And I told him briefly of my accidental meeting with Anita in the donjon, of the practical joke we planned, of our sudden meeting with the _real_ ghost on the ramparts. Mr. Hobson listened, his face growing redder and redder. At the finish of my story he suddenly leaped to his feet and brought his fist down on the table with a bang.
"Well, you little devils!" he said admiringly, and burst into loud laughter. "You"re a s.p.u.n.ky lad, Jeff. And there ain"t any doubt that the de Pierreponts are as good stuff as you can get in the ancestry business. The Christmas supper is spread in the banquet hall. Come, de Pierrepont, will you sup with the old Earl?"
The huge oaken banquet hall, lined with rich hangings, shrunk us to dwarfs by its vastness. Golden goblets were at each place. A butler, dressed in antique livery, threw a red cloak over Hobson"s fat shoulders. It was a whim of the old man"s.
As we took our places, I noticed the table was set for four.
"Whose is the extra place?" I asked.
The old man at first made no reply. At last he turned to me earnestly and said: "Do you believe in ghosts?"
"No," I replied. "Yet how else can I explain that vision I saw on the ramparts?"
"Is the fourth place for him?" Anita almost whispered.
The old man nodded mutely and raised a golden goblet.
"To the Transplanted Ghost!" I said. It was an empty goblet that I touched to my lips.
THE LAST GHOST IN HARMONY
BY NELSON LLOYD
From _Scribner"s Magazine_. Copyright, 1907, by Charles Scribner"s Sons.
By permission of the publishers and Nelson Lloyd.
The Last Ghost in Harmony
BY NELSON LLOYD
From his perch on the blacksmith"s anvil he spoke between the puffs of his post-prandial pipe. The fire in the forge was out and the day was going slowly, through the open door of the shop and the narrow windows, westward to the mountains. In the advancing shadow, on the pile of broken wheels on the work-bench, on keg and barrel, they sat puffing their post-prandial pipes and listening.
For a partner in business I want a truthful man, but for a companion give me one with imagination. To my mind imagination is the spice of life. There is nothing so uninteresting as a fact, for when you know it that is the end of it. When life becomes nothing but facts it won"t be worth living; yet in a few years the race will have no imagination left.
It is being educated out. Look at the children. When I was young the bogey man was as real to me as pa and nearly as much to be feared of, but just yesterday I was lectured for merely mentioning him to my neffy.
So with ghosts. We was taught to believe in ghosts the same as we was in Adam or Noar. Nowadays n.o.body believes in them. It is unscientific, and if you are superst.i.tious you are considered ignorant and laughed at.
Ghosts are the product of the imagination, but if I imagine I see one he is as real to me as if he actually exists, isn"t he? Therefore he does exist. That"s logic. You fellows have become scientific and admits only what you see and feel, and don"t depend on your imagination for anything. Such being the case, I myself admit that the sperrits no longer ha"nt the burying-ground or play around your houses. I admit it because the same condition exact existed in Harmony when I was there, and because of what was told me by Robert J. d.i.n.kle about two years after he died, and because of what occurred between me and him and the Rev. Mr. Spiegelnail.
Harmony was a highly intellectual town. About the last man there with any imagination or interesting ideas, excepting me, of course, was Robert J. d.i.n.kle. Yet he had an awful reputation, and when he died it was generally stated privately that the last landmark of ignorance and superst.i.tion had been providentially removed. You know he had always been seeing things, but we set it down to his fondness for hard cider or his natural prepensity for joshing. With him gone there was no one left to report the doings of the sperrit-world. In fact, so widespread was the light of reason, as the Rev. Mr. Spiegelnail called it, that the burying-ground became a popular place for moonlight strolls. Even I walked through it frequent on my way home from Miss Wheedle"s, with whom I was keeping company, and it never occurred to me to go any faster there, or to look back over my shoulder, for I didn"t believe in such foolishness. But to the most intellectual there comes times of doubt about things they know nothing of nor understand. Such a time come to me, when the wind was more mournfuller than usual in the trees, and the clouds scudded along overhead, casting peculiar shadders. My imagination got the best of my intellect. I hurried. I looked back over my shoulder.
I shivered, kind of. Natural I see nothing in the burying-ground, yet at the end of town I was still uneasy-like, though half laughing at myself.
It was so quiet; not a light burned anywhere, and the square seemed lonelier than the cemetery, and the store was so deserted, so ghostly in the moonlight, that I just couldn"t keep from peering around at it.
Then, from the empty porch, from the empty bench--empty, I swear, for I could see plain, so clear was the night--from absolute nothing come as pleasant a voice as ever I hear.
"h.e.l.lo!" it says.
My blood turned icy-like and the chills waved up and down all through me. I couldn"t move.
The voice came again, so natural, so familiar, that I warmed some, and rubbed my eyes and stared.
