my basket of work. I did very little work, I fear – now and then a few stitches when the spirit moved me, or when I had got well afloat in a dream, and was more tempted to follow it out than to read my book, as sometimes happened. At other times, and if the book were interesting, I used to get through volume after volume sitting there, paying no attention to anybody. And yet I did pay a kind of attention. Aunt Mary’s old ladies came in to call, and I heard them talk, though I very seldom listened; but for all that, if they had anything to say that was interesting, it is curious how I found it in my mind afterwards, as if the air had blown it to me. They came and went, and I had the sensation of their old bonnets gliding out and in, and their dresses rustling; and now and then had to jump up and shake hands with some one who knew me, and asked after my papa and mamma. Then Aunt Mary would give me a little smile again, and I slipped back to my window. She never seemed to mind. My mother would not have let me do it, I know. She would have remembered dozens of things there were to do. She would have sent me upstairs to fetch something which I was quite sure she did not want, or downstairs to carry some quite unnecessary message to the housemaid. She liked to keep me running about. Perhaps that was one reason why I was so fond of Aunt Mary’s drawing-room, and the deep recess of the window, and the curtain that fell half over it, and the broad window-seat where one could collect so many things without being found fault with for untidiness. Whenever we had anything the matter with us in these days, we were sent to St. Rule’s to get up our strength. And this was my case at the time of which I am going to speak.

Everybody had said, since ever I learned to speak, that I was fantastic and fanciful and dreamy, and all the other words with which a girl who may happen to like poetry, and to be fond of thinking, is so often made uncomfortable. People don’t know what they mean when they say fantastic. It sounds like Madge Wildfire or something of that sort. My mother thought I should always be busy, to keep nonsense out of my head. But really I was not at all fond of nonsense. I was rather serious than otherwise. I would have been no trouble to anybody if I had been left to myself. It was only that I had a sort of second-sight, and was conscious of things to which I paid no attention. Even when reading the most interesting book, the things that were being talked about blew in to me; and I heard what the people were saying in the streets as they passed under the window. Aunt Mary always said I could do two or indeed three things at once – both read and listen, and see. I am sure that I did not listen much, and seldom looked out, of set purpose – as some people do who notice what bonnets the ladies in the street have on; but I did hear what I couldn’t help hearing, even when I was reading my book, and I did see all sorts of things, though often for a whole half-hour I might never lift my eyes.

This does not explain what I said at the beginning, that there were many discussions about that window. It was, and still is, the last window in the row, of the College Library, which is opposite my aunt’s house in the High Street. Yet it is not exactly opposite, but a little to the west, so that I could see it best from the left side of my recess. I took it calmly for granted that it was a window like any other till I first heard the talk about it which was going on in the drawing-room.

“Have you never made up your mind, Mrs. Balcarres,” said old Mr. Pitmilly, “whether that window opposite is a window or no?” He said Mistress Balcarres – and he was always called Mr. Pitmilly, Morton: which was the name of his place.

“I am never sure of it, to tell the truth,” said Aunt Mary, “all these years.”

“Bless me!” said one of the old ladies, “and what window may that be?”

Mr. Pitmilly had a way of laughing as he spoke, which did not please me; but it was true that he was not perhaps desirous of pleasing me. He said, “Oh, just the window opposite,” with his laugh running through his words; “our friend can never make up her mind about it, though she has been living opposite it since—”

“You need never mind the date,” said another; “the Leebrary window! Dear me, what should it be but a window? up at that height it could not be a door.”

“The question is,” said my aunt, “if it is a real window with glass in it, or if it is merely painted, or if it once was a window, and has been built up. And the oftener people look at it, the less they are able to say.”

“Let me see this window,” said old Lady Carnbee, who was very active and strong-minded; and then they all came crowding upon me – three or four old ladies, very eager, and Mr. Pitmilly’s white hair appearing over their heads, and my aunt sitting quiet and smiling behind.

“I mind the window very well,” said Lady Carnbee; “aye: and so do more than me. But in its present appearance it is just like any other window; but has not been cleaned, I should say, in the memory of man.”

“I see what ye mean,” said one of the others. “It is just a very dead thing without any reflection in it; but I’ve seen as bad before.”

“Aye, it’s dead enough,” said another, “but that’s no rule; for these hizzies of women-servants in this ill age—”

“Nay, the women are well enough,” said the softest voice of all, which was Aunt Mary’s. “I will never let them risk their lives cleaning the outside of mine. And there are no women-servants in the Old Library: there is maybe something more in it than that.”

They were all pressing into my recess, pressing upon me, a row of old faces, peering into something they could not understand. I had a sense in my mind how curious it was, the wall of old ladies in their old satin gowns all glazed with age, Lady Carnbee with her lace about her head. Nobody was looking at me or thinking of me; but I felt unconsciously the contrast of my youngness to their oldness, and stared at them as they stared over my head at the Library window. I had given it no attention up to this time. I was more taken up with the old ladies than with the thing they were looking at.

“The framework is all right at least, I can see that, and pented black—”

“And the panes are pented black too. It’s no window, Mrs. Balcarres. It has been filled in, in the days of the window duties: you will mind, Leddy Carnbee.”

“Mind!” said that oldest lady. “I mind when your mother was marriet, Jeanie: and that’s neither the day nor yesterday. But as for the window, it’s just a delusion: and that is my opinion of the matter, if you ask me.”

“There’s a great want of light in that muckle room at the college,” said another. “If it was a window, the Leebrary would have more light.”

“One thing is clear,” said one of the younger ones, “it cannot be a window to see through. It may be filled in or it may be built up, but it is not a window to give light.”

“And who ever heard of a window that was no to see through?” Lady Carnbee said. I was fascinated by the look on her face, which was a curious scornful look as of one who knew more than she chose to say: and then my wandering fancy was caught by her hand as she held it up, throwing back the lace that dropped over it. Lady Carnbee’s lace was the chief thing about her – heavy black Spanish lace with large flowers. Everything she wore was trimmed with it. A large veil of it hung over her old bonnet. But her hand coming out of this heavy lace was a curious thing to see. She had very long fingers, very taper, which had been much admired in her youth; and her hand was very white, or rather more than white, pale, bleached, and bloodless, with large blue veins standing up upon the back; and she wore some fine rings, among others a big diamond in an ugly old claw setting. They were too big for her, and were wound round and round with yellow silk to make them keep on: and this little cushion of silk, turned brown with long wearing, had twisted round so that it was more conspicuous than the jewels; while the big diamond blazed underneath in the hollow of her hand, like some dangerous thing hiding and sending out darts of light. The hand, which seemed to come almost to a point, with this strange ornament underneath, clutched at my half-terrified imagination. It too seemed to mean far more than was said. I felt as if it might clutch me with sharp claws, and the lurking, dazzling creature bite – with a sting that would go to the heart.

Presently, however, the circle of the old faces broke up, the old ladies returned to their seats, and Mr. Pitmilly, small but very erect, stood up in the midst of them, talking with mild authority like a little oracle among the ladies. Only Lady Carnbee always contradicted the neat, little, old gentleman. She gesticulated, when she talked, like a Frenchwoman, and darted forth that hand of hers with the lace hanging over it, so that I always caught a glimpse of the lurking diamond. I thought she looked like a witch among the comfortable little group which gave such attention to everything Mr. Pitmilly said.

“For my part, it is my opinion there is no window there at all,” he said. “It’s very like the thing that’s called in scientific language an optical illusion. It arises generally, if I may use such a word in the presence of ladies, from a liver that is not just in the perfitt order and balance that organ demands – and then you will see things – a blue dog, I remember, was the thing in one case, and in another—”

“The man has gane gyte,” said Lady Carnbee; “I mind the windows in the Auld Leebrary as long as I mind anything. Is the Leebrary itself an optical illusion too?”

“Na, na,” and “No, no,” said the old ladies; “a blue dogue would be a strange vagary: but the Library we have all kent from our youth,” said one. “And I mind when the Assemblies were held there one year when the Town Hall was building,” another said.

“It is just a great divert to me,” said Aunt Mary: but what was strange was that she paused there, and said in a low tone, “now”: and then went on again, “for whoever comes to my house, there are aye discussions about that window. I have never just made up my mind about it myself. Sometimes I think it’s a case of these wicked window duties, as you said, Miss Jeanie, when half the windows in our houses were blocked up to save the tax. And then, I think, it may be due to that blank kind of building like the great new buildings on the Earthen Mound in Edinburgh, where the windows are just ornaments. And then whiles I am sure I can see the glass shining when the sun catches it in the afternoon.”

“You could so easily satisfy yourself, Mrs. Balcarres, if you were to—”

“Give a laddie a penny to cast a stone, and see what happens,” said Lady Carnbee.

“But I am not sure that I have any desire to satisfy myself,” Aunt Mary said. And then there was a stir in the room, and I had to come out from my recess and open the door for the old ladies and see them downstairs, as they all went away following one another. Mr. Pitmilly gave his arm to Lady Carnbee, though she was always contradicting him; and so the tea-party dispersed. Aunt Mary came to the head of the stairs with her guests in an old-fashioned gracious way, while I went down with them to see that the maid was ready at the door. When I came back Aunt Mary was still standing in the recess looking out. Returning to my seat she said, with a kind of wistful look, “Well, honey: and what is your opinion?”

“I have no opinion. I was reading my book all the time,” I said.

“And so you were, honey, and no’ very civil; but all the same I ken well you heard every word we said.”

II

It was a night in June; dinner was long over, and had it been winter the maids would have been shutting up the house, and my Aunt Mary preparing to go upstairs to her room. But it was still clear daylight, that daylight out of which the sun has been long gone, and which has no longer any rose reflections, but all has sunk into a pearly neutral tint – a light which is daylight yet is not day. We had taken a turn in the garden after dinner, and now we had returned to what we called our usual occupations. My aunt was reading. The English post had come in, and she had got her ‘Times,’ which was her great diversion. The ‘Scotsman’ was her morning reading, but she liked her ‘Times’ at night.

As for me, I too was at my usual occupation, which at that time was doing nothing. I had a book as usual, and was absorbed in it: but I was conscious of all that was going on all the same. The people strolled along the broad pavement, making remarks as they passed under the open window which came up into my story or my dream, and sometimes made me laugh. The tone and the faint sing-song, or rather chant, of the accent, which was “a wee Fifish,” was novel to me, and associated with holiday, and pleasant; and sometimes they said to each other something that was amusing, and often something that suggested a whole story; but presently they began to drop off, the footsteps slackened, the voices died away. It was getting late, though the clear soft daylight went on and on. All through the lingering evening, which seemed to consist of interminable hours, long but not weary, drawn out as if the spell of the light and the outdoor life might never end, I had now and then, quite unawares, cast a glance at the mysterious window which my aunt and her friends had discussed, as I felt, though I dared not say it even to myself, rather foolishly. It caught my eye without any intention on my part, as I paused, as it were, to take breath, in the flowing and current of undistinguishable thoughts and things from without and within which carried me along. First it occurred to me, with a little sensation of discovery, how absurd to say it was not a window, a living window, one to see through! Why, then, had they never seen it, these old folk? I saw as I looked up suddenly the faint greyness as of visible space within – a room behind, certainly dim, as it was natural a room should be on the other side of the street – quite indefinite: yet so clear that if some one were to come to the window there would be nothing surprising in it. For certainly there was a feeling of space behind the panes which these old half-blind ladies had disputed about whether they were glass or only fictitious panes marked on the wall. How silly! when eyes that could see could make it out in a minute. It was only a greyness at present, but it was unmistakable, a space that went back into gloom, as every room does when you look into it across a street. There were no curtains to show whether it was inhabited or not; but a room – oh, as distinctly as ever room was! I was pleased with myself, but said nothing, while Aunt Mary rustled her paper, waiting for a favourable moment to announce a discovery which settled her problem at once. Then I was carried away upon the stream again, and forgot the window, till somebody threw unawares a word from the outer world, “I’m goin’ hame; it’ll soon be dark.” Dark! what was the fool thinking of? it never would be dark if one waited out, wandering in the soft air for hours longer; and then my eyes, acquiring easily that new habit, looked across the way again.

Ah, now! nobody indeed had come to the window; and no light had been lighted, seeing it was still beautiful to read by – a still, clear, colourless light; but the room inside had certainly widened. I could see the grey space and air a little deeper, and a sort of vision, very dim, of a wall, and something against it; something dark, with the blackness that a solid article, however indistinctly seen, takes in the lighter darkness that is only space – a large, black, dark thing coming out into the grey. I looked more intently, and made sure it was a piece of furniture, either a writing-table or perhaps a large bookcase. No doubt it must be the last, since this was part of the old library. I never visited the old College Library, but I had seen such places before, and I could well imagine it to myself. How curious that for all the time these old people had looked at it, they had never seen this before!

It was more silent now, and my eyes, I suppose, had grown dim with gazing, doing my best to make it out, when suddenly Aunt Mary said, “Will you ring the bell, my dear? I must have my lamp.”

“Your lamp?” I cried, “when it is still daylight.” But then I gave another look at my window, and perceived with a start that the light had indeed changed: for now I saw nothing. It was still light, but there was so much change in the light that my room, with the grey space and the large shadowy bookcase, had gone out, and I saw them no more: for even a Scotch night in June, though it looks as if it would never end, does darken at the last. I had almost cried out, but checked myself, and rang the bell for Aunt Mary, and made up my mind I would say nothing till next morning, when to be sure naturally it would be more clear.

Next morning I rather think I forgot all about it – or was busy: or was more idle than usual: the two things meant nearly the same. At all events I thought no more of the window, though I still sat in my own, opposite to it, but occupied with some other fancy. Aunt Mary’s visitors came as usual in the afternoon; but their talk was of other things, and for a day or two nothing at all happened to bring back my thoughts into this channel. It might be nearly a week before the subject came back, and once more it was old Lady Carnbee who set me thinking; not that she said anything upon that particular theme. But she was the last of my aunt’s afternoon guests to go away, and when she rose to leave she threw up her hands, with those lively gesticulations which so many old Scotch ladies have. “My faith!” said she, “there is that bairn there still like a dream. Is the creature bewitched, Mary Balcarres? and is she bound to sit there by night and by day for the rest of her days? You should mind that there’s things about, uncanny for women of our blood.”

I was too much startled at first to recognise that it was of me she was speaking. She was like a figure in a picture, with her pale face the colour of ashes, and the big pattern of the Spanish lace hanging half over it, and her hand held up, with the big diamond blazing at me from the inside of her uplifted palm. It was held up in surprise, but it looked as if it were raised in malediction; and the diamond threw out darts of light and glared and twinkled at me. If it had been in its right place it would not have mattered; but there, in the open of the hand! I started up, half in terror, half in wrath. And then the old lady laughed, and her hand dropped. “I’ve wakened you to life, and broke the spell,” she said, nodding her old head at me, while the large black silk flowers of the lace waved and threatened. And she took my arm to go downstairs, laughing and bidding me be steady, and no’ tremble and shake like a broken reed. “You should be as steady as a rock at your age. I was like a young tree,” she said, leaning so heavily that my willowy girlish frame quivered – “I was a support to virtue, like Pamela, in my time.”

“Aunt Mary, Lady Carnbee is a witch!” I cried, when I came back.

“Is that what you think, honey? well: maybe she once was,” said Aunt Mary, whom nothing surprised.

And it was that night once more after dinner, and after the post came in, and the ‘Times,’ that I suddenly saw the Library window again. I had seen it every day and noticed nothing; but tonight, still in a little tumult of mind over Lady Carnbee and her wicked diamond which wished me harm, and her lace which waved threats and warnings at me, I looked across the street, and there I saw quite plainly the room opposite, far more clear than before. I saw dimly that it must be a large room, and that the big piece of furniture against the wall was a writing-desk. That in a moment, when first my eyes rested upon it, was quite clear: a large old-fashioned escritoire, standing out into the room: and I knew by the shape of it that it had a great many pigeon-holes and little drawers in the back, and a large table for writing. There was one just like it in my father’s library at home. It was such a surprise to see it all so clearly that I closed my eyes, for the moment almost giddy, wondering how papa’s desk could have come here – and then when I reminded myself that this was nonsense, and that there were many such writing-tables besides papa’s, and looked again – lo! it had all become quite vague and indistinct as it was at first; and I saw nothing but the blank window, of which the old ladies could never be certain whether it was filled up to avoid the window-tax, or whether it had ever been a window at all.

This occupied my mind very much, and yet I did not say anything to Aunt Mary. For one thing, I rarely saw anything at all in the early part of the day; but then that is natural: you can never see into a place from outside, whether it is an empty room or a looking-glass, or people’s eyes, or anything else that is mysterious, in the day. It has, I suppose, something to do with the light. But in the evening in June in Scotland – then is the time to see. For it is daylight, yet it is not day, and there is a quality in it which I cannot describe, it is so clear, as if every object was a reflection of itself.

I used to see more and more of the room as the days went on. The large escritoire stood out more and more into the space: with sometimes white glimmering things, which looked like papers, lying on it: and once or twice I was sure I saw a pile of books on the floor close to the writing-table, as if they had gilding upon them in broken specks, like old books. It was always about the time when the lads in the street began to call to each other that they were going home, and sometimes a shriller voice would come from one of the doors, bidding somebody to “cry upon the laddies” to come back to their suppers. That was always the time I saw best, though it was close upon the moment when the veil seemed to fall and the clear radiance became less living, and all the sounds died out of the street, and Aunt Mary said in her soft voice, “Honey! will you ring for the lamp?” She said honey as people say darling: and I think it is a prettier word.

Then finally, while I sat one evening with my book in my hand, looking straight across the street, not distracted by anything, I saw a little movement within. It was not any one visible – but everybody must know what it is to see the stir in the air, the little disturbance – you cannot tell what it is, but that it indicates some one there, even though you can see no one. Perhaps it is a shadow making just one flicker in the still place. You may look at an empty room and the furniture in it for hours, and then suddenly there will be the flicker, and you know that something has come into it. It might only be a dog or a cat; it might be, if that were possible, a bird flying across; but it is some one, something living, which is so different, so completely different, in a moment from the things that are not living. It seemed to strike quite through me, and I gave a little cry. Then Aunt Mary stirred a little, and put down the huge newspaper that almost covered her from sight, and said, “What is it, honey?” I cried “Nothing,” with a little gasp, quickly, for I did not want to be disturbed just at this moment when somebody was coming! But I suppose she was not satisfied, for she got up and stood behind to see what it was, putting her hand on my shoulder. It was the softest touch in the world, but I could have flung it off angrily: for that moment everything was still again, and the place grew grey and I saw no more.

“Nothing,” I repeated, but I was so vexed I could have cried. “I told you it was nothing, Aunt Mary. Don’t you believe me, that you come to look – and spoil it all!”

I did not mean of course to say these last words; they were forced out of me. I was so much annoyed to see it all melt away like a dream: for it was no dream, but as real as – as real as – myself or anything I ever saw.

She gave my shoulder a little pat with her hand. “Honey,” she said, “were you looking at something? Is’t that? is’t that?” “Is it what?” I wanted to say, shaking off her hand, but something in me stopped me: for I said nothing at all, and she went quietly back to her place. I suppose she must have rung the bell herself, for immediately I felt the soft flood of the light behind me, and the evening outside dimmed down, as it did every night, and I saw nothing more.

It was next day, I think, in the afternoon that I spoke. It was brought on by something she said about her fine work. “I get a mist before my eyes,” she said; “you will have to learn my old lace stitches, honey – for I soon will not see to draw the threads.”

