"Oh, all right," I said. "I don"t mind, now that the ghost, or whatever you like to call it, has gone; I"m myself again."
I jumped down, and threading my way along the bramble-entangled path, reached the front door. On opening it, I hesitated. The big, old-fashioned hall, with the great, frowning staircase leading to the gallery overhead, the many open doors showing nought but bare, deserted boards within, the grim pa.s.sages, all moonlit and peopled only with queer flickering shadows, suggested much that was terrifying. I fancied I heard noises, noises like stealthy footsteps moving from room to room, and tiptoeing along the pa.s.sages and down the staircase. Once my heart almost stopped beating as I saw what, at first, I took to be a white face peering at me from a far recess, but which I eventually discovered was only a daub of whitewash; and, once again, my hair all but rose on end, when one of the doors at which I was looking swung open and something came forth. Oh, the horror of that moment, as long as I live I shall never forget it. The something was a cat, just a rather lean but otherwise material, black Tom; yet, in the state my nerves were then, it created almost as much horror as if it had been a ghost. Of course, it was the figure of the walking man that was the cause of all this nervousness; had it not appeared to me I should doubtless have entered the house with the utmost sang-froid, my mind set on nothing but the condition of the walls, drains, etc. As it was, I held back, and it was only after a severe mental struggle I summoned up the courage to leave the doorway and explore. Cautiously, very cautiously, with my heart in my mouth, I moved from room to room, halting every now and then in dreadful suspense as the wind, soughing through across the open land behind the house, blew down the chimneys and set the window-frames jarring. At the commencement of one of the pa.s.sages I was immeasurably startled to see a dark shape poke forward, and then spring hurriedly back, and was so frightened that I dared not advance to see what it was.
Moment after moment sped by, and I still stood there, the cold sweat oozing out all over me, and my eyes fixed in hideous expectation on the blank wall. What was it? What was hiding there? Would it spring out on me if I went to see? At last, urged on by a fascination I found impossible to resist, I crept down the pa.s.sage, my heart throbbing painfully and my whole being overcome with the most sickly antic.i.p.ations. As I drew nearer to the spot, it was as much as I could do to breathe, and my respiration came in quick jerks and gasps. Six, five, four, two feet and I was at the dreaded angle. Another step--taken after the most prodigious battle--and--NOTHING sprang out on me. I was confronted only with a large piece of paper that had come loose from the wall, and flapped backwards and forwards each time the breeze from without rustled past it. The reaction after such an agony of suspense was so great, that I leaned against the wall, and laughed till I cried.
A noise, from somewhere away in the bas.e.m.e.nt, calling me to myself, I went downstairs and investigated. Again a shock--this time more sudden, more acute. Pressed against the window-pane of one of the front reception-rooms was the face of a man--with corpse-like cheeks and pale, malevolent eyes. I was petrified--every drop of my blood was congealed.
My tongue glued to my mouth, my arms hung helpless. I stood in the doorway and stared at it. This went on for what seemed to me an eternity. Then came a revelation. The face was not that of a ghost but of Mr. Baldwin, who, getting alarmed at my long absence, had come to look for me.
We left the premises together. All the way back to the town I thought--should I, or should I not, take the house? Seen as I had seen it, it was a ghoulish-looking place--as weird as a Paris catacomb--but then daylight makes all the difference. Viewed in the sunshine, it would be just like any other house--plain bricks and mortar. I liked the situation; it was just far enough away from a town to enable me to escape all the smoke and traffic, and near enough to make shopping easy.
The only obstacles were the shadows--the strange, enigmatical shadows I had seen in the hall and pa.s.sages, and the figure of the walker. Dare I take a house that knew such visitors? At first I said no, and then yes.
Something, I could not tell what, urged me to say yes. I felt that a very grave issue was at stake--that a great wrong connected in some manner with the mysterious figure awaited righting, and that the hand of Fate pointed at me as the one and only person who could do it.
"Are you sure the house isn"t haunted?" I demanded, as we slowly rolled away from the iron gate, and I leaned back in my seat to light my pipe.
"Haunted!" Mr. Baldwin scoffed, "why, I thought you didn"t believe in ghosts--laughed at them."
"No more I do believe in them," I retorted, "but I have children, and we know how imaginative children are."
"I can"t undertake to stop their imaginations."
"No, but you can tell me whether anyone else has imagined anything there. Imagination is sometimes very infectious."
"As far as I know, then, no; leastways, I have not heard tell of it."
"Who was the last tenant?"
"Mr. Jeremiah Dance."
"Why did he leave?"
"How do I know? Got tired of being there, I suppose."
"How long was he there?"
"Nearly three years."
"Where is he now?"
"That"s more than I can say. Why do you wish to know?"
"Why!" I repeated. "Because it is more satisfactory to me to hear about the house from someone who has lived in it. Has he left no address?"
"Not that I know of, and it"s more than two years since he was here."
"What! The house has been empty all that time?"
"Two years is not very long. Houses--even town houses--are frequently unoccupied for longer than that. I think you"ll like it."
I did not speak again till the drive was over, and we drew up outside the landlord"s house. I then said, "Let me have an agreement. I"ve made up my mind to take it. Three years and the option to stay on."
That was just like me. Whatever I did, I did on the spur of the moment, a mode of procedure that often led me into difficulties.
A month later and my wife, children, servants, and I were all ensconced in the Crow"s Nest.
That was in the beginning of October. Well, the month pa.s.sed by, and November was fairly in before anything remarkable happened. It then came about in this fashion.
Jennie, my eldest child, a self-willed and rather bad-tempered girl of about twelve, evading the vigilance of her mother, who had forbidden her to go out as she had a cold, ran to the gate one evening to see if I was anywhere in sight. Though barely five o"clock, the moon was high in the sky, and the shadows of the big trees had already commenced their gambols along the roadside.