There, sitting on the bench, in his favorite place, was the late Robert J. d.i.n.kle, gleaming in the moonlight, the front door showing right through him.
"I must appear pretty distinct," he says in a proud-like way. "Can"t you see me very plain?"
See him plain! I should think so. Even the patches on his coat was visible, and only for the building behind him, he never looked more natural, and hearing him so pleasant, set me thinking. This, says I, is the sperrit of the late Robert J. d.i.n.kle. In life he never did me any harm and in his present misty condition is likely to do less; if he is looking for trouble I"m not afraid of a bit of fog. Such being the case, I says, I shall address him as soon as I am able.
But Robert got tired waiting, and spoke again in an anxious tone, a little louder, and ruther complaining, "Don"t I show up good?" says he.
"I never see you looking better," I answered, for my voice had came back, and the chills were quieter, and I was fairly ca"m and dared even to move a little nearer.
A bright smile showed on his pale face. "It is a relief to be seen at last," he cried, most cheerful. "For years I"ve been trying to do a little ha"nting around here, and no one would notice me. I used to think mebbe my material was too delicate and gauzy, but I"ve conceded that, after all, the stuff is not to blame."
He heaved a sigh so natural that I forgot all about his being a ghost.
Indeed, taken all in all, I see that he had improved, was solemner, had a sweeter expression and wasn"t likely to give in to his old prepensity for joshing.
"Set down and we will talk it over," he went on most winning. "Really, I can"t do any harm, but please be a little afraid and then I will show up distincter. I must be getting dim now."
"You are," says I, for though I was on the porch edging nearer him most bold, I could hardly see him.
Without any warning he gave an awful groan that brought the chills waving back most violent. I jumped and stared, and as I stared he stood out plainer and solider in the moonlight.
"That"s better," he said with a jolly chuckle; "now you do believe in me, don"t you? Well, set there nervous-like, on the edge of the bench and don"t be too ca"m-like, or I"ll disappear."
The ghost"s orders were followed explicit. But with him setting there so natural and pleasant it was hard to be frightened and more than once I forgot. He, seeing me peering like my eyesight was bad, would give a groan that made my blood curdle. Up he would flare again, gleaming in the moonlight full and strong.
"Harmony"s getting too scientific, too intellectual," he said, speaking very melancholic. "What can"t be explained by arithmetic or geography is put down as impossible. Even the preachers encourage such idees and talk about Adam and Eve being allegories. As a result, the graveyard has become the slowest place in town. You simply can"t ha"nt anything around here. A man hears a groan in his room and he gets up and closes the shutters tighter, or throws a shoe at a rat, or swears at the wind in the chimney. A few sperrits were hanging around when I was first dead, but they were complaining very bad about the hard times. There used to be plenty of good society in the burying-ground, they said, but one by one they had to quit. All the old Berrys had left. Mr. Whoople retired when he was taken for a white mule. Mrs. Morris A. Klump, who once oppyrated "round the deserted house beyond the mill had gave up in disgust just a week before my arrival. I tried to encourage the few remaining, explained how the sperritualists were working down the valley and would strike town any time, but they had lost all hope--kept fading away till only me was left. If things don"t turn for the better soon I must go, too. It"s awful discouraging. And lonely! Why folks ramble around the graves like even I wasn"t there. Just last night my boy Ossy came strolling along with the lady he is keeping company with, and where do you s"pose they set down to rest, and look at the moon and talk about the silliest subjecks? Right on my headstone! I stood in front of them and did the ghostliest things till I was clean tired out and discouraged. They just would not pay the least attention."
The poor old ghost almost broke down and cried. Never in life had I known him so much affected, and it went right to my heart to see him wiping his eyes with his handkercher and snuffling.
"Mebbe you don"t make enough noise when you ha"nt," says I most sympathetic.
"I do all the regular acts," says he, a bit het up by my remark. "We always were kind of limited. I float around and groan, and talk foolish, and sometimes I pull off bedclothes or reveal the hiding-place of buried treasure. But what good does it do in a town so intellectual as Harmony?"
I have seen many folks who were down on their luck, but never one who so appealed to me as the late Robert J. d.i.n.kle. It was the way he spoke, the way he looked, his general patheticness, his very helplessness, and deservingness. In life I had known him well, and as he was now I liked him better. So I did want to do something for him. We sat studying for a long time, him smoking very violent, blowing clouds of fog outen his pipe, me thinking up some way to help him. And idees allus comes to them who sets and waits.
"The trouble is partly as you say, Robert," I allowed after a bit, "and again partly because you can"t make enough noise to awaken the slumbering imagination of intellectual Harmony. With a little natural help from me though, you might stir things up in this town."
You never saw a gladder smile or a more gratefuller look than that poor sperrit gave me.