“Oh, I hope you will keep your sight,” I cried, without thinking what I was saying. I was then young and very matter-of-fact. I had not found out that one may mean something, yet not half or a hundredth part of what one seems to mean: and even then probably hoping to be contradicted if it is anyhow against one’s self.

“My sight!” she said, looking up at me with a look that was almost angry; “there is no question of losing my sight – on the contrary, my eyes are very strong. I may not see to draw fine threads, but I see at a distance as well as ever I did – as well as you do.”

“I did not mean any harm, Aunt Mary,” I said. “I thought you said – But how can your sight be as good as ever when you are in doubt about that window? I can see into the room as clear as—” My voice wavered, for I had just looked up and across the street, and I could have sworn that there was no window at all, but only a false image of one painted on the wall.

“Ah!” she said, with a little tone of keenness and of surprise: and she half rose up, throwing down her work hastily, as if she meant to come to me: then, perhaps seeing the bewildered look on my face, she paused and hesitated – “Aye, honey!” she said, “have you got so far ben as that?”

What did she mean? Of course I knew all the old Scotch phrases as well as I knew myself; but it is a comfort to take refuge in a little ignorance, and I know I pretended not to understand whenever I was put out. “I don’t know what you mean by ‘far ben,’” I cried out, very impatient. I don’t know what might have followed, but some one just then came to call, and she could only give me a look before she went forward, putting out her hand to her visitor. It was a very soft look, but anxious, and as if she did not know what to do: and she shook her head a very little, and I thought, though there was a smile on her face, there was something wet about her eyes. I retired into my recess, and nothing more was said.

But it was very tantalising that it should fluctuate so; for sometimes I saw that room quite plain and clear – quite as clear as I could see papa’s library, for example, when I shut my eyes. I compared it naturally to my father’s study, because of the shape of the writing-table, which, as I tell you, was the same as his. At times I saw the papers on the table quite plain, just as I had seen his papers many a day. And the little pile of books on the floor at the foot – not ranged regularly in order, but put down one above the other, with all their angles going different ways, and a speck of the old gilding shining here and there. And then again at other times I saw nothing, absolutely nothing, and was no better than the old ladies who had peered over my head, drawing their eyelids together, and arguing that the window had been shut up because of the old long-abolished window tax, or else that it had never been a window at all. It annoyed me very much at those dull moments to feel that I too puckered up my eyelids and saw no better than they.

Aunt Mary’s old ladies came and went day after day while June went on. I was to go back in July, and I felt that I should be very unwilling indeed to leave until I had quite cleared up – as I was indeed in the way of doing – the mystery of that window which changed so strangely and appeared quite a different thing, not only to different people, but to the same eyes at different times. Of course I said to myself it must simply be an effect of the light. And yet I did not quite like that explanation either, but would have been better pleased to make out to myself that it was some superiority in me which made it so clear to me, if it were only the great superiority of young eyes over old – though that was not quite enough to satisfy me, seeing it was a superiority which I shared with every little lass and lad in the street. I rather wanted, I believe, to think that there was some particular insight in me which gave clearness to my sight – which was a most impertinent assumption, but really did not mean half the harm it seems to mean when it is put down here in black and white.

I had several times again, however, seen the room quite plain, and made out that it was a large room, with a great picture in a dim gilded frame hanging on the farther wall, and many other pieces of solid furniture making a blackness here and there, besides the great escritoire against the wall, which had evidently been placed near the window for the sake of the light. One thing became visible to me after another, till I almost thought I should end by being able to read the old lettering on one of the big volumes which projected from the others and caught the light; but this was all preliminary to the great event which happened about Midsummer Day – the day of St. John, which was once so much thought of as a festival, but now means nothing at all in Scotland any more than any other of the saints’ days: which I shall always think a great pity and loss to Scotland, whatever Aunt Mary may say.

III

It was about midsummer, I cannot say exactly to a day when, but near that time, when the great event happened. I had grown very well acquainted by this time with that large dim room. Not only the escritoire, which was very plain to me now, with the papers upon it, and the books at its foot, but the great picture that hung against the farther wall, and various other shadowy pieces of furniture, especially a chair which one evening I saw had been moved into the space before the escritoire, – a little change which made my heart beat, for it spoke so distinctly of some one who must have been there, the some one who had already made me start, two or three times before, by some vague shadow of him or thrill of him which made a sort of movement in the silent space: a movement which made me sure that next minute I must see something or hear something which would explain the whole – if it were not that something always happened outside to stop it, at the very moment of its accomplishment. I had no warning this time of movement or shadow. I had been looking into the room very attentively a little while before, and had made out everything almost clearer than ever; and then had bent my attention again on my book, and read a chapter or two at a most exciting period of the story: and consequently had quite left St. Rule’s, and the High Street, and the College Library, and was really in a South American forest, almost throttled by the flowery creepers, and treading softly lest I should put my foot on a scorpion or a dangerous snake.

At this moment something suddenly calling my attention to the outside, I looked across, and then, with a start, sprang up, for I could not contain myself. I don’t know what I said, but enough to startle the people in the room, one of whom was old Mr. Pitmilly. They all looked round upon me to ask what was the matter. And when I gave my usual answer of “Nothing,” sitting down again shamefaced but very much excited, Mr. Pitmilly got up and came forward, and looked out, apparently to see what was the cause. He saw nothing, for he went back again, and I could hear him telling Aunt Mary not to be alarmed, for Missy had fallen into a doze with the heat, and had startled herself waking up, at which they all laughed: another time I could have killed him for his impertinence, but my mind was too much taken up now to pay any attention. My head was throbbing and my heart beating. I was in such high excitement, however, that to restrain myself completely, to be perfectly silent, was more easy to me then than at any other time of my life. I waited until the old gentleman had taken his seat again, and then I looked back. Yes, there he was! I had not been deceived. I knew then, when I looked across, that this was what I had been looking for all the time – that I had known he was there, and had been waiting for him, every time there was that flicker of movement in the room – him and no one else. And there at last, just as I had expected, he was. I don’t know that in reality I ever had expected him, or any one: but this was what I felt when, suddenly looking into that curious dim room, I saw him there.

He was sitting in the chair, which he must have placed for himself, or which some one else in the dead of night when nobody was looking must have set for him, in front of the escritoire – with the back of his head towards me, writing. The light fell upon him from the left hand, and therefore upon his shoulders and the side of his head, which, however, was too much turned away to show anything of his face. Oh, how strange that there should be some one staring at him as I was doing, and he never to turn his head, to make a movement! If any one stood and looked at me, were I in the soundest sleep that ever was, I would wake, I would jump up, I would feel it through everything. But there he sat and never moved. You are not to suppose, though I said the light fell upon him from the left hand, that there was very much light. There never is in a room you are looking into like that across the street; but there was enough to see him by – the outline of his figure dark and solid, seated in the chair, and the fairness of his head visible faintly, a clear spot against the dimness. I saw this outline against the dim gilding of the frame of the large picture which hung on the farther wall.

I sat all the time the visitors were there, in a sort of rapture, gazing at this figure. I knew no reason why I should be so much moved. In an ordinary way, to see a student at an opposite window quietly doing his work might have interested me a little, but certainly it would not have moved me in any such way. It is always interesting to have a glimpse like this of an unknown life – to see so much and yet know so little, and to wonder, perhaps, what the man is doing, and why he never turns his head. One would go to the window – but not too close, lest he should see you and think you were spying upon him – and one would ask, Is he still there? is he writing, writing always? I wonder what he is writing! And it would be a great amusement: but no more. This was not my feeling at all in the present case. It was a sort of breathless watch, an absorption. I did not feel that I had eyes for anything else, or any room in my mind for another thought. I no longer heard, as I generally did, the stories and the wise remarks (or foolish) of Aunt Mary’s old ladies or Mr. Pitmilly. I heard only a murmur behind me, the interchange of voices, one softer, one sharper; but it was not as in the time when I sat reading and heard every word, till the story in my book, and the stories they were telling (what they said almost always shaped into stories), were all mingled into each other, and the hero in the novel became somehow the hero (or more likely heroine) of them all. But I took no notice of what they were saying now. And it was not that there was anything very interesting to look at, except the fact that he was there. He did nothing to keep up the absorption of my thoughts. He moved just so much as a man will do when he is very busily writing, thinking of nothing else. There was a faint turn of his head as he went from one side to another of the page he was writing; but it appeared to be a long long page which never wanted turning. Just a little inclination when he was at the end of the line, outward, and then a little inclination inward when he began the next. That was little enough to keep one gazing. But I suppose it was the gradual course of events leading up to this, the finding out of one thing after another as the eyes got accustomed to the vague light: first the room itself, and then the writing-table, and then the other furniture, and last of all the human inhabitant who gave it all meaning. This was all so interesting that it was like a country which one had discovered. And then the extraordinary blindness of the other people who disputed among themselves whether it was a window at all! I did not, I am sure, wish to be disrespectful, and I was very fond of my Aunt Mary, and I liked Mr. Pitmilly well enough, and I was afraid of Lady Carnbee. But yet to think of the – I know I ought not to say stupidity – the blindness of them, the foolishness, the insensibility! discussing it as if a thing that your eyes could see was a thing to discuss! It would have been unkind to think it was because they were old and their faculties dimmed. It is so sad to think that the faculties grow dim, that such a woman as my Aunt Mary should fail in seeing, or hearing, or feeling, that I would not have dwelt on it for a moment, it would have seemed so cruel! And then such a clever old lady as Lady Carnbee, who could see through a millstone, people said – and Mr. Pitmilly, such an old man of the world. It did indeed bring tears to my eyes to think that all those clever people, solely by reason of being no longer young as I was, should have the simplest things shut out from them; and for all their wisdom and their knowledge be unable to see what a girl like me could see so easily. I was too much grieved for them to dwell upon that thought, and half ashamed, though perhaps half proud too, to be so much better off than they.

All those thoughts flitted through my mind as I sat and gazed across the street. And I felt there was so much going on in that room across the street! He was so absorbed in his writing, never looked up, never paused for a word, never turned round in his chair, or got up and walked about the room as my father did. Papa is a great writer, everybody says: but he would have come to the window and looked out, he would have drummed with his fingers on the pane, he would have watched a fly and helped it over a difficulty, and played with the fringe of the curtain, and done a dozen other nice, pleasant, foolish things, till the next sentence took shape. “My dear, I am waiting for a word,” he would say to my mother when she looked at him, with a question why he was so idle, in her eyes; and then he would laugh, and go back again to his writing-table. But He over there never stopped at all. It was like a fascination. I could not take my eyes from him and that little scarcely perceptible movement he made, turning his head. I trembled with impatience to see him turn the page, or perhaps throw down his finished sheet on the floor, as somebody looking into a window like me once saw Sir Walter do, sheet after sheet. I should have cried out if this Unknown had done that. I should not have been able to help myself, whoever had been present; and gradually I got into such a state of suspense waiting for it to be done that my head grew hot and my hands cold. And then, just when there was a little movement of his elbow, as if he were about to do this, to be called away by Aunt Mary to see Lady Carnbee to the door! I believe I did not hear her till she had called me three times, and then I stumbled up, all flushed and hot, and nearly crying. When I came out from the recess to give the old lady my arm (Mr. Pitmilly had gone away some time before), she put up her hand and stroked my cheek. “What ails the bairn?” she said; “she’s fevered. You must not let her sit her lane in the window, Mary Balcarres. You and me know what comes of that.” Her old fingers had a strange touch, cold like something not living, and I felt that dreadful diamond sting me on the cheek.

I do not say that this was not just a part of my excitement and suspense; and I know it is enough to make any one laugh when the excitement was all about an unknown man writing in a room on the other side of the way, and my impatience because he never came to an end of the page. If you think I was not quite as well aware of this as any one could be! but the worst was that this dreadful old lady felt my heart beating against her arm that was within mine. “You are just in a dream,” she said to me, with her old voice close at my ear as we went downstairs. “I don’t know who it is about, but it’s bound to be some man that is not worth it. If you were wise you would think of him no more.”

“I am thinking of no man!” I said, half crying. “It is very unkind and dreadful of you to say so, Lady Carnbee. I never thought of – any man, in all my life!” I cried in a passion of indignation. The old lady clung tighter to my arm, and pressed it to her, not unkindly.

“Poor little bird,” she said, “how it’s strugglin’ and flutterin’! I’m not saying but what it’s more dangerous when it’s all for a dream.”

She was not at all unkind; but I was very angry and excited, and would scarcely shake that old pale hand which she put out to me from her carriage window when I had helped her in. I was angry with her, and I was afraid of the diamond, which looked up from under her finger as if it saw through and through me; and whether you believe me or not, I am certain that it stung me again – a sharp malignant prick, oh full of meaning! She never wore gloves, but only black lace mittens, through which that horrible diamond gleamed.

I ran upstairs – she had been the last to go and Aunt Mary too had gone to get ready for dinner, for it was late. I hurried to my place, and looked across, with my heart beating more than ever. I made quite sure I should see the finished sheet lying white upon the floor. But what I gazed at was only the dim blank of that window which they said was no window. The light had changed in some wonderful way during that five minutes I had been gone, and there was nothing, nothing, not a reflection, not a glimmer. It looked exactly as they all said, the blank form of a window painted on the wall. It was too much: I sat down in my excitement and cried as if my heart would break. I felt that they had done something to it, that it was not natural, that I could not bear their unkindness – even Aunt Mary. They thought it not good for me! not good for me! and they had done something – even Aunt Mary herself – and that wicked diamond that hid itself in Lady Carnbee’s hand. Of course I knew all this was ridiculous as well as you could tell me; but I was exasperated by the disappointment and the sudden stop to all my excited feelings, and I could not bear it. It was more strong than I.

I was late for dinner, and naturally there were some traces in my eyes that I had been crying when I came into the full light in the dining-room, where Aunt Mary could look at me at her pleasure, and I could not run away. She said, “Honey, you have been shedding tears. I’m loth, loth that a bairn of your mother’s should be made to shed tears in my house.”

“I have not been made to shed tears,” cried I; and then, to save myself another fit of crying, I burst out laughing and said, “I am afraid of that dreadful diamond on old Lady Carnbee’s hand. It bites – I am sure it bites! Aunt Mary, look here.”

“You foolish lassie,” Aunt Mary said; but she looked at my cheek under the light of the lamp, and then she gave it a little pat with her soft hand. “Go away with you, you silly bairn. There is no bite; but a flushed cheek, my honey, and a wet eye. You must just read out my paper to me after dinner when the post is in: and we’ll have no more thinking and no more dreaming for tonight.”

“Yes, Aunt Mary,” said I. But I knew what would happen; for when she opens up her ‘Times,’ all full of the news of the world, and the speeches and things which she takes an interest in, though I cannot tell why – she forgets. And as I kept very quiet and made not a sound, she forgot tonight what she had said, and the curtain hung a little more over me than usual, and I sat down in my recess as if I had been a hundred miles away. And my heart gave a great jump, as if it would have come out of my breast; for he was there. But not as he had been in the morning – I suppose the light, perhaps, was not good enough to go on with his work without a lamp or candles – for he had turned away from the table and was fronting the window, sitting leaning back in his chair, and turning his head to me. Not to me – he knew nothing about me. I thought he was not looking at anything; but with his face turned my way.

My heart was in my mouth: it was so unexpected, so strange! though why it should have seemed strange I know not, for there was no communication between him and me that it should have moved me; and what could be more natural than that a man, wearied of his work, and feeling the want perhaps of more light, and yet that it was not dark enough to light a lamp, should turn round in his own chair, and rest a little, and think – perhaps of nothing at all? Papa always says he is thinking of nothing at all. He says things blow through his mind as if the doors were open, and he has no responsibility. What sort of things were blowing through this man’s mind? or was he thinking, still thinking, of what he had been writing and going on with it still? The thing that troubled me most was that I could not make out his face. It is very difficult to do so when you see a person only through two windows, your own and his. I wanted very much to recognise him afterwards if I should chance to meet him in the street. If he had only stood up and moved about the room, I should have made out the rest of his figure, and then I should have known him again; or if he had only come to the window (as papa always did), then I should have seen his face clearly enough to have recognised him. But, to be sure, he did not see any need to do anything in order that I might recognise him, for he did not know I existed; and probably if he had known I was watching him, he would have been annoyed and gone away.

But he was as immovable there facing the window as he had been seated at the desk. Sometimes he made a little faint stir with a hand or a foot, and I held my breath, hoping he was about to rise from his chair – but he never did it. And with all the efforts I made I could not be sure of his face. I puckered my eyelids together as old Miss Jeanie did who was shortsighted, and I put my hands on each side of my face to concentrate the light on him: but it was all in vain. Either the face changed as I sat staring, or else it was the light that was not good enough, or I don’t know what it was. His hair seemed to me light – certainly there was no dark line about his head, as there would have been had it been very dark – and I saw, where it came across the old gilt frame on the wall behind, that it must be fair: and I am almost sure he had no beard. Indeed I am sure that he had no beard, for the outline of his face was distinct enough; and the daylight was still quite clear out of doors, so that I recognised perfectly a baker’s boy who was on the pavement opposite, and whom I should have known again whenever I had met him: as if it was of the least importance to recognise a baker’s boy! There was one thing, however, rather curious about this boy. He had been throwing stones at something or somebody. In St. Rule’s they have a great way of throwing stones at each other, and I suppose there had been a battle. I suppose also that he had one stone in his hand left over from the battle, and his roving eye took in all the incidents of the street to judge where he could throw it with most effect and mischief. But apparently he found nothing worthy of it in the street, for he suddenly turned round with a flick under his leg to show his cleverness, and aimed it straight at the window. I remarked without remarking that it struck with a hard sound and without any breaking of glass, and fell straight down on the pavement. But I took no notice of this even in my mind, so intently was I watching the figure within, which moved not nor took the slightest notice, and remained just as dimly clear, as perfectly seen, yet as indistinguishable, as before. And then the light began to fail a little, not diminishing the prospect within, but making it still less distinct than it had been.

Then I jumped up, feeling Aunt Mary’s hand upon my shoulder. “Honey,” she said, “I asked you twice to ring the bell; but you did not hear me.”

“Oh, Aunt Mary!” I cried in great penitence, but turning again to the window in spite of myself.

“You must come away from there: you must come away from there,” she said, almost as if she were angry: and then her soft voice grew softer, and she gave me a kiss: “never mind about the lamp, honey; I have rung myself, and it is coming; but, silly bairn, you must not aye be dreaming – your little head will turn.”

All the answer I made, for I could scarcely speak, was to give a little wave with my hand to the window on the other side of the street.

She stood there patting me softly on the shoulder for a whole minute or more, murmuring something that sounded like, “She must go away, she must go away.” Then she said, always with her hand soft on my shoulder, “Like a dream when one awaketh.” And when I looked again, I saw the blank of an opaque surface and nothing more.

Aunt Mary asked me no more questions. She made me come into the room and sit in the light and read something to her. But I did not know what I was reading, for there suddenly came into my mind and took possession of it, the thud of the stone upon the window, and its descent straight down, as if from some hard substance that threw it off: though I had myself seen it strike upon the glass of the panes across the way.