Jennie clambered up the gate as children do, and peering over, suddenly espied what she took to be me, striding towards the house, at a swinging pace, and followed by two poodles.
"Poppa," she cried, "how cute of you! Only to think of you bringing home two doggies! Oh, Poppa, naughty Poppa, what will mum say?" and climbing over into the lane at imminent danger to life and limb, she tore frantically towards the figure. To her dismay, however, it was not me, but a stranger with a horribly white face and big gla.s.sy eyes which he turned down at her and stared. She was so frightened that she fainted, and some ten minutes later I found her lying out there on the road. From the description she gave me of the man and dogs, I felt quite certain they were the figures I had seen; though I pretended the man was a tramp, and a.s.sured her she would never see him again. A week pa.s.sed, and I was beginning to hope nothing would happen, when one of the servants gave notice to leave.
At first she would not say why she did not like the house, but when pressed made the following statement:--
"It"s haunted, Mrs. B----. I can put up with mice and beetles, but not with ghosts. I"ve had a queer sensation, as if water was falling down my spine, ever since I"ve been here, but never saw anything till last night. I was then in the kitchen getting ready to go to bed. Jane and Emma had already gone up, and I was preparing to follow them, when, all of a sudden, I heard footsteps, quick and heavy, cross the gravel and approach the window.
""The boss," says I to myself; "maybe he"s forgot the key and can"t get in at the front door."
"Well, I went to the window and was about to throw it open, when I got an awful shock. Pressed against the gla.s.s, looking in at me, was a face--not the boss"s face, not the face of anyone living, but a horrid white thing with a drooping mouth and wide-open, gla.s.sy eyes, that had no more expression in them than a pig. As sure as I"m standing here, Mrs. B----, it was the face of a corpse--the face of a man that had died no natural death. And by its side, standing on their hind-legs, and staring in at me too were two dogs, both poodles--also no living things, but dead, horribly dead. Well, they stared at me, all three of them, for perhaps a minute, certainly not less, and then vanished. That"s why I"m leaving, Mrs. B----. My heart was never overstrong. I always suffered with palpitations, and if I saw those heads again, it would kill me."
After this my wife spoke to me seriously.
"Jack," she said, "are you sure there"s nothing in it? I don"t think Mary would leave us without a good cause, and the description of what she saw tallies exactly with the figure that frightened Jennie. Jennie a.s.sures me she never said a word about it to the servants. They can"t both have imagined it."
I did not know what to say. My conscience p.r.i.c.ked me. Without a doubt I ought to have told my wife of my own experience in the lane, and have consulted her before taking the house. Supposing she, or any of the children, should die of fright, it would be my fault. I should never forgive myself.
"You"ve something on your mind! What is it?" my wife demanded.
I hesitated a moment or two and then told her. The next quarter of an hour was one I do not care to recollect, but when it was over, and she had had her say, it was decided I should make enquiries and see if there was any possible way of getting rid of the ghosts. With this end in view, I drove to the town, and after several fruitless efforts was at length introduced to a Mr. Marsden, clerk of one of the banks, who, in reply to my questions, said:
"Well, Mr. B----, it"s just this way. I do know something, only--in a small place like this--one has to be so extra careful what one says.
Some years ago a Mr. Jeremiah Dance occupied the Crow"s Nest. He came here apparently a total stranger, and though often in the town, was only seen in the company of one person--his landlord, Mr. Baldwin, with whom--if local gossip is to be relied on--he appeared to be on terms of the greatest familiarity. Indeed, they were seldom apart, walked about the lanes arm-in-arm, visited each other"s houses on alternate evenings, called each other "Teddy" and "Leslie." This state of things continued for nearly three years, and then people suddenly began to comment on the fact that Mr. Dance had gone, or at least was no longer visible. An errand-boy, returning back to town, late one evening, swore to being pa.s.sed on the way by a trap containing Mr. Baldwin and Mr. Dance, who were speaking in very loud voices--just as if they were having a violent altercation. On reaching that part of the road where the trees are thickest overhead, the lad overtook them, or rather Mr. Baldwin, preparing to mount into the trap. Mr. Dance was nowhere to be seen. And from that day to this nothing has ever been heard of him. As none of his friends or relations came forward to raise enquiries, and all his bills were paid--several of them by Mr. Baldwin--no one took the matter up.
Mr. Baldwin pooh-poohed the errand-boy"s story, and declared that, on the night in question, he had been alone in an altogether different part of the county, and knew nothing whatever of Mr. Dance"s movements, further than that he had recently announced his intention of leaving the Crow"s Nest before the expiration of the three years" lease. He had not the remotest idea where he was. He claimed the furniture in payment of the rent due to him."
"Did the matter end there?" I asked.
"In one sense of the word, yes--in another, no. Within a few weeks of Dance"s disappearance rumours got afloat that his ghost had been seen on the road, just where, you may say, you saw it. As a matter of fact, I"ve seen it myself--and so have crowds of other people."
"Has anyone ever spoken to it?"
"Yes--and it has vanished at once. I went there one night with the purpose of laying it, but, on its appearing suddenly, I confess I was so startled, that I not only forgot what I had rehea.r.s.ed to say, but ran home, without uttering as much as a word."
"And what are your deductions of the case?"
"The same as everyone else"s," Mr. Marsden whispered, "only, like everyone else, I dare not say."
"Had Mr. Dance any dogs?"
"Yes--two poodles, of which, much to Mr. Baldwin"s annoyance (everyone noticed this), he used to make the most ridiculous fuss."