IV

I am afraid I continued in a state of great exaltation and commotion of mind for some time. I used to hurry through the day till the evening came, when I could watch my neighbour through the window opposite. I did not talk much to any one, and I never said a word about my own questions and wonderings. I wondered who he was, what he was doing, and why he never came till the evening (or very rarely); and I also wondered much to what house the room belonged in which he sat. It seemed to form a portion of the old College Library, as I have often said. The window was one of the line of windows which I understood lighted the large hall; but whether this room belonged to the library itself, or how its occupant gained access to it, I could not tell. I made up my mind that it must open out of the hall, and that the gentleman must be the Librarian or one of his assistants, perhaps kept busy all the day in his official duties, and only able to get to his desk and do his own private work in the evening. One has heard of so many things like that – a man who had to take up some other kind of work for his living, and then when his leisure-time came, gave it all up to something he really loved – some study or some book he was writing. My father himself at one time had been like that. He had been in the Treasury all day, and then in the evening wrote his books, which made him famous. His daughter, however little she might know of other things, could not but know that! But it discouraged me very much when somebody pointed out to me one day in the street an old gentleman who wore a wig and took a great deal of snuff, and said, That’s the Librarian of the old College. It gave me a great shock for a moment; but then I remembered that an old gentleman has generally assistants, and that it must be one of them.

Gradually I became quite sure of this. There was another small window above, which twinkled very much when the sun shone, and looked a very kindly bright little window, above that dullness of the other which hid so much. I made up my mind this was the window of his other room, and that these two chambers at the end of the beautiful hall were really beautiful for him to live in, so near all the books, and so retired and quiet, that nobody knew of them. What a fine thing for him! and you could see what use he made of his good fortune as he sat there, so constant at his writing for hours together. Was it a book he was writing, or could it be perhaps Poems? This was a thought which made my heart beat; but I concluded with much regret that it could not be Poems, because no one could possibly write Poems like that, straight off, without pausing for a word or a rhyme. Had they been Poems he must have risen up, he must have paced about the room or come to the window as papa did – not that papa wrote Poems: he always said, “I am not worthy even to speak of such prevailing mysteries,” shaking his head – which gave me a wonderful admiration and almost awe of a Poet, who was thus much greater even than papa. But I could not believe that a poet could have kept still for hours and hours like that. What could it be then? perhaps it was history; that is a great thing to work at, but you would not perhaps need to move nor to stride up and down, or look out upon the sky and the wonderful light.

He did move now and then, however, though he never came to the window. Sometimes, as I have said, he would turn round in his chair and turn his face towards it, and sit there for a long time musing when the light had begun to fail, and the world was full of that strange day which was night, that light without colour, in which everything was so clearly visible, and there were no shadows. “It was between the night and the day, when the fairy folk have power.” This was the after-light of the wonderful, long, long summer evening, the light without shadows. It had a spell in it, and sometimes it made me afraid: and all manner of strange thoughts seemed to come in, and I always felt that if only we had a little more vision in our eyes we might see beautiful folk walking about in it, who were not of our world. I thought most likely he saw them, from the way he sat there looking out: and this made my heart expand with the most curious sensation, as if of pride that, though I could not see, he did, and did not even require to come to the window, as I did, sitting close in the depth of the recess, with my eyes upon him, and almost seeing things through his eyes.

I was so much absorbed in these thoughts and in watching him every evening – for now he never missed an evening, but was always there – that people began to remark that I was looking pale and that I could not be well, for I paid no attention when they talked to me, and did not care to go out, nor to join the other girls for their tennis, nor to do anything that others did; and some said to Aunt Mary that I was quickly losing all the ground I had gained, and that she could never send me back to my mother with a white face like that. Aunt Mary had begun to look at me anxiously for some time before that, and, I am sure, held secret consultations over me, sometimes with the doctor, and sometimes with her old ladies, who thought they knew more about young girls than even the doctors. And I could hear them saying to her that I wanted diversion, that I must be diverted, and that she must take me out more, and give a party, and that when the summer visitors began to come there would perhaps be a ball or two, or Lady Carnbee would get up a picnic. “And there’s my young lord coming home,” said the old lady whom they called Miss Jeanie, “and I never knew the young lassie yet that would not cock up her bonnet at the sight of a young lord.”

But Aunt Mary shook her head. “I would not lippen much to the young lord,” she said. “His mother is sore set upon siller for him; and my poor bit honey has no fortune to speak of. No, we must not fly so high as the young lord; but I will gladly take her about the country to see the old castles and towers. It will perhaps rouse her up a little.”

“And if that does not answer we must think of something else,” the old lady said.

I heard them perhaps that day because they were talking of me, which is always so effective a way of making you hear – for latterly I had not been paying any attention to what they were saying; and I thought to myself how little they knew, and how little I cared about even the old castles and curious houses, having something else in my mind. But just about that time Mr. Pitmilly came in, who was always a friend to me, and, when he heard them talking, he managed to stop them and turn the conversation into another channel. And after a while, when the ladies were gone away, he came up to my recess, and gave a glance right over my head. And then he asked my Aunt Mary if ever she had settled her question about the window opposite, “that you thought was a window sometimes, and then not a window, and many curious things,” the old gentleman said.

My Aunt Mary gave me another very wistful look; and then she said, “Indeed, Mr. Pitmilly, we are just where we were, and I am quite as unsettled as ever; and I think my niece she has taken up my views, for I see her many a time looking across and wondering, and I am not clear now what her opinion is.”

“My opinion!” I said, “Aunt Mary.” I could not help being a little scornful, as one is when one is very young. “I have no opinion. There is not only a window but there is a room, and I could show you—” I was going to say, “show you the gentleman who sits and writes in it,” but I stopped, not knowing what they might say, and looked from one to another. “I could tell you – all the furniture that is in it,” I said. And then I felt something like a flame that went over my face, and that all at once my cheeks were burning. I thought they gave a little glance at each other, but that may have been folly. “There is a great picture, in a big dim frame,” I said, feeling a little breathless, “on the wall opposite the window—”

“Is there so?” said Mr. Pitmilly, with a little laugh. And he said, “Now I will tell you what we’ll do. You know that there is a conversation party, or whatever they call it, in the big room tonight, and it will be all open and lighted up. And it is a handsome room, and two-three things well worth looking at. I will just step along after we have all got our dinner, and take you over to the pairty, madam – Missy and you—”

“Dear me!” said Aunt Mary. “I have not gone to a pairty for more years than I would like to say – and never once to the Library Hall.” Then she gave a little shiver, and said quite low, “I could not go there.”

“Then you will just begin again tonight, madam,” said Mr. Pitmilly, taking no notice of this, “and a proud man will I be leading in Mistress Balcarres that was once the pride of the ball!”

“Ah, once!” said Aunt Mary, with a low little laugh and then a sigh. “And we’ll not say how long ago;” and after that she made a pause, looking always at me: and then she said, “I accept your offer, and we’ll put on our braws; and I hope you will have no occasion to think shame of us. But why not take your dinner here?”

That was how it was settled, and the old gentleman went away to dress, looking quite pleased. But I came to Aunt Mary as soon as he was gone, and besought her not to make me go. “I like the long bonnie night and the light that lasts so long. And I cannot bear to dress up and go out, wasting it all in a stupid party. I hate parties, Aunt Mary!” I cried, “and I would far rather stay here.”

“My honey,” she said, taking both my hands, “I know it will maybe be a blow to you, but it’s better so.”

“How could it be a blow to me?” I cried; “but I would far rather not go.”

“You’ll just go with me, honey, just this once: it is not often I go out. You will go with me this one night, just this one night, my honey sweet.”

I am sure there were tears in Aunt Mary’s eyes, and she kissed me between the words. There was nothing more that I could say; but how I grudged the evening! A mere party, a conversazione (when all the College was away, too, and nobody to make conversation!), instead of my enchanted hour at my window and the soft strange light, and the dim face looking out, which kept me wondering and wondering what was he thinking of, what was he looking for, who was he? all one wonder and mystery and question, through the long, long, slowly fading night!

It occurred to me, however, when I was dressing – though I was so sure that he would prefer his solitude to everything – that he might perhaps, it was just possible, be there. And when I thought of that, I took out my white frock though Janet had laid out my blue one – and my little pearl necklace which I had thought was too good to wear. They were not very large pearls, but they were real pearls, and very even and lustrous though they were small; and though I did not think much of my appearance then, there must have been something about me – pale as I was but apt to colour in a moment, with my dress so white, and my pearls so white, and my hair all shadowy perhaps, that was pleasant to look at: for even old Mr. Pitmilly had a strange look in his eyes, as if he was not only pleased but sorry too, perhaps thinking me a creature that would have troubles in this life, though I was so young and knew them not. And when Aunt Mary looked at me, there was a little quiver about her mouth. She herself had on her pretty lace and her white hair very nicely done, and looking her best. As for Mr. Pitmilly, he had a beautiful fine French cambrie frill to his shirt, plaited in the most minute plaits, and with a diamond pin in it which sparkled as much as Lady Carnbee’s ring; but this was a fine frank kindly stone, that looked you straight in the face and sparkled, with the light dancing in it as if it were pleased to see you, and to be shining on that old gentleman’s honest and faithful breast: for he had been one of Aunt Mary’s lovers in their early days, and still thought there was nobody like her in the world.

I had got into quite a happy commotion of mind by the time we set out across the street in the soft light of the evening to the Library Hall. Perhaps, after all, I should see him, and see the room which I was so well acquainted with, and find out why he sat there so constantly and never was seen abroad. I thought I might even hear what he was working at, which would be such a pleasant thing to tell papa when I went home. A friend of mine at St. Rule’s – oh, far, far more busy than you ever were, papa! – and then my father would laugh as he always did, and say he was but an idler and never busy at all.

The room was all light and bright, flowers wherever flowers could be, and the long lines of the books that went along the walls on each side, lighting up wherever there was a line of gilding or an ornament, with a little response. It dazzled me at first all that light: but I was very eager, though I kept very quiet, looking round to see if perhaps in any corner, in the middle of any group, he would be there. I did not expect to see him among the ladies. He would not be with them, – he was too studious, too silent: but, perhaps among that circle of grey heads at the upper end of the room – perhaps—

No: I am not sure that it was not half a pleasure to me to make quite sure that there was not one whom I could take for him, who was at all like my vague image of him. No: it was absurd to think that he would be here, amid all that sound of voices, under the glare of that light. I felt a little proud to think that he was in his room as usual, doing his work, or thinking so deeply over it, as when he turned round in his chair with his face to the light.

I was thus getting a little composed and quiet in my mind, for now that the expectation of seeing him was over, though it was a disappointment, it was a satisfaction too – when Mr. Pitmilly came up to me, holding out his arm. “Now,” he said, “I am going to take you to see the curiosities.” I thought to myself that after I had seen them and spoken to everybody I knew, Aunt Mary would let me go home, so I went very willingly, though I did not care for the curiosities. Something, however, struck me strangely as we walked up the room. It was the air, rather fresh and strong, from an open window at the east end of the hall. How should there be a window there? I hardly saw what it meant for the first moment, but it blew in my face as if there was some meaning in it, and I felt very uneasy without seeing why.

Then there was another thing that startled me. On that side of the wall which was to the street there seemed no windows at all. A long line of bookcases filled it from end to end. I could not see what that meant either, but it confused me. I was altogether confused. I felt as if I was in a strange country, not knowing where I was going, not knowing what I might find out next. If there were no windows on the wall to the street, where was my window? My heart, which had been jumping up and calming down again all this time, gave a great leap at this, as if it would have come out of me – but I did not know what it could mean.

Then we stopped before a glass case, and Mr. Pitmilly showed me some things in it. I could not pay much attention to them. My head was going round and round. I heard his voice going on, and then myself speaking with a queer sound that was hollow in my ears; but I did not know what I was saying or what he was saying. Then he took me to the very end of the room, the east end, saying something that I caught – that I was pale, that the air would do me good. The air was blowing full on me, lifting the lace of my dress, lifting my hair, almost chilly. The window opened into the pale daylight, into the little lane that ran by the end of the building. Mr. Pitmilly went on talking, but I could not make out a word he said. Then I heard my own voice, speaking through it, though I did not seem to be aware that I was speaking. “Where is my window? – where, then, is my window?” I seemed to be saying, and I turned right round, dragging him with me, still holding his arm. As I did this my eye fell upon something at last which I knew. It was a large picture in a broad frame, hanging against the farther wall.

What did it mean? Oh, what did it mean? I turned round again to the open window at the east end, and to the daylight, the strange light without any shadow, that was all round about this lighted hall, holding it like a bubble that would burst, like something that was not real. The real place was the room I knew, in which that picture was hanging, where the writing-table was, and where he sat with his face to the light. But where was the light and the window through which it came? I think my senses must have left me. I went up to the picture which I knew, and then I walked straight across the room, always dragging Mr. Pitmilly, whose face was pale, but who did not struggle but allowed me to lead him, straight across to where the window was – where the window was not; – where there was no sign of it. “Where is my window? – where is my window?” I said. And all the time I was sure that I was in a dream, and these lights were all some theatrical illusion, and the people talking; and nothing real but the pale, pale, watching, lingering day standing by to wait until that foolish bubble should burst.

“My dear,” said Mr. Pitmilly, “my dear! Mind that you are in public. Mind where you are. You must not make an outcry and frighten your Aunt Mary. Come away with me. Come away, my dear young lady! and you’ll take a seat for a minute or two and compose yourself; and I’ll get you an ice or a little wine.” He kept patting my hand, which was on his arm, and looking at me very anxiously. “Bless me! bless me! I never thought it would have this effect,” he said.

But I would not allow him to take me away in that direction. I went to the picture again and looked at it without seeing it: and then I went across the room again, with some kind of wild thought that if I insisted I should find it. “My window – my window!” I said.

There was one of the professors standing there, and he heard me. “The window!” said he. “Ah, you’ve been taken in with what appears outside. It was put there to be in uniformity with the window on the stair. But it never was a real window. It is just behind that bookcase. Many people are taken in by it,” he said.

His voice seemed to sound from somewhere far away, and as if it would go on for ever; and the hall swam in a dazzle of shining and of noises round me; and the daylight through the open window grew greyer, waiting till it should be over, and the bubble burst.

V

It was Mr. Pitmilly who took me home; or rather it was I who took him, pushing him on a little in front of me, holding fast by his arm, not waiting for Aunt Mary or any one. We came out into the daylight again outside, I, without even a cloak or a shawl, with my bare arms, and uncovered head, and the pearls round my neck. There was a rush of the people about, and a baker’s boy, that baker’s boy, stood right in my way and cried, “Here’s a braw ane!” shouting to the others: the words struck me somehow, as his stone had struck the window, without any reason. But I did not mind the people staring, and hurried across the street, with Mr. Pitmilly half a step in advance. The door was open, and Janet standing at it, looking out to see what she could see of the ladies in their grand dresses. She gave a shriek when she saw me hurrying across the street; but I brushed past her, and pushed Mr. Pitmilly up the stairs, and took him breathless to the recess, where I threw myself down on the seat, feeling as if I could not have gone another step farther, and waved my hand across to the window. “There! there!” I cried. Ah! there it was – not that senseless mob – not the theatre and the gas, and the people all in a murmur and clang of talking. Never in all these days had I seen that room so clearly. There was a faint tone of light behind, as if it might have been a reflection from some of those vulgar lights in the hall, and he sat against it, calm, wrapped in his thoughts, with his face turned to the window. Nobody but must have seen him. Janet could have seen him had I called her upstairs. It was like a picture, all the things I knew, and the same attitude, and the atmosphere, full of quietness, not disturbed by anything. I pulled Mr. Pitmilly’s arm before I let him go, – “You see, you see!” I cried. He gave me the most bewildered look, as if he would have liked to cry. He saw nothing! I was sure of that from his eyes. He was an old man, and there was no vision in him. If I had called up Janet, she would have seen it all. “My dear!” he said. “My dear!” waving his hands in a helpless way.

“He has been there all these nights,” I cried, “and I thought you could tell me who he was and what he was doing; and that he might have taken me in to that room, and showed me, that I might tell papa. Papa would understand, he would like to hear. Oh, can’t you tell me what work he is doing, Mr. Pitmilly? He never lifts his head as long as the light throws a shadow, and then when it is like this he turns round and thinks, and takes a rest!”

Mr. Pitmilly was trembling, whether it was with cold or I know not what. He said, with a shake in his voice, “My dear young lady – my dear—” and then stopped and looked at me as if he were going to cry. “It’s peetiful, it’s peetiful,” he said; and then in another voice, “I am going across there again to bring your Aunt Mary home; do you understand, my poor little thing, my – I am going to bring her home – you will be better when she is here.”

I was glad when he went away, as he could not see anything: and I sat alone in the dark which was not dark, but quite clear light – a light like nothing I ever saw. How clear it was in that room! not glaring like the gas and the voices, but so quiet, everything so visible, as if it were in another world. I heard a little rustle behind me, and there was Janet, standing staring at me with two big eyes wide open. She was only a little older than I was. I called to her, “Janet, come here, come here, and you will see him, – come here and see him!” impatient that she should be so shy and keep behind. “Oh, my bonnie young leddy!” she said, and burst out crying. I stamped my foot at her, in my indignation that she would not come, and she fled before me with a rustle and swing of haste, as if she were afraid. None of them, none of them! not even a girl like myself, with the sight in her eyes, would understand. I turned back again, and held out my hands to him sitting there, who was the only one that knew. “Oh,” I said, “say something to me! I don’t know who you are, or what you are: but you’re lonely and so am I; and I only – feel for you. Say something to me!” I neither hoped that he would hear, nor expected any answer. How could he hear, with the street between us, and his window shut, and all the murmuring of the voices and the people standing about? But for one moment it seemed to me that there was only him and me in the whole world.

But I gasped with my breath, that had almost gone from me, when I saw him move in his chair! He had heard me, though I knew not how. He rose up, and I rose too, speechless, incapable of anything but this mechanical movement. He seemed to draw me as if I were a puppet moved by his will. He came forward to the window, and stood looking across at me. I was sure that he looked at me. At last he had seen me: at last he had found out that somebody, though only a girl, was watching him, looking for him, believing in him. I was in such trouble and commotion of mind and trembling, that I could not keep on my feet, but dropped kneeling on the window-seat, supporting myself against the window, feeling as if my heart were being drawn out of me. I cannot describe his face. It was all dim, yet there was a light on it: I think it must have been a smile; and as closely as I looked at him he looked at me. His hair was fair, and there was a little quiver about his lips. Then he put his hands upon the window to open it. It was stiff and hard to move; but at last he forced it open with a sound that echoed all along the street. I saw that the people heard it, and several looked up. As for me, I put my hands together, leaning with my face against the glass, drawn to him as if I could have gone out of myself, my heart out of my bosom, my eyes out of my head. He opened the window with a noise that was heard from the West Port to the Abbey. Could any one doubt that?

And then he leaned forward out of the window, looking out. There was not one in the street but must have seen him. He looked at me first, with a little wave of his hand, as if it were a salutation – yet not exactly that either, for I thought he waved me away; and then he looked up and down in the dim shining of the ending day, first to the east, to the old Abbey towers, and then to the west, along the broad line of the street where so many people were coming and going, but so little noise, all like enchanted folk in an enchanted place. I watched him with such a melting heart, with such a deep satisfaction as words could not say; for nobody could tell me now that he was not there, – nobody could say I was dreaming any more. I watched him as if I could not breathe – my heart in my throat, my eyes upon him. He looked up and down, and then he looked back to me. I was the first, and I was the last, though it was not for long: he did know, he did see, who it was that had recognised him and sympathised with him all the time. I was in a kind of rapture, yet stupor too; my look went with his look, following it as if I were his shadow; and then suddenly he was gone, and I saw him no more.

I dropped back again upon my seat, seeking something to support me, something to lean upon. He had lifted his hand and waved it once again to me. How he went I cannot tell, nor where he went I cannot tell; but in a moment he was away, and the window standing open, and the room fading into stillness and dimness, yet so clear, with all its space, and the great picture in its gilded frame upon the wall. It gave me no pain to see him go away. My heart was so content, and I was so worn out and satisfied – for what doubt or question could there be about him now? As I was lying back as weak as water, Aunt Mary came in behind me, and flew to me with a little rustle as if she had come on wings, and put her arms round me, and drew my head on to her breast. I had begun to cry a little, with sobs like a child. “You saw him, you saw him!” I said. To lean upon her, and feel her so soft, so kind, gave me a pleasure I cannot describe, and her arms round me, and her voice saying “Honey, my honey!” – as if she were nearly crying too. Lying there I came back to myself, quite sweetly, glad of everything. But I wanted some assurance from them that they had seen him too. I waved my hand to the window that was still standing open, and the room that was stealing away into the faint dark.

“This time you saw it all?” I said, getting more eager. “My honey!” said Aunt Mary, giving me a kiss: and Mr. Pitmilly began to walk about the room with short little steps behind, as if he were out of patience. I sat straight up and put away Aunt Mary’s arms. “You cannot be so blind, so blind!” I cried. “Oh, not tonight, at least not tonight!” But neither the one nor the other made any reply. I shook myself quite free, and raised myself up. And there, in the middle of the street, stood the baker’s boy like a statue, staring up at the open window, with his mouth open and his face full of wonder – breathless, as if he could not believe what he saw. I darted forward, calling to him, and beckoned him to come to me. “Oh, bring him up! bring him, bring him to me!” I cried.

Mr. Pitmilly went out directly, and got the boy by the shoulder. He did not want to come. It was strange to see the little old gentleman, with his beautiful frill and his diamond pin, standing out in the street, with his hand upon the boy’s shoulder, and the other boys round, all in a little crowd. And presently they came towards the house, the others all following, gaping and wondering. He came in unwilling, almost resisting, looking as if we meant him some harm. “Come away, my laddie, come and speak to the young lady,” Mr. Pitmilly was saying. And Aunt Mary took my hands to keep me back. But I would not be kept back.

“Boy,” I cried, “you saw it too: you saw it: tell them you saw it! It is that I want, and no more.”

He looked at me as they all did, as if he thought I was mad. “What’s she wantin’ wi’ me?” he said; and then, “I did nae harm, even if I did throw a bit stane at it – and it’s nae sin to throw a stane.”

“You rascal!” said Mr. Pitmilly, giving him a shake; “have you been throwing stones? You’ll kill somebody some of these days with your stones.” The old gentleman was confused and troubled, for he did not understand what I wanted, nor anything that had happened. And then Aunt Mary, holding my hands and drawing me close to her, spoke. “Laddie,” she said, “answer the young lady, like a good lad. There’s no intention of finding fault with you. Answer her, my man, and then Janet will give ye your supper before you go.”

“Oh speak, speak!” I cried; “answer them and tell them! you saw that window opened, and the gentleman look out and wave his hand?”

“I saw nae gentleman,” he said, with his head down, “except this wee gentleman here.”

“Listen, laddie,” said Aunt Mary. “I saw ye standing in the middle of the street staring. What were ye looking at?”

“It was naething to make a wark about. It was just yon windy yonder in the library that is nae windy. And it was open as sure’s death. You may laugh if you like. Is that a’ she’s wantin’ wi’ me?”

“You are telling a pack of lies, laddie,” Mr. Pitmilly said.

“I’m tellin’ nae lees – it was standin’ open just like ony ither windy. It’s as sure’s death. I couldna believe it mysel’; but it’s true.”

“And there it is,” I cried, turning round and pointing it out to them with great triumph in my heart. But the light was all grey, it had faded, it had changed. The window was just as it had always been, a sombre break upon the wall.

I was treated like an invalid all that evening, and taken upstairs to bed, and Aunt Mary sat up in my room the whole night through. Whenever I opened my eyes she was always sitting there close to me, watching. And there never was in all my life so strange a night. When I would talk in my excitement, she kissed me and hushed me like a child. “Oh, honey, you are not the only one!” she said. “Oh whisht, whisht, bairn! I should never have let you be there!”

“Aunt Mary, Aunt Mary, you have seen him too?”

“Oh whisht, whisht, honey!” Aunt Mary said: her eyes were shining – there were tears in them. “Oh whisht, whisht! Put it out of your mind, and try to sleep. I will not speak another word,” she cried.

But I had my arms round her, and my mouth at her ear. “Who is he there? – tell me that and I will ask no more—”

“Oh honey, rest, and try to sleep! It is just – how can I tell you? – a dream, a dream! Did you not hear what Lady Carnbee said? – the women of our blood—”

“What? what? Aunt Mary, oh Aunt Mary—”

“I canna tell you,” she cried in her agitation, “I canna tell you! How can I tell you, when I know just what you know and no more? It is a longing all your life after – it is a looking – for what never comes.”

“He will come,” I cried. “I shall see him tomorrow – that I know, I know!”

She kissed me and cried over me, her cheek hot and wet like mine. “My honey, try if you can sleep – try if you can sleep: and we’ll wait to see what tomorrow brings.”

“I have no fear,” said I; and then I suppose, though it is strange to think of, I must have fallen asleep – I was so worn-out, and young, and not used to lying in my bed awake. From time to time I opened my eyes, and sometimes jumped up remembering everything: but Aunt Mary was always there to soothe me, and I lay down again in her shelter like a bird in its nest.

But I would not let them keep me in bed next day. I was in a kind of fever, not knowing what I did. The window was quite opaque, without the least glimmer in it, flat and blank like a piece of wood. Never from the first day had I seen it so little like a window. “It cannot be wondered at,” I said to myself, “that seeing it like that, and with eyes that are old, not so clear as mine, they should think what they do.” And then I smiled to myself to think of the evening and the long light, and whether he would look out again, or only give me a signal with his hand. I decided I would like that best: not that he should take the trouble to come forward and open it again, but just a turn of his head and a wave of his hand. It would be more friendly and show more confidence, – not as if I wanted that kind of demonstration every night.

I did not come down in the afternoon, but kept at my own window upstairs alone, till the tea-party should be over. I could hear them making a great talk; and I was sure they were all in the recess staring at the window, and laughing at the silly lassie. Let them laugh! I felt above all that now. At dinner I was very restless, hurrying to get it over; and I think Aunt Mary was restless too. I doubt whether she read her ‘Times’ when it came; she opened it up so as to shield her, and watched from a corner. And I settled myself in the recess, with my heart full of expectation. I wanted nothing more than to see him writing at his table, and to turn his head and give me a little wave of his hand, just to show that he knew I was there. I sat from half-past seven o’clock to ten o’clock: and the daylight grew softer and softer, till at last it was as if it was shining through a pearl, and not a shadow to be seen. But the window all the time was as black as night, and there was nothing, nothing there.

Well: but other nights it had been like that: he would not be there every night only to please me. There are other things in a man’s life, a great learned man like that. I said to myself I was not disappointed. Why should I be disappointed? There had been other nights when he was not there.

Aunt Mary watched me, every movement I made, her eyes shining, often wet, with a pity in them that almost made me cry: but I felt as if I were more sorry for her than for myself. And then I flung myself upon her, and asked her, again and again, what it was, and who it was, imploring her to tell me if she knew? and when she had seen him, and what had happened? and what it meant about the women of our blood? She told me that how it was she could not tell, nor when: it was just at the time it had to be; and that we all saw him in our time – “that is,” she said, “the ones that are like you and me.” What was it that made her and me different from the rest? but she only shook her head and would not tell me. “They say,” she said, and then stopped short. “Oh, honey, try and forget all about it – if I had but known you were of that kind! They say – that once there was one that was a Scholar, and liked his books more than any lady’s love. Honey, do not look at me like that. To think I should have brought all this on you!”

“He was a Scholar?” I cried.

“And one of us, that must have been a light woman, not like you and me. But maybe it was just in innocence; for who can tell? She waved to him and waved to him to come over: and yon ring was the token: but he would not come. But still she sat at her window and waved and waved – till at last her brothers heard of it, that were stirring men; and then – oh, my honey, let us speak of it no more!”

“They killed him!” I cried, carried away. And then I grasped her with my hands, and gave her a shake, and flung away from her. “You tell me that to throw dust in my eyes – when I saw him only last night: and he as living as I am, and as young!”

“My honey, my honey!” Aunt Mary said.

After that I would not speak to her for a long time; but she kept close to me, never leaving me when she could help it, and always with that pity in her eyes. For the next night it was the same; and the third night. That third night I thought I could not bear it any longer. I would have to do something if only I knew what to do! If it would ever get dark, quite dark, there might be something to be done. I had wild dreams of stealing out of the house and getting a ladder, and mounting up to try if I could not open that window, in the middle of the night – if perhaps I could get the baker’s boy to help me; and then my mind got into a whirl, and it was as if I had done it; and I could almost see the boy put the ladder to the window, and hear him cry out that there was nothing there. Oh, how slow it was, the night! and how light it was, and everything so clear no darkness to cover you, no shadow, whether on one side of the street or on the other side! I could not sleep, though I was forced to go to bed. And in the deep midnight, when it is dark dark in every other place, I slipped very softly downstairs, though there was one board on the landing-place that creaked – and opened the door and stepped out. There was not a soul to be seen, up or down, from the Abbey to the West Port: and the trees stood like ghosts, and the silence was terrible, and everything as clear as day. You don’t know what silence is till you find it in the light like that, not morning but night, no sunrising, no shadow, but everything as clear as the day.

It did not make any difference as the slow minutes went on: one o’clock, two o’clock. How strange it was to hear the clocks striking in that dead light when there was nobody to hear them! But it made no difference. The window was quite blank; even the marking of the panes seemed to have melted away. I stole up again after a long time, through the silent house, in the clear light, cold and trembling, with despair in my heart.

I am sure Aunt Mary must have watched and seen me coming back, for after a while I heard faint sounds in the house; and very early, when there had come a little sunshine into the air, she came to my bedside with a cup of tea in her hand; and she, too, was looking like a ghost. “Are you warm, honey – are you comfortable?” she said. “It doesn’t matter,” said I. I did not feel as if anything mattered; unless if one could get into the dark somewhere – the soft, deep dark that would cover you over and hide you – but I could not tell from what. The dreadful thing was that there was nothing, nothing to look for, nothing to hide from – only the silence and the light.

That day my mother came and took me home. I had not heard she was coming; she arrived quite unexpectedly, and said she had no time to stay, but must start the same evening so as to be in London next day, papa having settled to go abroad. At first I had a wild thought I would not go. But how can a girl say I will not, when her mother has come for her, and there is no reason, no reason in the world, to resist, and no right! I had to go, whatever I might wish or any one might say.

Aunt Mary’s dear eyes were wet; she went about the house drying them quietly with her handkerchief, but she always said, “It is the best thing for you, honey – the best thing for you!” Oh, how I hated to hear it said that it was the best thing, as if anything mattered, one more than another! The old ladies were all there in the afternoon, Lady Carnbee looking at me from under her black lace, and the diamond lurking, sending out darts from under her finger. She patted me on the shoulder, and told me to be a good bairn. “And never lippen to what you see from the window,” she said. “The eye is deceitful as well as the heart.” She kept patting me on the shoulder, and I felt again as if that sharp wicked stone stung me. Was that what Aunt Mary meant when she said yon ring was the token? I thought afterwards I saw the mark on my shoulder. You will say why? How can I tell why? If I had known, I should have been contented, and it would not have mattered any more.

I never went back to St. Rule’s, and for years of my life I never again looked out of a window when any other window was in sight. You ask me did I ever see him again? I cannot tell: the imagination is a great deceiver, as Lady Carnbee said: and if he stayed there so long, only to punish the race that had wronged him, why should I ever have seen him again? for I had received my share. But who can tell what happens in a heart that often, often, and so long as that, comes back to do its errand? If it was he whom I have seen again, the anger is gone from him, and he means good and no longer harm to the house of the woman that loved him. I have seen his face looking at me from a crowd. There was one time when I came home a widow from India, very sad, with my little children: I am certain I saw him there among all the people coming to welcome their friends. There was nobody to welcome me, – for I was not expected: and very sad was I, without a face I knew: when all at once I saw him, and he waved his hand to me. My heart leaped up again: I had forgotten who he was, but only that it was a face I knew, and I landed almost cheerfully, thinking here was some one who would help me. But he had disappeared, as he did from the window, with that one wave of his hand.

And again I was reminded of it all when old Lady Carnbee died – an old, old woman – and it was found in her will that she had left me that diamond ring. I am afraid of it still. It is locked up in an old sandalwood box in the lumber-room in the little old country-house which belongs to me, but where I never live. If any one would steal it, it would be a relief to my mind. Yet I never knew what Aunt Mary meant when she said, “Yon ring was the token,” nor what it could have to do with that strange window in the old College Library of St. Rule’s.

THE HAUNTING OF WHITE GATES

G. M. Robins

1900

I

In a Vault not far from this Tablet
Repose the mortal Remains of
two Protestant Gentlewomen,
Mrs. ANNA and Mrs. CLARA KENTON,
of White Gates, in this Parish.

For many Years they led a Life of
Virtuous Retirement, united in Sisterly Affection.
They lived to mourn the loss of amiable Parents,
of three Brothers, and two Sisters,
Whose names are duly recorded on a
Tablet in the Chancel,
and after presenting to the World
a shining Example of Christian Patience,
Fortitude, and Resignation, quitted this Life
for a better, in sure and certain
Expectation of future Glory.

Mrs. ANNA deceased Dec. 8, 18——,

Mrs. CLARA surviving her beloved Sister
only one month and three days.

This Monument is erected by the Piety
of their Nephew and sole Descendant,

JOSHUA KENYON HACKETT,

In Commemoration of Qualities in this life,
Alas! too rare!

•   •   •   •   •

The soft, dark eyes of a young girl in a shady black hat and feathers perused with languid interest the information recorded on the square, ugly marble tablet, mounted upon slate, which adorned the wall just above the mouldering oak pew labelled “White Gates.” The piety of the sole descendant of the Kenyon family had limited itself to a very plain, not to say bald memorial of his maiden aunts. Not a carving, not a flourish, no death’s-head, nor dove, nor weeping willow, testified to the depth of his affection.

Muriel North, whose imagination was keen, found herself taking a definite dislike to the idea of Mr. Joshua Hackett’s personality, while she speculated as to the grammatical accuracy of his description of himself as the descendant of these irreproachable ladies.

The date of the tablet was twenty years earlier than the dull November Sunday upon which Miss North formed, for the first time, a part of the scanty congregation in the ramshackle village church.

“Why doesn’t he live at White Gates himself, instead of letting it?” she idly mused, as the Litany came to an end, and the aged clerk, pulling himself to his feet with an effort, gave out a hymn.

Terrible groans in the west gallery announced the preliminary spasms of the harmonium; and then the shrill quavering voices of the schoolchildren broke out into song.

The place, the ritual, were survivals such as are yet to be found in the remoter agricultural districts of England. Muriel had never been in such a church, never assisted at such a function before; and it added to a curious sense of remoteness from the world she knew, which had assailed her as soon as she arrived at White Gates yesterday.

The chambers which, in London, she shared with two girl friends, and the city office in which her daily lot was cast, with a typewriter, were things alien, far removed from the moaning, desolate wolds, the silent, depopulated waste which surrounded the village of Longstreet Parva.

Coming at last out of church, from the oppression of mustiness and dry-rot, and the suggestion of wet vaults and gaping coffins under the uneven stone slabs of the floor, there encompassed her a heaving expanse of country sown with the graves of a race that had ceased to be, before the armed tread of Caesar’s legions shook the land. Even in summer a wind always moaned about the hill where the church stood; now, in the dreary November, the gusts whistled and screamed, and sprinkled Muriel’s dainty hat and feathers with the first drops of the water they had drawn as they scudded over the cold bosom of the Atlantic.

Below her a creeping mist hid the village – rent here and there by a desultory wind that had no heart to persevere. The contorted chimneys of White Gates showed against black fir-trees.

“No wonder they let it cheap,” reflected Muriel, as she descended the hill. The few worshippers dispersed in silence.

Nobody spoke to the girl. The natives of the Wolds are not a friendly race. Perhaps in their blood still lurks the memory of a time when they dwelt in pile-raised villages in the marshes to escape their foes.

“It may have been bearable in summer,” Miss North was thinking, as she pushed open one of the white gates and walked among the yellow leaves to the unpretentious house door, “but in winter – rather they than I!”

“They” were Muriel’s father and his second wife. Being very poor and in weak health, it was but natural that Major North should marry again; and still more natural that he should become the property of the most impecunious of the ladies who showed him special attention at the boarding-houses frequented by him and his daughters. Two of these daughters, Evie and Constance, married; Muriel, the youngest, chose to be independent. But the chronic ill-health of the major had now developed into positive disease; and Mrs. North had implored Muriel to come and relieve her for a time of a portion of her heavy nursing duties.

The firm in whose employ the girl worked well knew her value, and readily agreed to keep her post for her during her father’s illness; so she repaired, as in duty bound, to the remote village where the couple resided in a house of some pretensions, which they had procured ridiculously cheap.

“Oh, he’s better today,” said Mrs. North, as she and her stepdaughter sat down to their Sunday roast beef and apple tart. “I think your coming cheered him up. The church is rather depressing, isn’t it?”

“The whole place seems to me a little depressing,” said Muriel with a shiver, thinking of her terribly cold drive from the station the previous day, eleven miles across the wold in a cart. “I dare say it’s better in summer.”

“It’s very pretty,” said Mrs. North eagerly, “and such a nice house! Stables, you know, and the rent so low, owing to the distance from the railway; your father is able to keep his horse, his great pleasure. He was so counting upon the hunting this winter.” She sighed regretfully.

“He may get some yet,” said Muriel hopefully. “He is not nearly so ill as I expected to find him.”

“He’s been so well all the autumn, and taking such an interest in the place,” regretted his wife. “Really it is so far beyond anything we thought our means would allow, and yet not a big house, not expensive to keep up. And the garden so well stocked! Mr. Hackett had it all attended to in spite of the house being empty for so long.”

“Was the house long empty?”

“Oh, dear yes. People don’t care for remote places nowadays. Every one is for railways and telephones and automobiles. The house-agent told us he had only to say, ‘In the Cotswolds,’ and intending tenants fled!”

“I wonder Mr. Hackett should let it, if it is his family place,” mused Muriel. “One’s own place never seems remote – at least, so I should have fancied.”

“He did live here for a time,” was the reply, “but I don’t think he was popular in the neighbourhood; anyhow, he left, and all kinds of people have had it since. But it suits us admirably. Not a large neighbourhood, but everyone has called; your father’s position, you know.” And the poor soul, whose life’s ambition had been fulfilled when she married an “army man,” smiled in satisfaction.

Muriel would not for worlds have damped Agnes’s simple pride, so she said nothing; but she felt that, personally, she did not consider the house comfortable.

It was not old enough to be picturesque or quaint. The rooms were square, with early Victorian sash windows. A horrible green iron verandah made dark the interior of the dining- and drawing-rooms. It was hard to believe that, at any season of the year, the Cotswolds would feel themselves in harmony with that flimsy erection.

•   •   •   •   •

This girl was quick to feel local influences. Her own mother had been a Celt, pure-blooded, the descendant of a race of Irish kings; and Muriel had inherited, with her clear skin and wonderful eyes, the sensitive temperament which is so curiously alive to the pressure of the unseen through nature’s visible order.

More than one curious experience, of a nature almost too elusive to be chronicled, had fallen to her lot; and once, as quite a small child, she had declined to sleep in a certain house where lodgings had been taken by the family, and had sobbed without reason, refusing to be left alone, and next day it was discovered that a corpse lay that night in the room next that in which the child slept.

Her thoughts, as that afternoon she sat by her father’s bed, were of the two old Protestant gentlewomen whose bones had lain somewhere not far from the soles of her boots as she sat in the melancholy church that morning.

What kind of lives had they really led, concealed in that Virtuous Retirement which figured so well upon their tombstone? Had they quarrelled? Or had they clung together the closer, as Fate tore from them, one by one, all those who had formerly played and romped with them through the gardens of White Gates? Had their hearts broken, under the stroke of some forsaking lover, keener even than the death of brother or sister? Or had they been content to vegetate and make up their lives out of servants’ shortcomings, fruit preserving, and the gossip of a scanty neighbourhood? Food for much conjecture floated in the brain of Muriel, sitting where they might have sat, beside a sickbed – perhaps the very same bed which had held the pining, dying limbs of many Kenyons. It was a mahogany four-poster, upholstered in gay new chintz, according to the taste of Mrs. North. Muriel wished it still wore the green damask hangings and woollen fringe which formed, she was certain, its original garment.

This room looked to the front of the house, and had a communicating dressing-room. The two best bedrooms were at the back, over the dining-and drawing-rooms, and these also had a communicating door. Muriel felt certain that it was these two latter rooms which had watched over the virgin slumbers of the Protestant gentlewomen.

On the other side of the landing was a bachelor’s room, now assigned to her own use, as it was possible, even in this weather, to warm it with a fire. Here she felt certain that Joshua had slept, when he came on a visit to his maiden aunts.

It was a bitterly cold night. Muriel passed it on a sofa at the foot of her father’s bed, Mrs North occupying the bachelor’s room, that she might get a sound night’s rest for the first time in many weeks.

All through the dark hours the girl’s dreams were confused. The thoughts she had cherished during the gloomy day, of death and dissolution, in that house, that bed, filled her brain with curious imaginings. The light tread of watchers, the slow shuffling step of undertaker’s men, the murmur of voices round a bed, and of deep groaning breaths, woke her again and again, but always to find the room quiet and her father sleeping peacefully. Yet, as soon as her eyes, still weary with her long cold journey of yesterday, closed again, the weird procession passed before her brain, the ceaseless out-going of the dead from White Gates! The tolling of the bell in the crazy church tower smote her ear, every room contained a corpse, watched with candles. People moved to and fro, doing the last sad offices. The very smell of death was in her nostrils as she struggled awake again. The night-light burned beside her watch; it was half-past five.

Rising noiselessly she put fresh billets on the dying fire, and kindled it afresh, listened with satisfaction to the major’s even breathing, and was just about to lie down again when she heard a door softly close.

In the absolute stillness the sound seemed all the more audible because it was manifestly made with extreme caution, by one not desiring to be heard.

“How vexing of Agnes to be awake and on the fidget when she might be having a good night,” she thought; and, hurrying swiftly to the door, she peeped across the passage with the design of assuring her stepmother that all was well. A lamp was burning upon a small table on the landing, as the two women thought it quite possible that communication between them during the night might be necessary.

Just outside the door of the room in which Mrs. North was sleeping, and immediately opposite Muriel, a young woman stood, her hand still on the latch of the door. She was tall, fair, pale, with a look of great determination, and a rigid line of jaw which was especially noticeable. Her eyes gave the impression of being artificially darkened beneath, and her fair hair was elaborately puffed and waved.

As Muriel peeped out, she was in the act of turning quickly away from the door which she bad just closed; her face was hut for a moment visible, then she turned round and walked swiftly along the passage leading to the other end of the house, where the servants’ rooms were.

This passage was considerably to the right of where Muriel stood, beyond the stair-head; and the woman was thus completely lost to view the moment she reached it.

Two things in her appearance struck the gazing girl as odd. One was the expression – as of a mind tensely nerved to some special effort – which appeared on her strong face – the thin lips compressed, the eyes narrowed; the other was a small point, but curious. As she turned her back, it could be seen that her conspicuous-looking hair was arranged in a large ball behind, and that this ball was encircled by a string of beads, apparently tied beneath with ribbon streamers, which hung down her dress to the waist.

Her presence mildly surprised Muriel. She knew that there was only one indoor servant – a capable, elderly person, whom she had already seen; but she had heard her stepmother mention a young dressmaker from the village, who had come in to help her with the nursing, and she took it for granted that this was she. Still, it was both annoying and puzzling to find her prowling about the passage at such an hour; and her appearance conveyed anything but a favourable impression.

Leaving the door at which she stood slightly ajar, she slipped noiselessly across the landing, turned the handle of Mrs. North’s door, and peeped in.

The night-light showed the occupant of the bed motionless in the heavy sleep of the thoroughly tired woman.

On reflection it was perhaps natural to suppose that the dressmaker had come to ascertain that the worn-out watcher was really getting the rest she needed; but Muriel had not liked her expression, and returned to bed somewhat displeased at the incident.

“What is the name of the young woman, the dressmaker you told me of, who is sleeping in the house?” she asked when she and Agnes met downstairs at breakfast, having left the patient comfortable after his good night.

“What, Miss Abel? But she is not sleeping in the house now; she went home yesterday morning.”

“She was sleeping, or, I should say, walking about the house at half-past five this morning,” replied Muriel. “I was making up the fire, and heard your door shut. I thought you were on the fidget, and looked out to see; and she was standing just outside your door listening. I thought it rather queer, for she was fully dressed; but I supposed she thought she might be wanted.”

Mrs. North, who had listened with open mouth, turned extremely red.

“Oh,” she said nervously, “then – then, I suppose Miss Abel came back. I did not know; now I think of it, I believe I remember her saying something of the kind. She has been very attentive, and probably thought, as you say, that I might want her.”

“Very attentive; but she doesn’t look like a country dressmaker, her dress did fit and hang so remarkably well.”

“I will ask Caroline,” murmured Agnes, and, taking up her keys, she hurriedly went out of the room, leaving Muriel rather mystified. Miss Abel’s appearance had impressed her most disagreeably, and she wondered at Mrs. North’s liking to have such a person about; but then Agnes was always odd – apt to foregather with the most unlikely people.

II

At about eleven o’clock that morning the doctor arrived: a hale, elderly man, who seemed imbued with the strong, robust air of the Cotswolds, and whose general appearance captivated Muriel. She soon found that he knew all there was to know of every house, church, family, estate, barrow, or cromlech in the district; and with the keenest interest she began to ply him with questions about the Kenyons and White Gates.

“I remember them well, of course,” he said. “I knew the whole family from a boy, but I had been already ten years in practice here when Miss Anna was found dead in her bed.”

“Was she found dead in her bed?” asked the girl, with breathless interest.

He nodded. “Sudden failure of the heart’s action,” he said. “But what caused it, my dear – what caused it is another matter, and did not come within the scope of my certificate.”

“Then you knew what caused it?”

“Certainly not; nobody knew. I do not suppose anybody ever will.”

“What kind of old ladies were they, really?” asked Muriel.

“They were about the most detestable people I ever was personally acquainted with,” responded the doctor simply. The girl’s eager eyes drew him on, and after a bit he resumed. “The whole family of Kenyon was as odious as it is possible for people to be who live within the narrowest borders of respectability. The father of these two old women had made money in Bristol, and built this house upon the site of a farm which had belonged to his family for generations. He was a morose, evil-tempered man, repulsively ugly; and his wife was worse. The children were most of them sickly in constitution, and all hideous. One of the seven was an idiot – they used to say she was ill-treated, and had been heard to scream o’ nights; she died in her early teens. The eldest son also died young. The eldest daughter ran away with a gamekeeper named Hackett. She was the least ill-favoured of the lot, but as ill-conditioned as any, I should say. The second son went to London, and formed a liaison with some woman, so was not received at home. The others all died unmarried, fortunately for society; it was a stock one could not wish to see preserved. The Hacketts had one son; shortly after his birth they quarrelled – going, as I understand, to the length of fire-irons and carving-knives – and separated. I imagine he had thought he should get money out of the old man, and ill-treated his wife when he found he could not. She came back home with the child, who was brought up in this house; he was about thirty years old when his aunts died, and for nearly twenty years they had been his only living relations.”

“Were they rich?”

“They were commonly reported to be so. All the neighbourhood knew them as misers. They lived almost without servants, for their temper was so bad that nobody would stay with them. One woman, who had been their nurse when they were children, remained faithful; she survived them a few years. Except for her there was no indoor servant, save such women as could be persuaded to come in by the day from the village; and they kept no horses. But the curious thing, the thing that has never been explained, was – what became of their money?.… They left Hackett, their nephew, heir of all they possessed, on the sole condition of his erecting a suitable monument to their memory in the church. But when he came to examine their affairs, there was found to be just enough invested stock to bring in about £300 a year – a sum which would have more than covered their annual expenses for years past. Their lawyer – a solicitor of very good standing in Bristol – told Hackett that, ever since they had been mistress of their fortune they had been realizing large sums of money, whenever the condition of the market was advantageous. They had sold land, they had sold shares, they were constantly having big consignments of bank-notes sent down to them at White Gates. He had an idea that they turned this money into gems, or gold plate, or something concrete, which they could look at and treasure. There was something like forty thousand pounds to be accounted for. You look interested, Miss North.”

“I should think so! Do go on! Who would have thought that Virtuous Retirement could he so sensational? Please – what happened?”

“Why, nothing. The money was not forthcoming, that was all.”

“Surely the heir searched—”

“Searched? I should think so! After due investigation of the safe—”

“The safe! What safe?”

“Oh, haven’t you seen the safe? The one built into the wall of Miss Anna’s room!”

“Do show me,” urged Muriel.

They were talking in the dressing-room adjoining the patient’s room, and the doctor, laughing to find so charming a listener to his gossip, led the girl across the landing, and opened the door into one of the two large communicating bedrooms at the back of the house.

In the wall between these rooms was fixed the iron door of a safe: and there were signs that the wall had been artificially thickened for its reception, for the doorway leading from one room to the next was furnished with two doors, and between these was comfortable space for a person to stand.

“The will,” said the doctor, “Particularly included the contents of the safe, in the list of the possessions to which Hackett was to succeed. But, when opened, it contained only a few trinkets which had belonged to the sisters, and a fair quantity of silver plate, the total value of the whole collection being perhaps fifty pounds. Everything was neatly arranged, packed, and labelled. There was no appearance of anything having been disturbed.

“Hackett had the place pretty well pulled down, the safe taken from the wall, the space between the walls examined, inch by inch, the interior and exterior measurements of every inch of space ascertained mathematically. Then the floor, both of this and the adjoining room, was taken up, bit by bit, the beams and rafters overhauled, every scrap of furniture taken to pieces, the frames of the beds, the very rungs of the chairs subjected to the minutest scrutiny, since miserly old maiden ladies have strange ideas of securing the safety of their treasures. Every scrap of writing existing in the house was carefully gone through to see if any clue could be found. The old servant, of whom I spoke – her name was Deborah Blaize – declared most positively that her mistresses had frequent dealings with diamond merchants, that she had actually seen a sapphire which they told her was worth two thousand pounds; and that she knew for a fact that these treasures were packed in the safe, the gems being secured inside a dispatch-box with a triple lock, of which Miss Anna always wore the three keys on a slender gold chain round her neck, under her clothes.”

“Surely the diamond merchants could have been found,” broke in Muriel.

“Hackett could not discover them. Neither were there any keys found round Miss Anna’s neck at her death. There was no document found bearing the slightest reference to any such transactions. You see,” said the doctor, “the difficulty was this. Nothing of the terms of the will, nor of the existence of the secret hoard, came to light till the death of Miss Clara, who was the elder, but much the weaker-minded of the couple. In fact, I never used to think her quite ‘all there,’ as the saying is; but she was left by her father absolute mistress of the house and the money, because he had a spite against Anna, the only one of the family who used to dare to browbeat him. Anna ruled the roast, however, but it was thought extremely likely that her desire to realize the property was the result of a fear that she might die first, and Clara be induced to alter her will, or otherwise imposed upon. Clara survived her sister more than a month, so there was no question of opening the will until her death. It is perfectly possible, indeed most likely, that she, who was the one to find her sister dead, would instantly remove from her neck the chain and keys that guarded the treasure, and hide or dispose of them as best occurred to her. The two seem to have acted completely in concert about most things, though it was always Anna who led, and Clara who followed.”

“What did the elder, Miss Clara, die of?”

“Primarily, of the family scourge – consumption; they all had either weak hearts or weak lungs. The shock of her sister’s death, and exposure to the cold in her nightdress, brought on a paralytic stroke, and bronchitis supervened.”

“Exposure?” queried Muriel.

The doctor nodded, pointing to the adjoining room.

“She slept in there. The door of communication was always open, and they burned a light all night – their solitary extravagance. One terribly cold night – a bitter black frost and an icy wind, such as we revel in here in Longstreet – old Deborah was aroused by being violently shaken in her bed, and sitting up in the pitch darkness, cried aloud to know who was there, getting in reply only curious, inarticulate sounds. Wild with terror she struck a light, expecting to find herself in the clutches of a lunatic; but it was Miss Clara who stood there, speechless, and with her mouth drawn horribly to one side. She wore only her nightdress, and was as cold as ice. Huddling on some clothes, Deborah ran with her along the passage to Miss Anna’s room; and there, in that place” – the doctor pointed – “though not in that bed you see before you – the old one was simply cut to bits afterwards to find treasure – there sat Miss Anna, still grim, erect, facing them – glaring at them in her frilled nightcap, with eyes a-stare, stone dead!”

Muriel gave an involuntary gasp. The horror of that situation, and of the two lonely old women in the grip of it, made her shudder.

“Was the nephew in the house?” she asked. “No, oh no, he was in Bristol.”

“Were there any signs of confusion in the room?”

“None whatever, nothing to make any one fancy that any special thing had occurred in the night. Miss Clara could not speak, and the idea of writing does not seem to have occurred to her feeble brain in the first moments of horror, so no suspicion was aroused. On ascertaining that Miss Anna was dead, old Deborah tried to force the body into a recumbent position. But it was frozen stiff; and, at that culminating horror, the old woman told me that her nerve deserted her, and she rushed screaming from the room. Her first care was to bestow the shivering, trembling old Miss Clara in her own bed, then she rushed from the house, roused the gardener, who then lived in the cottage across the road, and sent him for me.

“When I got here Miss Clara was delirious – quite wandering in the head. She had still the use of her hands at that time, and had her brain been clear, she could have written us some account of what had passed in the dead hours of that night. She was icy cold when she aroused Deborah, we felt sure she must have been long out of bed. But she was never sensible again till very near death, when she evidently wished to say something, but by that time all power of communicating anything had left her. On the day of Miss Anna’s death there was a severe snowfall, I never remember a worse in all my winters on these wolds. It was some days before we could send a telegram to Hackett, two or three more before he could reach White Gates. When he came, it was evident that his surviving aunt was dying, and he could do nothing but wait for the end. He knew of the treasure in the safe, though I fancy he had no idea of its comprising the bulk of their fortune; but nobody said a word that could lead him to suppose it had been tampered with. The shock of finding her sister dead was more than enough to account for Miss Clara’s seizure. It was not until her death that old Deborah first awoke his suspicions by saying that she could not find the triple keys, and at there dawned upon us all the extreme probability that something might have happened on that night to cause the failure of heart which had killed Miss Anna.

“It was then too late to search for traces – the snow out of doors and house-cleaning within had eliminated all such; the only thing that could be called a clue at all, was the testimony of a charwoman to the effect that, some weeks after Miss Anna’s death, she had found the remains of burnt paper in the stove in the hall, which was never by any chance lighted.”

“You suppose, then, that the valuables really were in the safe, but were carried off by a thief?”

“Against that theory is the fact that no such person was ever seen or heard of; and that the safe was apparently quite undisturbed, being securely locked when Hackett first examined it, the key in its usual position in the old ladies’ key-box. On the other hand, the triple keys, of whose existence old Deborah was positive, were gone. There was no sort of reason, either then or afterwards, to doubt old Deborah’s complete fidelity. Most people inclined strongly to the idea that the jewels were concealed somewhere in the house, and this opinion grew when months went by and no sales of important gems could be discovered to have taken place, though Hackett had people on the watch everywhere. He and his wife came and lived here for a bit, for it turned out that he was married, had been secretly married for more than a year. He did nothing all the time but ransack the place, quite fruitlessly. Soon his wife died, in her first confinement. He said then that the house was no better than a grave, and he went back to Bristol with his little boy. Then there was a rush of people anxious to rent White Gates; everybody thought that they were sure to discover the treasure. But it has never been found; perhaps you may hit upon it, Miss North.”

“Perhaps; I shall dream of it, at least,” she laughed. “Why, here comes Agnes, wondering what on earth we are plotting here in the cold!”

Mrs. North looked surprised, and anything but pleased, to find them in this room.

“I am showing Miss North the safe,” said Dr. Forrest. “You ought to get her to find the treasure for you, ma’am; she looks a bit of a clairvoyante.”

“Oh, I don’t believe that nonsense about the treasure,” said Mrs. North frigidly. “Muriel dear, go to your father, I want to speak to the doctor;” and, as the girl left the room, she heard her begin, urgently, “I do hope you have not—” The rest was lost in the shutting of the door; but as she moved away, she caught the doctor’s hearty response—

“No, no, my dear madam, certainly not!”

That night Muriel slept soundly and undisturbed in the small front room, never moving until awakened at eight o’clock. The major also slept well, so well that on the morrow his wife declared that she did not want her “night off” again; but Muriel insisted.

“While I am here, I may as well do my share,” she urged. Accordingly she slept again on the sofa, and slept well until two o’clock, when her father woke, and grew restless. As it soon appeared that he was not likely to sleep again, Muriel suggested reading aloud; he seemed pleased with the idea. She had a volume of Kipling with her, which she had left in the drawing-room, so, lighting a candle, she softly stole from the room to get it. There was, perhaps, a half-thought in her mind that Miss Abel might be prowling on the landing; but she was not there, nor in the house at all, as far as Muriel knew. She went with noiseless feet to the stair-head, the thoughts that occupied her being, as nearly as she could afterwards remember, as to which of the stories in Life’s Handicap she should select to soothe the major.

She was half-way down; her candle flung long, wavering shadows across the hall; something light, something that moved, caught her eye in the darkness near the floor. She turned her light fully upon the place, grasping the balustrade, and with an undefined feeling of expectation in her heart she stood still.

There was a woman, stooping, crawling on her hands and knees, upon the black and red diamond tiles that paved the hall. The curiously fair hair, with its conspicuous arrangement, could only belong to Miss Abel. What in the world was she about? The momentary terror became merged in curiosity; she was picking up something from the floor.

Muriel saw the quick movement of her hand as it pounced on an apparently very small object, took it up, glanced at it, bestowed it in some receptacle. Then, as though attracted by a sound, the searcher raised her head; the attitude was that of listening – keen, furtive. Her glance travelled up to the landing above her; she remained a moment motionless, then, like one reassured, she stooped and again felt carefully about her, to and fro, shifted her position slightly, repeated the movement of picking up something. After a little she sat upon her heels, took the box, or what it was that she held, from the ground, and seemed to examine the contents; then bowed herself afresh, and again searched the floor.

Muriel watched like one petrified, a consideration creeping into her consciousness that made her shiver. Until the coming of her light Miss Abel must have been searching for those minute objects she had dropped in the pitch dark. The coming of the candle and the spectator made no effect upon her movements; she neither started nor turned her head.

An urgent need to make sure was the first imperative impulse. Leaning over the rail, and subduing her voice that the invalid above might not hear it, she spoke—

“Miss Abel, what are you doing?”

The quavering accents fell dead upon the silence, the crouching figure took no heed. It was just possible that she might be deaf; and Muriel, taking her courage in both hands, cleared the remaining stairs at a run, and, gaining the hail, circled round so as to face the intruder.

The woman with the sinister jaw and heavily shaded eyes now stood up. Her movements all suggested a fierce necessity for noiseless haste. She made a dart at the house door, and with one last backward gaze of alarmed watchfulness seemed to let herself out instantly. The sound of the cautious click of the latch as it closed behind her, echoed through the still house to its remotest end, like the widening of ripples on a pool when a stone is gently dropped. The first momentary impression of the listening girl was the conviction that her stepmother must he aroused by a noise so solitary, so incisive.

Shaking all over she approached the door. The chain was up, the bolts drawn. The whole figure of this woman was delusion then – stark and sheer delusion. Her knees knocked together, she almost lost grip on her own consciousness; only the thought of her father’s critical state kept her from abject panic. For his sake she mastered fear, compelled her limbs to obey her will – to enter the drawing-room, take thence the book she needed, and to walk, not to stampede, up the stairs again.

The bedroom, with its fire and lamp, seemed the essence of comfort and friendliness. She crouched by the generous blaze, warming her chilled fingers, steadying her convulsive shaking.

“This is a cold house,” she said to her father, forcing her wan lips to a smile. “Is Agnes awake?” asked the major.

She looked up quickly. “No! What makes you ask?”

“I thought I heard you speak to her; and I thought I heard her door close.”

III

“Ah, Dr. Forrest,” said Muriel, archly, next day, “I have made a discovery! Not treasure – no! But I have found out what Agnes was so anxious you should not tell me yesterday White Gates is haunted!”

“Ah!” said the doctor, retaining her hand that he might feel her pulse, “so you have been dreaming of horrors, have you? I’m not surprised; I should not have told you all that yarn.”

“You cannot be responsible for my dreaming; you left out the essential person in the story; who is she?”

He looked genuinely puzzled. “Tell me what you saw, Miss North.”

“Tell me first – you knew the house is haunted?”

“I have heard people say so.”

“And tenants left, and the rent went down, in consequence?”

“Folks are superstitious.”

“Now, doctor, what did people see, or fancy they saw?”

“’Pon my life, I hardly know. Noises, rustlings, doors opened, some one about the house at night – the usual thing. The manner of the old ladies’ death was more than enough to give the place a bad name.”

“But the person – the individual that walks and rustles, that opens or closes doors – who is she? No Kenyon, I am quite sure, from your description of the family. Do tell me how she comes into the story.”

“My dear young lady, I have no notion what you are talking about; please explain.” She told him, then, of the two appearances of the fair-haired woman – told him so simply and directly, that he could not help but feel in some sort impressed.

“The first time I saw her,” she said, “nothing could have been more totally unexpected. Now, do tell me who she is!”

“But I have no idea who she is.” He looked thoroughly puzzled. “The idea of her being Miss Abel is absurd, of course. The little dressmaker is a dark-haired hunchback.”

“Is she not one of the treasure-hunters who occupied the house in such numbers for the last twenty years?”

“No, certainly not. There have been five sets of tenants, and I have known them all. You see, folks here are at my mercy completely. If they fall ill, they must either die or call me in.” He laughed. “Nobody at all like the person you describe has ever, to my knowledge, set foot in the house. And yet, oddly enough, I do know of a person to whom your description applies in some curious points: the hair especially – the unusual style of it. She is a Mrs. Gibson, the wife of a farmer who lives at Cloverhead, nearly twelve miles from here, on the wolds. She isn’t young now by any means; and she is no ghost – as much alive as you or I – and I would take my oath she never was at White Gates in her life.”

“Who is she? A native of these parts?”

“A native of God knows where. She was a barmaid in Bristol, and turned the heads of half the young men in the place, in my day. I don’t know why she married Gibson of Cloverhead; he’s rich, of course; but she might have done better, I should think.”

“I should like to see her,” said Muriel suddenly. “Was she married at the time of Miss Kenyon’s death?”

He pondered. “Was she? No. That spring, I think it was. Yes, of course, that spring. I remember it now, because Hackett’s wife and she were confined much the same time. Her child – Mrs. Gibson’s – was born prematurely, about six months after her marriage, and did not live. She was left without a baby, and poor little Hackett without a mother.”

“I should like to see her,” said Muriel. “If it was summertime, I’d drive you over,” said the doctor. “But this time of year it’s out of the question.”

The human brain weaves threads faster than any spider; and Muriel’s was busy indeed after the doctor left her.

Mrs. Gibson – ex-barmaid in Bristol – very attractive. Young Hackett was in business in Bristol.… Her sudden marriage, immediately after the announcement of his – for Dr. Forrest had said that the fact of his being married came as a surprise to the neighbourhood.… The birth of her child.… Oh, surely, surely there was some thread of connection here! Was it not possible that after all Mrs. Gibson, and she alone, knew the secret of the disappearance of the bulk of Joshua’s fortune? The motive? – Revenge.

It all seemed to unroll itself before her like a drama. Young Hackett, the doctor said, knew of the secret hoard; if Muriel’s suspicions hit the mark, the one person to whom he would be likely to mention such a thing would be the barmaid. How easy to gain access to a house inhabited solely by three women, all advanced in years! In so many empty rooms, how easy concealment to one who had learned the ways of the house from the nephew and heir of its owners!

And no possible clue to connect the woman and her secret could, as far as one saw, have been forthcoming, short of her own haunting presence there! In the very place!

Muriel was divided between a great desire to pass a night in the room containing the safe, and a great fear of doing so. The thought of Agnes was the casting vote; her distress and disapproval would be so great, and Muriel could think of no device by which permission to change her room could be obtained, without speaking of the second apparition which was so far, a secret between herself and the doctor. Neither he nor she had the least reason to suppose that Mrs. North had ever been disturbed nocturnally, though she knew the house was reputed haunted, and was most anxious that her stepdaughter should be kept in ignorance.

Major North’s turn for the better became so marked, that very soon there was no more night-nursing required. The weather changed, and grew soft and genial, which was very favourable to him.

Dr. Forrest and Muriel more than once discussed the fanciful theories which she had based upon his casual mention of Mrs. Gibson: the doctor inclining to the belief that, had she really abstracted the jewels, she would have taken herself off and lived in wealth upon the proceeds; Muriel strongly urging that such a theory was opposed to the motive of the theft, as she conceived it, and that Mrs. Gibson’s possession of the treasures accounted entirely for the undoubted fact that no sale of them had been attempted.

One evening, unusually late, the doctor dropped in, finding the girl, as he expected, alone in the library.

“Miss Muriel,” he said, “I’m sent for, to Cloverhead. Mrs. Gibson is ill. I shall start early tomorrow morning, and as it’s so fine, if you like. I’ll take you; but you must wrap up.”

Mrs. North eagerly accepted the chance for Muriel to get a good long drive; and the following morning, amid the chill, still smiles of a sunny, quiet December day, they set off in the dog-cart over the wolds, to the remote farm known as Cloverhead.

A more desolate drive than that which lies between the two places could hardly be imagined. The wold, in its most treeless, exposed form, heaved in sullen savagery all about it. The square, grey, hard-looking house, with its ricks and outbuildings, stood out as a landmark for miles and miles.

A pebble-capped walk, edged with pointed cypress bushes, led from the gate to the house door; and, as the doctor’s cart stopped, a tall woman, wrapped in a shawl, came slowly down the dark entrance passage, and paused on the threshold, holding her shawl over her mouth as though she feared the keen air.

“Good-morning, Mrs. Gibson,” called the doctor. “May I bring in this young lady out of the cold?”

The woman nodded silently; and, with some tumult of nerves, Muriel found herself approaching, facing, actually speaking to – the spectre that haunted White Gates.

There was no doubt it was she. The face was gaunt, aged, haggard, the hard line of jaw was even more pronounced; but the sunken eyes were still accented with artificial pencilling, the abundant hair was not grey, and was still elaborately dressed. As she preceded them into her parlour, the grandeur of her carriage, and the fine lines of her build, showed traces of a personality not usual in farmers’ wives.

“Sit down,” she said abruptly to Muriel, pulling forward a solid old Chippendale chair.

“You must have had a chilly drive. There s a good fire. I’ll go and have a chat with the doctor, and tell the girl to bring you some cake.” Muriel sat down, bewildered. The corporeal touch of the woman’s fingers upon her own jarred with probabilities. Many people in these days have heard of Phantasms of the living. Muriel never had. It seemed uncanny, even to the point of horror, that she should have spoken face to face with a woman whom she had recently seen vanish through barred doors.

The room was hot and stuffy, the big clock ticked lazily, the wood fire crackled. An armchair, such as one sees in old pictures, with very high back, drawn near the fire and piled with tumbled pillows, showed that Mrs. Gibson had been sitting here until the doctor’s arrival. There was an inkstand on the table near, and a litter of papers and pens. It was a relief to see signs of habitation among the wool mats, albums, and wax-flower groups.

Muriel’s eye rested idly on a folded vellum document that looked legal, thence it wandered to a packet of letters, carefully tied up. There was sealing-wax upon the package – newly spilt, as one could see by the adjacent candle and smell by the unmistakable fragrance. There was in the girl’s mind no smallest intent to spy, but her eye fell on the inscription, written in a large, flowing hand.

“To be given, with all the other contents of this box, to Maurice Kenyon Hackett, on the death of his father. The contents to justify my entire course of conduct.”

A hot flush mounted slowly to Muriel’s brow. Springing up, she turned her back upon the table, and walked to the window. Her heart beat uncomfortably. She was ashamed, yet triumphant. She felt like a spy, yet she longed – oh, how ardently – to break the seal, and possess herself of the secret those letters hid!

After a long hesitation she took a sudden resolution – with a swift movement back to the table she turned the package over so that the wax lay uppermost, and the inscription was hidden from view. Then she went back to the window. A minute later a servant-girl brought in a tray of cake and currant wine; and, to beguile the time of waiting, Muriel presently ate some, for her long drive had made her hungry. More than an hour was she alone with that packet of mystery, before the doctor and his patient rejoined her.

The woman’s face was more drawn, her eyes more sunken than ever. “I’m sorry you’ve had to wait so long,” she said.

Muriel murmured a word of deprecation, and thanked her for her hospitality. Mrs. Gibson approached the table, against which she leaned, like one who needs support; the girl saw a sudden swift start, as her eye fell on the package; she saw her note that it lay so that no writing could be seen, saw her glance from it to her visitor, and push it away as though inadvertently, under some loose sheets of blotting-paper.

“We must get off, Miss Muriel, or we shall be benighted,” said Dr. Forrest.

“Are you staying with the doctor?” asked Mrs. Gibson.

“Oh no, I am staying at White Gates,” replied Muriel, smiling full into her eyes. There was not a flicker, not a ray of recognition, nor of consciousness.

“White Gates? Where’s that?” said the slow, hard voice. For a moment Muriel held her breath; then she replied simply – “I think you know the house; I have seen you there.”

The woman looked at her in blank, broad surprise. “I don’t know what you mean,” she said.

The doctor drew back, watching Muriel, his hand hiding his amused lips.

“I have been staying a month at White Gates, in Longstreet,” said Muriel, “and I have twice seen you there; the second time, you were picking up those things that you dropped in the hall, you remember.”

Still the woman faced her with unmoved muscles; but a red spot crept into her cheeks. “You make a mistake,” she said coldly, “I have not been beyond the garden since October.”

“Nevertheless, I have seen you at White Gates,” steadily repeated the girl. “Next time, do you think you will know me?”

“I don’t understand your insinuation,” replied her antagonist, after a pause. “I have hardly been in Longstreet village in my life, and I do not know the house you allude to.”

“Nor the owner?” softly suggested Muriel.

Nothing could daunt this woman; her lips tightened themselves like cords. “Nor its owner,” she replied unflinchingly. Then she turned to the doctor.

“This young lady has – a bee in her bonnet.”

“She seems to be asking queer questions,” said Dr. Forrest, twinkling. “I will ask no more,” said Muriel, her face relaxing into a smile. “I have found out all I wished to know. Good-bye, Mrs. Gibson; do speak to me next time we meet. We have been introduced now, you know.”

“I am sure she must be cracked,” was the only answer vouchsafed by the hostess. The woman had strung herself to a point, but, as they shook hands, Muriel felt that she was quivering, and her breath came in quick, short pants. They drove away in silence from the desolate place, and, standing at the door, she watched them go, her shawl over her mouth.

“She sent for rue chiefly to tell me that she has made me sole executor of her will,” said the doctor, speaking at last. “I don’t fancy she and Gibson get on over well. Poor soul! Her days are numbered, I hardly think she will get through the winter.”

Mrs. Gibson never moved until the dog-cart dipped down out of sight, over the brow of the moor. Then she turned back to the sitting-room, and, closing the door, stood motionless in the middle of the room. After a silence, she flung her arms upwards and outwards, with a gesture that sent her shawl to the ground, and showed the attenuation of her finely-proportioned figure.

“My God!” she said aloud, “after twenty years!… My God! How long it takes to die!”

IV

Of course Muriel told Dr. Forrest of the inscription on the packet of letters, and he gave her in return the information that Maurice was certainly the name of Joshua Hackett’s son. It began to seem to him almost probable that the wronged woman had chosen so to avenge herself and that the box to be given to the young man might actually prove to contain the missing fortune. Meanwhile, no action was possible; all was surmise; and Mrs. Gibson so near death that the doctor could not find it in his heart to break confidence, and confide his suspicions to Joshua Hackett.

For several days the image of the miserable woman, her desolate house, and her haggard eyes, so dwelt in Muriel’s mind that she went about the house expecting to meet her at every corner. But as days went by, and all things at White Gates pursued their normal course, the strength of the impression began to fade. Several external circumstances combined in this direction. The weather continued “saft,” the major liked her to exercise his horse, she was introduced by the doctor to the young people at the Manor House, and with them she rode and also played hockey, and had something of a good time. But soon after Christmas the weather became severe. A heavy snowfall, accompanied by a driving gale, plunged the Cotswolds into a mass of drifts; and White Gates, when communication with the outer world was practically severed, was a weird and gruesome abode.

On the third night of the siege Muriel went to bed wearied out. The weather made the major worse, the doctor could not be sent for, and she had sat up with him the previous night, scarcely sleeping at all. Tonight, no sooner was her head on the pillow than she was wrapped in the healthy slumber of a thoroughly tired girl.

How long she had been asleep she did not know; but suddenly she found herself wide awake, with an impression that some one had called her. She sat up; the expanse of snow without cast a reflection of light into the room, and, truth to tell, she expected to see Mrs. Gibson; but there was no one.

Concluding that Mrs. North might have called her, and her father be worse, she slipped out of bed, wrapped her warm gown about her, and opened the door. All was still. She crossed the passage, and from the bedroom came the sound of the major’s snores. Reassured she turned to go back, when her attention was caught by a curious phenomenon.

Between her and the open door of her own room there hovered a pale, nebulous light. It was of no particular shape, and perhaps two feet in height, seeming not to touch the floor. As the girl’s eyes fell upon it, it began to move, crossed the stair-head, and passed slowly on until it was in front of the door leading to the bedroom which contained the safe. Muriel caught her breath. Oh, if it went in there, she dared not, could not follow!

But it did go in – or rather, it vanished, seeming to pass through the wooden panels; and suddenly fear fell away from her like an external thing, and she knew that she must follow. As she turned the key, she heard the hall clock strike three, and thought, “I am not asleep; I hear the clock.”

The waning moon was on this side of the house, and objects in the room could be clearly distinguished; but quite distinct from its pallid radiance was the blue, quivering mass of light near the safe. It grew in size and height until it was the shape and size of a human figure – and slowly, as it seemed to her, it took on the likeness of Mrs. Gibson.

The details of her appearance were not like the former ones; she now wore the shawl in which Muriel had seen her in the flesh; her eyes were fixed upon the girl with eagerness and recognition; after a moment, words were clearly audible.

“It was the keys – can you hear me? Do you hear me? You say you have seen me – hear me now. The keys, I left that out, and the doctor ought to know. I buried them in my baby’s coffin; I shut them in his little dead hand, for it should all have been his; he was the heir. Three keys on a little chain…”

Muriel had no recollection of the end of the episode, nor of how she got back to bed. When she next awoke, in the broad sunshine, she was strongly inclined to consider the whole thing as a dream, in spite of the clock. However, as soon as she was up, she wrote down the curious words of the message. It was not until after the episode was finished that she heard that her stepmother, coming out of her room early that morning, had been startled to see the door of the spare room standing wide open.

Two days after, Dr. Forrest succeeded in braving the drifts, and arrived shortly after breakfast. The first thing he said to Muriel was – “Mrs. Gibson died the night before last, between two and three in the morning.”

The girl turned very white.

“She came to me with a message,” said she. “A very curious message about a key. I wonder if there is any sense in it.”

“About a key!” cried the doctor. “If it should be the missing one! I was there when she died, but she had been unconscious for hours when I arrived, and she never spoke or moved. After it was over, her husband showed me her will. She had no property of any kind to bequeath; all I have to do, is to take in charge the box mentioned in the inscription you saw, and to hand it and its contents intact to Maurice. Hackett immediately on his father’s death. There was no stipulation that we should not see what was inside, so I unlocked the box. It contains the letters you told me of, a quantity of babies’ clothes, a wedding-ring, one or two photographs, and a dispatch-box, of an expensive kind, with a lock which is evidently a complicated one, and no key that we can find. I really feel pretty sure that it is the dispatch-box, and I must take legal advice about withholding it from Hackett, I think.”

Muriel handed him the message, as she had written it. He was profoundly struck. At last – “They will have to open the vault to bury the mother,” he said. “If Gibson will consent, we might at least test the truth of this.”

•   •   •   •   •

Within a fortnight it was known that Joshua Hackett, of White Gates, had died on the same night as that in which Josephine Gibson passed away. He was found dead in bed – heart failure – the Kenyon scourge, they said. Whether the vision that visited Muriel that night passed on to his bedside, who can say?’

The dispatch-box was handed over at once, by the much relieved doctor, to Maurice, and with it the keys, taken from the hand of a dead baby, in Mr. Gibson’s family vault.

The jewels were all there; with them was a sheaf of Bank of England notes, the total value of which was £25,000.

The packet of letters from Joshua to the woman whom he had deceived by a mock marriage, were a full explanation of her wrongs. There was no doubt that her intention in making the theft was to secure a part of Joshua’s fortune for her unborn child. A written statement which accompanied the letters showed that she had no idea of the amount of the hoard beforehand; but dare not afterwards send any of it back. This statement also related in full how she had opened the box, when she got safely out of the room, to remove any papers which might supply a clue to the owner of the property; how, not clearly understanding how the intricate lock worked, she had failed to re-fasten it securely, and how, just as she was in the act of flight, the box flew open, and the jewels rolled about the hall, on which she gave up all for lost, till emboldened by the fact that, although she knew Miss Anna had been awakened by her theft of the keys from her neck, still there was no sign or sound of any one moving in the house. She then ventured to light her lantern, to pick up every single gem, and to make good her escape; and it was not until weeks after that she heard the horrible news that she had been the unintentional murderer of the old lady.

The above curious facts remain the solitary psychic experience in the life of Muriel North. No doubt the girl arrived at the house just when the thoughts of the woman, by reason of approaching death, were constantly and strongly turned upon the events immediately preceding her marriage: the period into which had been crowded all the tragedy and bitterness of her afterwards monotonous existence. The influence was potent, the girl’s temperament of a quality to respond. She has been inclined to avoid haunted houses since. White Gates no longer belongs to this interesting category.

THE VENGEANCE OF A TREE

Eleanor F. Lewis

1904

Through the windows of Jim Daly’s saloon, in the little town of C——, the setting sun streamed in yellow patches, lighting up the glasses scattered on the tables and the faces of several men who were gathered near the bar. Farmers mostly they were, with a sprinkling of shopkeepers, while prominent among them was the village editor, and all were discussing a startling piece of news that had spread through the town and its surroundings. The tidings that Walter Stedman, a laborer on Albert Kelsey’s ranch, had assaulted and murdered his employer’s daughter, had reached them, and had spread universal horror among the people.

A farmer declared that he had seen the deed committed as he walked through a neighboring lane, and, having always been noted for his cowardice, instead of running to the girl’s aid, had hailed a party of miners who were returning from their midday meal through a field near by. When they reached the spot, however, where Stedman (as they supposed) had done his black deed, only the girl lay there, in the stillness of death. Her murderer had taken the opportunity to fly. The party had searched the woods of the Kelsey estate, and just as they were nearing the house itself the appearance of Walter Stedman, walking in a strangely unsteady manner toward it, made them quicken their pace.

He was soon in custody, although he had protested his innocence of the crime. He said that he had just seen the body himself on his way to the station, and that when they had found him he was going to the house for help. But they had laughed at his story and had flung him into the tiny, stifling calaboose of the town.

What were their proofs? Walter Stedman, a young fellow of about twenty-six, had come from the city to their quiet town, just when times were at their hardest, in search of work. The most of the men living in the town were honest fellows, doing their work faithfully, when they could get it, and when they had socially asked Stedman to have a drink with them, he had refused in rather a scornful manner. “That infernal city chap,” he was called, and their hate and envy increased in strength when Albert Kelsey had employed him in preference to any of themselves. As time went on, the story of Stedman’s admiration for Margaret Kelsey had gone afloat, with the added information that his employer’s daughter had repulsed him, saying that she would not marry a common laborer. So Stedman, when this news reached his employer’s ears, was discharged, and this, then, was his revenge! For them, these proofs were sufficient to pronounce him guilty.

Yet that afternoon, as Stedman, crouched on the floor of the calaboose, grew hopeless in the knowledge that no one would believe his story, and that his undeserved punishment would be swift and sure, a tramp, boarding a freight car several miles from the town, sped away from the spot where his crime had been committed, and knew that forever its shadow would follow him.

From the tiny window of his prison Walter Stedman could see the red glow of the heavens that betokened the setting of the sun. So the red sun of his life was soon to set, a life that had been innocent of all crime, and that now was to be ended for a deed that he had never committed. Most prominent of all the visions that swept through his mind was that of Margaret Kelsey, lying as he had first found her, fresh from the hands of her murderer. But there was another of a more tender nature. How long he and Margaret had tried to keep their secret, until Walter could be promoted to a higher position, so that he could ask for her hand with no fear of the father’s antagonism! Then came the remembrance of an afternoon meeting between the two in the woods of the Kelsey estate – how, just as they were parting, Walter had heard footsteps near them, and, glancing sharply around, saw an evil, scowling, murderous face peering through the brush. He had started toward it, but the owner of the countenance had taken himself hurriedly off.

The gossiping townspeople had misconstrued this romance, and when Albert Kelsey had heard of this clandestine meeting from the man who was later on to appear as a leader of the mob, and that he had discharged Stedman, they had believed that the young man had formally proposed and had been rejected. But justice had gone wrong, as it had done innumerable times before, and will again. An innocent man was to be hanged, even without the comfort of a trial, while the man who was guilty was free to wander where he would.

That autumn night the darkness came quickly, and only the stars did their best to light the scene. A body of men, all masked, and having as a leader one who had ever since Stedman’s arrival in town, cherished a secret hatred of the young man, dragged Stedman from the calaboose and tramped through the town, defying all, defying even God himself. Along the highway, and into Farmer Brown’s “cross cut,” they went, vigilantly guarding their prisoner, who, with the lanterns lighting up his haggard face, walked among them with the lagging step of utter hopelessness.

“That’s a good tree,” their leader said, presently, stopping and pointing out a spreading oak; when the slipknot was adjusted and Stedman had stepped on the box, he added: “If you’ve got anything to say, you’d better say it now.”

“I am innocent, I swear before God,” the doomed man answered; “I never took the life of Margaret Kelsey.”

“Give us your proof,” jeered the leader, and when Stedman kept a despairing silence, he laughed shortly.

“Ready, men!” he gave the order. The box was kicked aside, and then – only a writhing body swung to and fro in the gloom.

In front of the men stood their leader, watching the contortions of the body with silent glee. “I’ll tell you a secret, boys,” he said suddenly. “I was after that poor murdered girl myself. A damn little chance I had; but, by God, he had just as little!”

A pause – then: “He’s shunted this earth. Cut him down, you fellows!”

•   •   •   •   •

“It’s no use, son. I’ll give up the blasted thing as a bad job. There’s something queer about that there tree. Do you see how its branches balance it? We have cut the trunk nearly in two, but it won’t come down. There’s plenty of others around; we’ll take one of them. If I’d a long rope with me I’d get that tree down, and yet the way the thing stands it would be risking a fellow’s life to climb it. It’s got the devil in it, sure.”

So old Farmer Brown shouldered his axe and made for another tree, his son following. They had sawed and chopped and chopped and sawed, and yet the tall white oak, with its branches jutting out almost as regularly as if done by the work of a machine, stood straight and firm.

Farmer Brown, well known for his weak, cowardly spirit, who in beholding the murder of Albert Kelsey’s daughter, had in his fright mistaken the criminal, now in his superstition let the oak stand, because its well-balanced position saved it from falling, when other trees would have been down. And so this tree, the same one to which an innocent man had been hanged, was left – for other work.

It was a bleak, rainy night – such a night as can be found only in central California. The wind howled like a thousand demons, and lashed the trees together in wild embraces. Now and then the weird “hoot, hoot!” of an owl came softly from the distance in the lulls of the storm, while the barking of coyotes woke the echoes of the hills into sounds like fiendish laughter.

In the wind and rain a man fought his path through the bush and into Farmer Brown’s “cross cut,” as the shortest way home. Suddenly he stopped, trembling, as if held by some unseen impulse. Before him rose the white oak, wavering and swaying in the storm.

“Good God! it’s the tree I swung Stedman from!” he cried, and a strange fear thrilled him.

His eyes were fixed on it, held by some undefinable fascination. Yes, there on one of the longest branches a small piece of rope still dangled. And then, to the murderer’s excited vision, this rope seemed to lengthen, to form at the end into a slipknot, a knot that encircled a purple neck, while below it writhed and swayed the body of a man!

“Damn him!” he muttered, starting toward the hanging form, as if about to help the rope in its work of strangulation; “will he forever follow me? And yet he deserved it, the black-hearted villain! He took her life—”

He never finished the sentence. The white oak, towering above him in its strength, seemed to grow like a frenzied, living creature. There was a sudden splitting sound, then came a crash, and under the fallen tree lay Stedman’s murderer, crushed and mangled.

From between the broken trunk and the stump that was left, a gray, dim shape sprang out, and sped past the man’s still form, away into the wild blackness of the night.

THE PARLOR-CAR GHOST

Eleanor F. Lewis

1904

All draped with blue denim – the seaside cottage of my friend, Sara Pyne. She asked me to go there with her when she opened it to have it set in order for the summer. She confessed that she felt a trifle nervous at the idea of entering it alone. And I am always ready for an excursion. So much blue denim rather surprised me, because blue is not complimentary to Sara’s complexion – she always wears some shade of red, by preference. She perceived my wonder; she is very near-sighted, and therefore sees everything by some sort of sixth sense.

“You do not like my portieres and curtains and table-covers,” said she. “Neither do I. But I did it to accommodate. And now he rests well in his grave, I hope.”

“Whose grave, for pity’s sake?”

“Mr. J. Billington Price’s.”

“And who is he? He doesn’t sound interesting.”

“Then I will tell you about him,” said Sara, taking a seat directly in front of one of those curtains.

•   •   •   •   •

Last autumn I was leaving this place for New York, traveling on the fast express train known as the Flying Yankee. Of course, I thought of the Flying Dutchman and Wagner’s musical setting of the uncanny legend, and how different things are in these days of steam, etc. Then I looked out of the window at the landscape, the horizon that seemed to wheel in a great curve as the train sped on. Every now and then I had an impression at the “tail of the eye” that a man was sitting in a chair three or four numbers in front of me on the opposite side of the car. Each time that I saw this shape I looked at the chair and ascertained that it was unoccupied. But it was an odd trick of vision. I raised my lorgnette, and the chair showed emptier than before. There was nobody in it, certainly. But the more I knew that it was vacant the more plainly I saw the man. Always with the corner of my eye. It made me nervous. When passengers entered the car I dreaded lest they might take that seat. What would happen if they should? A bag was put in the chair – that made me uncomfortable. The bag was removed at the next station. Then a baby was placed in the seat. It began to laugh as though someone had gently tickled it. There was something odd about that chair – thirteen was its number. When I looked away from it the impression was strong upon me that some person sitting there was watching me.

Really, it would not do to humor such fancies. So I touched the electric button, asked the porter to bring me a table, and taking from my bag a pack of cards, proceeded to divert myself with a game of patience. I was puzzling where to put a seven of spades. “Where can it go?” I murmured to myself. A voice behind me prompted: “Play the four of diamonds on the five, and you can do it.” I started. The only occupants of the car, besides me, were a bridal couple, a mother with three little children, and a typical preacher of one of the straitest sects. Who had spoken? “Play up the four, madam,” repeated this voice.

I looked fearfully over my shoulder. At first I saw a bluish cloud, like cigar smoke, but inodorous. Then the vision cleared, and I saw a young man whom I knew by a subtle intuition to be the occupant, seen and not seen, of chair number thirteen. Evidently he was a traveling salesman – and a ghost. Of course, a drummer’s ghost sounds ridiculous – they’re so extremely alive! Or else you would expect a dead drummer to be particularly dead and not “walk.” This was a most commonplace-looking ghost, cordial, pushing, businesslike. At the same time, his face had an expression of utter despair and horror which made him still more preposterous. Of course it is not nice to let a stranger speak to one, even on so impersonal a topic as a four of diamonds. But a ghost – there can’t be any rule of etiquette about talking with a ghost! My dear, it was dreadful! That forward creature showed me how to play all the cards, and then begged me to lay them out again, in order that he might give me some clever points. I was too much amazed and disturbed to speak. I could only place the cards at his suggestion. This I did so as not to appear to be listening to the empty air, and be supposed to be a crazy woman. Presently the ghost spoke again, and told me his story.

“Madam,” he said, “I have been riding back and forth on this car ever since February 22, 189—. Seven months and eleven days. All this time I have not exchanged a word with anyone. For a drummer, that is pretty hard, you may believe! You know the story of the Flying Dutchman? Well, that is very nearly my case. A curse is upon me and will not be removed until some kind soul— But I’m getting ahead of my text. That day there were four of us, traveling for different houses. One of the boys was in wool, one in baking powder, one in boots and shoes, and myself in cotton goods. We met on the road, took seats together and fell into talking shop.

“Those fellows told big lies about their sales, Washington’s Birthday though it was. The baking powder man raised the amount of the bills of goods which he had sold better than a whole can of his stuff could have done. I admitted the straight truth, that I had not yet been able to make a sale. And then I swore – not in a light-minded, chipper style of verbal trimmings, but a great, round, heaven-defying oath – that I would sell a case of blue denims on that trip if it took me forever. We became dry with talk, and when the train stopped at Rivermouth, we went out to have some beer. It is good there, you know – pardon me, I forgot that I was speaking to a lady. Well, we had to run to get aboard. I missed my footing, fell under the wheels, and the next thing that I knew they were holding an inquest over my remains; while I, disemboweled, was sitting on a corner of the undertaker’s table, wondering which of the coroner’s jury was likely to want a case of blue denims.

“Then I remembered my wicked oath, and understood that I was a soul doomed to wander until I could succeed in selling that bill of goods. I spoke once or twice, offering the denims under value, but nobody noticed me. Verdict: accidental death; negligence of deceased; railroad corporation not to blame; deceased got out for beer at his own risk. The other drummers took charge of the remains, and wrote a beautiful letter to my relatives about my social qualities and my impressive conversation. I wish it had been less impressive that time! I might have lied about my sales, or I might have said that I hoped for better luck. But after that oath there was nothing for it. Back and forth, back and forth, on this road, in chair number thirteen, to all eternity. Nobody suspects my presence. They sit on my knees – I’m playing in luck when it is a nice baby as it was this afternoon! They pile wraps, bags, even railway literature on me. They play cards under my nose – and what duffers some of them are! You, madam, are the first person who has perceived me; and therefore I ventured to speak to you, meaning no offense. I can see that you are sorry for me. Now, if you recall the story of the Flying Dutchman, he was saved by the charity of a good woman. In fact, Senta married him. Now I’m not asking anything of that size. I see that you wear a wedding ring, and no doubt you make some man’s happiness. I wasn’t a marrying man myself, and, naturally, am not a marrying ghost. And that has nothing to do with the matter anyway. But if you could – I don’t suppose you would have any use for them – but if you were disposed to do a turn of good, solid, Christian charity – I should be everlastingly grateful, and you may have that case of denims at $72.50. And that quality is quoted today at $80. Does it go, madam?”

The speech of the poor ghost was not very eloquent, but his eyes had an intense, eager glare, which was terrible. Something – pity, fear, I do not know what – compelled me. I decided to do without that white and gold evening cloak. Instead, I gave $72.50 to the ghost and took from him a receipt for the sum, signed J. Billington Price. Then he smiled contentedly, thanked me with emotion, and returned to chair number thirteen. Several times on the journey, although I did not perceive him again, I felt dazed. When the train arrived at New York, and I, with the other passengers, dismounted, it seemed to me that a strong hand passed under my elbow, steadying me down the steps. As I walked the length of the station my bag – not heavy at any time – appeared to become weightless. I believe that the parlor-car ghost walked beside me, carrying the bag, whose handle still remained in my other hand. Indeed, once or twice I thought I felt the touch of cold fingers against mine. Since then I have no reason to suppose that the poor ghost is not at rest. I hope he is.

But I never expected nor wished for the blue denims. The next day, however, a dray belonging to a great wholesale house backed up to our door and delivered a case of denims, with a receipted bill for the same. What was I to do? I could not go about selling blue denims; I could not give them away without exciting comment. So I furnished the cottage with them – and you know the effect on my complexion. Pity me, dear! And credit me, frivolous woman as I am, with having saved a soul at the expense of my own vanity. My story is told. What do you think about it?

THE MASS OF SHADOWS

Anatole France

1908

This tale the sacristan of the church of St. Eulalie at Neuville d’Aumont told me, as we sat under the arbor of the White Horse, one fine summer evening, drinking a bottle of old wine to the health of the dead man, now very much at his ease, whom that very morning he had borne to the grave with full honors, beneath a pall powdered with smart silver tears.

–   –   –

My poor father who is dead (it is the sacristan who is speaking) was in his lifetime a grave-digger. He was of an agreeable disposition, the result, no doubt, of the calling he followed, for it has often been pointed out that people who work in cemeteries are of a jovial turn. Death has no terrors for them; they never give it a thought. I, for instance, monsieur, enter a cemetery at night as little perturbed as though it were the arbor of the White Horse. And if by chance I meet with a ghost, I don’t disturb myself in the least about it, for I reflect that he may just as likely have business of his own to attend to as I. I know the habits of the dead, and I know their character. Indeed, so far as that goes, I know things of which the priests themselves are ignorant. If I were to tell you all I have seen, you would be astounded. But a still tongue makes a wise head, and my father, who, all the same, delighted in spinning a yarn, did not disclose a twentieth part of what he knew. To make up for this he often repeated the same stories, and to my knowledge he told the story of Catherine Fontaine at least a hundred times.

Catherine Fontaine was an old maid whom he well remembered having seen when he was a mere child. I should not be surprised if there were still, perhaps, three old fellows in the district who could remember having heard folks speak of her, for she was very well known and of excellent reputation, though poor enough. She lived at the corner of the Rue aux Nonnes, in the turret which is still to be seen there, and which formed part of an old half-ruined mansion looking on to the garden of the Ursuline nuns. On that turret can still be traced certain figures and half-obliterated inscriptions. The late curé of St. Eulalie, Monsieur Levasseur, asserted that there are the words in Latin, Love is stronger than death, “which is to be understood,” so he would add, “of divine love.”

Catherine Fontaine lived by herself in this tiny apartment. She was a lace-maker. You know, of course, that the lace made in our part of the world was formerly held in high esteem. No one knew anything of her relatives or friends. It was reported that when she was eighteen years of age she had loved the young Chevalier d’Aumont-Cléry, and had been secretly affianced to him. But decent folk didn’t believe a word of it, and said it was nothing but a tale concocted because Catherine Fontaine’s demeanor was that of a lady rather than that of a working woman, and because, moreover, she possessed beneath her white locks the remains of great beauty. Her expression was sorrowful, and on one finger she wore one of those rings fashioned by the goldsmith into the semblance of two tiny hands clasped together. In former days folks were accustomed to exchange such rings at their betrothal ceremony. I am sure you know the sort of thing I mean.

Catherine Fontaine lived a saintly life. She spent a great deal of time in churches, and every morning, whatever might be the weather, she went to assist at the six o’clock Mass at St. Eulalie.

Now one December night, whilst she was in her little chamber, she was awakened by the sound of bells, and nothing doubting that they were ringing for the first Mass, the pious woman dressed herself, and came downstairs and out into the street. The night was so obscure that not even the walls of the houses were visible, and not a ray of light shone from the murky sky. And such was the silence amid this black darkness, that there was not even the sound of a distant dog barking, and a feeling of aloofness from every living creature was perceptible. But Catherine Fontaine knew well every single stone she stepped on, and, as she could have found her way to the church with her eyes shut, she reached without difficulty the corner of the Rue aux Nonnes and the Rue de la Paroisse, where the timbered house stands with the tree of Jesse carved on one of its massive beams. When she reached this spot she perceived that the church doors were open, and that a great light was streaming out from the wax tapers. She resumed her journey, and when she had passed through the porch she found herself in the midst of a vast congregation which entirely filled the church. But she did not recognize any of the worshippers and was surprised to observe that all of these people were dressed in velvets and brocades, with feathers in their hats, and that they wore swords in the fashion of days gone by. Here were gentlemen who carried tall canes with gold knobs, and ladies with lace caps fastened with coronet-shaped combs. Chevaliers of the Order of St. Louis extended their hands to these ladies, who concealed behind their fans painted faces, of which only the powdered brow and the patch at the corner of the eye were visible! All of them proceeded to take their places without the slightest sound, and as they moved neither the sound of their footsteps on the pavement, nor the rustle of their garments could be heard. The lower places were filled with a crowd of young artisans in brown jackets, dimity breeches, and blue stockings, with their arms round the waists of pretty blushing girls who lowered their eyes. Near the holy water stoups peasant women, in scarlet petticoats and laced bodices, sat upon the ground as immovable as domestic animals, whilst young lads, standing up behind them, stared out from wide-open eyes and twirled their hats round and round on their fingers, and all these sorrowful countenances seemed centred irremovably on one and the same thought, at once sweet and sorrowful.

On her knees, in her accustomed place, Catherine Fontaine saw the priest advance toward the altar, preceded by two servers. She recognized neither priest nor clerks. The Mass began. It was a silent Mass, during which neither the sound of the moving lips nor the tinkle of the bell was audible. Catherine Fontaine felt that she was under the observation and the influence also of her mysterious neighbor, and when, scarcely turning her head, she stole a glance at him, she recognized the young Chevalier d’Aumont-Cléry, who had once loved her, and who had been dead for five and forty years. She recognized him by a small mark which he had over the left ear, and above all by the shadow which his long black eyelashes cast upon his cheeks. He was dressed in his hunting clothes, scarlet with gold lace, the very clothes he wore that day when he met her in St. Leonard’s Wood, begged of her a drink, and stole a kiss. He had preserved his youth and good looks. When he smiled, he still displayed magnificent teeth. Catherine said to him in an undertone:

“Monseigneur, you who were my friend, and to whom in days gone by I gave all that a girl holds most dear, may God keep you in His grace! O, that He would at length inspire me with regret for the sin I committed in yielding to you; for it is a fact that, though my hair is white and I approach my end, I have not yet repented of having loved you. But, dear dead friend and noble seigneur, tell me, who are these folk, habited after the antique fashion, who are here assisting at this silent Mass?”

The Chevalier d’Aumont-Cléry replied in a voice feebler than a breath, but none the less crystal clear:

“Catherine, these men and women are souls from purgatory who have grieved God by sinning as we ourselves sinned through love of the creature, but who are not on that account cast off by God, inasmuch as their sin, like ours, was not deliberate.

“Whilst separated from those whom they loved upon earth, they are purified in the cleansing fires of purgatory, they suffer the pangs of absence, which is for them the most cruel of tortures. They are so unhappy that an angel from heaven takes pity upon their love-torment. By the permission of the Most High, for one hour in the night, he reunites each year lover to loved in their parish church, where they are permitted to assist at the Mass of Shadows, hand clasped in hand. These are the facts. If it has been granted to me to see thee before thy death, Catherine, it is a boon which is bestowed by God’s special permission.”

And Catherine Fontaine answered him:

“I would die gladly enough, dear, dead lord, if I might recover the beauty that was mine when I gave you to drink in the forest.”

Whilst they thus conversed under their breath, a very old canon was taking the collection and proffering to the worshippers a great copper dish, wherein they let fall, each in his turn, ancient coins which have long since ceased to pass current: écus of six livres, florins, ducats and ducatoons, jacobuses and rose-nobles, and the pieces fell silently into the dish. When at length it was placed before the Chevalier, he dropped into it a louis which made no more sound than had the other pieces of gold and silver.

Then the old canon stopped before Catherine Fontaine, who fumbled in her pocket without being able to find a farthing. Then, being unwilling to allow the dish to pass without an offering from herself, she slipped from her finger the ring which the Chevalier had given her the day before his death, and cast it into the copper bowl. As the golden ring fell, a sound like the heavy clang of a bell rang out, and on the stroke of this reverberation the Chevalier, the canon, the celebrant, the servers, the ladies and their cavaliers, the whole assembly vanished utterly; the candles guttered out, and Catherine Fontaine was left alone in the darkness.

–   –   –

Having concluded his narrative after this fashion, the sacristan drank a long draught of wine, remained pensive for a moment, and then resumed his talk in these words:

–   –   –

I have told you this tale exactly as my father has told it to me over and over again, and I believe that it is authentic, because it agrees in all respects with what I have observed of the manners and customs peculiar to those who have passed away. I have associated a good deal with the dead ever since my childhood, and I know that they are accustomed to return to what they have loved.

It is on this account that the miserly dead wander at night in the neighborhood of the treasures they conceal during their life time. They keep a strict watch over their gold; but the trouble they give themselves, far from being of service to them, turns to their disadvantage; and it is not a rare thing at all to come upon money buried in the ground on digging in a place haunted by a ghost. In the same way deceased husbands come by night to harass their wives who have made a second matrimonial venture, and I could easily name several who have kept a better watch over their wives since death than they ever did while living.

That sort of thing is blameworthy, for in all fairness the dead have no business to stir up jealousies. Still I do but tell you what I have observed myself. It is a matter to take into account if one marries a widow. Besides, the tale I have told you is vouchsafed for in the manner following:

The morning after that extraordinary night Catherine Fontaine was discovered dead in her chamber. And the beadle attached to St. Eulalie found in the copper bowl used for the collection a gold ring with two clasped hands. Besides, I’m not the kind of man to make jokes. Suppose we order another bottle of wine?…

HIS DAY BACK

Jack Brant

1913

There was a knock at the door. At my request, it opened and in walked, or rather glided, my man, Mullbury. A strange thing about Mullbury is that he whenever he knocks, I realize instantly that I have something to say to him.

“Mullbury, pack my suitcase for a week of travel. I’m going West.”

Mullbury immediately withdrew. He is a most remarkable man, and save for the one time when he asked for an increase in wages because of the court’s decision that he should pay alimony, his sole object in knocking has been to take my expected command.

Why I should start for the West I could not understand. I knew no one in New Mexico. I had seen it on the map when a small boy – a square of pink, I think, though I am not sure now of the color – and learned that it was one of those lawless places called territories.

Beyond that, being what is known as a narrow man, which means that more vital interests absorb my attentions, I have never taken the slightest interest in New Mexico until startled by Mullbury’s knock. Then, moved by some unexplainable impulse, I threw away my cigar, telephoned for accommodations to Las Cruces, and started on the midnight express.

During the three days’ journey, I had ample time to reflect on the folly of this move. I realized perfectly that I should not have left my business at this time. That I had always intended, when able to take a vacation, to visit my brother in Cuba.

Cuba would do me good, and I would have the opportunity to gratify an abnormal craving to see a cockfight. Yet I found it absolutely impossible to turn back.

On the afternoon of the third day, I arrived in Las Cruces on a train I would not have caught but for the fortunate fact that it was twelve hours late. I took passage in what might have been the original overland stage, slightly modified, and was conveyed safely through the dust, to the taste of which I had become accustomed on the sleeper, to a one-story mud fort bearing the name “hotel” in red and black over its door.

I engaged a narrow but surprisingly cool room. Then I ventured forth on the one long business street, still compelled by the unaccountable impulse, and purchased a complete costume more in accord with my surroundings than the one suit which I had brought with me, and which was already attracting more attention than was pleasing to a man of my retiring nature.

I also purchased an elaborate prospecting outfit, provisions to last several days, and a sleeping-bag. This last was forced upon me by an attractive Mexican maiden with perfect teeth who thrust it laughingly into my arms, repeating what appeared to be the only English she knew, “You buy! You buy!” as if it all was a huge joke.

And it was a joke. That bag would have been all right for a trip to the north pole, but was slightly unnecessary for the burning sands of New Mexico.

As a final act of folly I engaged transportation with a mule-team which would start in the morning for Organ. Organ is a small mining settlement at the base of the Organ Mountains, which rise very much like the pipe-stems of an organ above the level desert in the east.

Rugged and steep the mountains look, like the edge of the world. I felt somewhere that they were my destination, and watched them – gorgeously lighted with purple and gold by the brilliant sunset – with interest.

There was a great deal of mystery and awe about them. They seemed a fitting haunt for wild, inhuman spirits, whose unholy groans could echo through the deep canyons; for lone, ghostly shapes, floating sadly from their heights at dusk to bring terror and disaster to the surrounding world. Standing there so tall, and plainly outlined in the clear, dry air. I could scarcely believe when told that they were ten miles away, so near they seemed.

I never believed in fairies. At least, not very much. You can’t if you happen to live in a city with proof on all sides that no such things exist. But I couldn’t help thinking, as I looked at those mountains, that if there were any anywhere you would find them among those red and pink and purple rocks.

•   •   •   •   •

At daybreak the next morning, the hotel furnished me with a fine breakfast, and I was relieved to find that my madness had not affected my appetite. I had not slept very well – a reddish stain on the wall over my head, framed by about a hundred and fifty disconnected red legs, had reminded me of what a man on the train had told me regarding tarantulas and centipedes. But I don’t think I saw any real ones.

I found my mule team and put my pack in and climbed up on the front seat with the driver. The first part of the drive was very pleasant until the sun discovered us and came a little nearer to see what a man of my make was doing with a prospector’s outfit.

The desert, which had looked so flat in the distance, was a series of sandy hills partly covered with cactus and what I think was sage (I am not sure that I know what sage is, so it might have been sage), populated by lizards and horned toads and fat little prairie dogs and thousands upon thousands of long-eared rabbits. I understood what the man meant who said that when he got out on the desert, the ground got up and started to run away from him.

Every now and then we would come upon a bird about as big as a spring chicken, which looked like an overgrown and very unkempt sandpeep, employed in killing a snake or making a tasty breakfast off of centipedes and tarantulas. If I had to live in that country, I would tame one of those birds and keep it with me constantly.

I tried to learn something of the country from the driver, but without success. He was cheerful enough, but his vocabulary was not much more extensive than that of the girl who had sold me the sleeping-bag. He was evidently used to prospectors of my type, for he made no comment when I asked to be put off just before reaching Organ.

He waved to me as I entered a deep ravine, and I waved back. Then I passed out of sight among the rocks, and found myself absolutely alone in the wildest country I had ever seen.

Up and up I climbed, winding in and out through massive boulders and tangles of knotted and twisted trees. I had no idea where I was going, but the something that had brought me this far kept leading me on, and I followed passively.

Once in a patch of sand I saw tracks as big as my head, with claws; but I was not afraid. The reason that I did not feel worried I attribute to my belief in fate – since my marriage I have been content to take calmly whatever may be in store for me.

After scrambling over an impossible trail that branched from the main gorge – a thing no man would have done of his own free will – I found myself in a narrow defile between towering cliffs. I followed this until it ended in a circular platform shut in on all sides except the front by steep, unscalable walls of rocks.

I walked to the edge and peered over – and drew back hastily. There was a sheer drop of about five hundred feet, with ugly looking rocks at the bottom. The only means of access was the narrow defile through which I had entered. I could go no farther.

“Well, here I am!” I said aloud, perfectly unconsciously.

“It’s about time,” answered a gruff voice above me.

I sat down and mopped my brow. To be expected at this place and at this time was a good deal of a shock, even to such a believer in fate as myself.

“Don’t be alarmed,” said the voice, less gruff this time and with a tone of amusement in it. “It’s a little uncanny at first, but you will get used to it. I did.”

This gave me courage to look up in the direction from which the voice came. There, some fifty feet directly over my head, sitting calmly on the only projecting piece of rock on that whole smooth surface, his legs swinging idly over the edge, was a man!

For a few minutes we looked at each other in silence. He was about my size, dressed in a prospector’s outfit similar to my own, and as new. His face was kindly, showing nothing but amused curiosity, and I began to feel more at ease. There was something even familiar about him, and I wondered where I had seen him before.

“How did you get up there?” I asked, my wonder prompting the question.

“It’s easy when you are in my condition,” he replied casually. “Are you Mr. Bent?”

“Benjamin Bent is my name,” I answered “Who are you?”

“My name is Adams – Jonathan Adams. You have probably heard a great deal about me.”

I gasped. Jonathan Adams was the name of my wife’s second husband, the one before she married me.

“Not the Jonathan Adams who married Mrs. Hayes?” I stammered.

“The same,” he answered. “You, I believe, had the pleasure of marrying her next.”

“But,” I remonstrated, beginning to feel dizzy, “you were supposed to have died five years ago!”

“That’s right,” said Mr. Adams. “I did die. I committed suicide by jumping off this very cliff, as Mr. Hayes did before me.”

“See here,” I said, trying to appear calm. “This is no time to joke. You don’t expect me to believe that you are my wife’s second husband’s ghost!”

“That’s just what I am,” he answered with a grin. “Aren’t you beginning to see through me.”

I looked at him closely. To my astonishment, I could follow a crack in the rock behind him through his shoulders. I sat down and pressed my head between my hands, trying to think.

“There, there!” said the ghost. “Don’t take it so hard. I know just how you feel. I felt the same way when I first saw Mr. Hayes. But, good Heavens, there is nothing to be afraid of. I wouldn’t hurt you if I could. I know what you have been through already. I came down here to help you, the same as Mr. Hayes did for me.”

He was so reassuring and polite and apologetic that most of my fear left me, and my curiosity got the better of what remained. I looked up again with interest.

“I never saw a ghost before,” I said, trying to explain my fright. “I suppose you just floated up to that rock?”

“Sure,” answered Mr. Adams. “I’ll come down to show you.”

With that he slipped off the ledge and slowly floated to my side. He put out his hand, but drew it away hastily when I reached out to shake it. I recognized him now from his likeness to the big picture in the gilt frame which my wife kept hung in the sitting-room beside the one of Mr. Hayes.

“I’m sorry,” he said, referring with evident confusion to his action in withdrawing his hand. “but I can’t get over some of those habits. Of course, you couldn’t shake hands with me, for there is nothing there to shake.”

I saw he was sensitive about it, so I merely laughed, though I was curious to try the effect.

“It’s mighty good of you to take it so well,” he continued. “I was in a blue funk for quite a time before Mr. Hayes could comfort me. A very nice man, that Mr. Hayes. Have you ever met him?”

I shook my head.

“Well, never mind; you will. He didn’t come now because he thought two of us might be too much for you. But we are always together, and I am sure we three will be great friends. Bond of sympathy, you know.”

He sat down beside me and asked me to fill my pipe. It all seemed so natural that I did this with as much unconcern as if he had been Jonathan Adams in the flesh. He apologized for not joining me in my smoke, saying that he had lost his taste for it.

“It’s not a very long story,” he began, after I was nicely puffing, “and my being here is all through Mr. Hayes. He was Amelia’s first husband, you know. He stood it as long as he could, which was just five years. Then he came out here, discovered this place where we are now, and jumped over. It was taking awful chances, when you think that he didn’t know anything of what was coming after. But he was a nervous, high-strung man, and had reached the point where he was willing to take chances. He says now that he would have done it two or three years earlier if he had known the relief and rest he was going to get. It was perfect bliss, all right, after his five years of married life. For a number of years he just sat back and enjoyed it.

“Then he got to thinking, in his generous way, that perhaps some poor fellow was suffering just as he had suffered. This thought kept bothering him so much, being of a tender nature, that he made inquiries and found out about me. After that, the knowledge of my troubles bothered him still more, till at last he couldn’t stand it any longer and began to plan how he could help me out.

“Now, there is a rule where we are that every five years we can come back to Earth on the same day that we snuffed out. There aren’t many of us that do it, because we are satisfied where we are and are content to let the worth go its way undisturbed. But Mr. Hayes was so worried over my troubles that five years ago this very day, which was his ‘day back,’ as we call it, he made arrangements to meet me here.

“We met. It was a meeting that I will never forget, and it took me a long time to get over it. But finally I became accustomed to him, and in an hour he had convinced me, and I jumped off. And I may say that I have never regretted it since.

“Then through some mutual friend we found out about you, and we agreed that it was only fair that you should have the benefit of our experiences. So I have come back to clear up any of the points you may be in doubt about.

“Of course, there are some drawbacks, and we don’t get all the privileges of those who pass out naturally. But it’s so much better than the life you have been leading that there is no comparison.”

Here I stopped him with a gesture of my hand.

“Mr. Adams,” I said brokenly, “I think I understand what you are driving at, and I am very grateful. But did you know that I buried my dear wife last Tuesday?”

“No!” he cried, “You don’t mean to tell me that Amelia is dead?”

For a few moments he remained silent, his head bowed.

“Dear, dear!” he finally said. “I should read the papers more thoroughly. Allow me to condole with you.”

Mechanically he extended his hand. I reached out to grasp it, but my fingers closed on the empty air. He was too much worked up to notice.

“I will take the news back to Mr. Hayes,” he said quietly.

“I am very grateful to you both,” I said after a few moments of respectful silence, “for your kind intentions and your interest in me. Please express to Mr. Hayes my deepest gratitude.”

“Yes, yes,” said Mr. Adams a little absently “I have enjoyed meeting you, and it is somewhat of a disappointment that you are not to join us. But, of course. I will not urge that now.”

“Poor Amelia!” was all I could say.

“And now,” said Mr. Adams, straightening up, “if you expect to get back before dark, I will not detain you longer.”

He was right – time had gone faster than I had noticed. I turned toward the pass through which I had come. Then we both jumped with fright.

A deep growl came rolling up among the rocks!

Mr. Adams was the first to recover himself. “Grizzly!” he said, smiling. “Funny how strong habit is. Of course, he can’t do a thing to me, yet for a moment I was as frightened as if I was alive.”

“How about me?” I asked, still trembling.

Mr. Adams became serious at once.

“I think I can manage it,” he said. “The bear smells you, but he can see me, and if you will step behind that rock, I may be able to decoy him off. He will think it is me he smells. So I will say good-bye, for I may have to leave hastily.”

I dropped obediently behind the rock, but peered over the top to watch developments. If Mr. Adams failed I preferred jumping off the cliff to being eaten gradually by a hungry bear.

The shaggy head and shoulders of a huge grizzly appeared round the corner. I knew he was a grizzly from a rug which we once owned. Mr. Adams approached him fearlessly, and the bear opened his mouth to receive him. I shuddered with horror.

But when within only a few feet of the bear, Mr. Adams jumped lightly over his head and landed somewhere behind him. The effect on the grizzly was astonished disappointment. He turned quickly round and dashed after Mr. Adams, who was disappearing round the corner.

After a few minutes had elapsed, I rose from my hiding-place and followed them.

There was no sign of them in the narrow defile, and I did not see them again until I reached the main ravine. There I caught sight of them far up the mountain: Mr. Adams sailing serenely over the rough ground, the bear panting in hot pursuit a few feet behind.

Mr. Adams turned and waved me a polite farewell, which I returned. Then I walked quietly to Organ, chartered a mule-team, and three days later arrived back in Boston.

•   •   •   •   •

The first thing I then did was to visit a famous brain and nerve specialist. If science had any explanation for my experience, I wanted to hear it before I began boasting about my acquaintance with real ghosts.

“My dear sir,” said the specialist after I had told him everything, “your case, though interesting, is not at all unusual. It has nothing to do with mental telepathy or telegy which are the only so-called supernatural effects recognized by science. You are no doubt familiar with the phenomenon of walking in the sleep, the walker being awake to all appearances and with eyes wide open. You, sir, have the opposite malady of dreaming while you are actually awake. I prescribe complete rest and a change of climate.”

“But, doctor,” I expostulated, “if it was all a dream, why did the bear follow Mr. Adams out of the canyon?”

“Do not think,” answered the wise doctor, “that because the bear ran out of the canyon that he was necessarily following anyone. Unless cornered or wounded, they are timid animals, and your sudden appearance in a prospector’s outfit would ordinarily be enough to protect you. And then it is possible that this was also part of your dream and there wasn’t any bear.”

This was all I could get out of him.

Of course he is right, and there are no ghosts. But he’ll never get me to believe it, just the same!