The ghost of Charlotte Cray, and other stories 8 – Marryat · Verses Across
Literature · Short Stories
The ghost of Charlotte Cray, and other stories 8The Secret of Economy (part 3)
18
Literature · Short Stories
The ghost of Charlotte Cray, and other stories 8
The Secret of Economy (part 3)
MarryatEnglish
But at last we stand on level ground again. There is no light anywhere except from the guides’ lamps, the foremost one (who is always spokesman) waves his above his head, and introduces la grande salle. I look up and around me, but all is black as pitch. I feel that I am standing on broken flints and a great deal of mud; and as the guide’s lamp throws its faint gleam here and there, I see that the cavern we stand in is very vast and damp, and uncommonly like a huge cellar; but I can’t say I see anything more. In another minute the guide has turned, and leads us through a passage cut in the rock. We are not going up or downstairs now, but picking our way over slippery stones and between places sometimes so narrow and sometimes so low, that our shoulders get various bumps and bruises, and the guide’s warning of “Garde tête!” sounds continuously. Every now and then we come upon a larger excavation, which is called a salle, and given some name consequent on the likeness assumed by the stalactites contained in it. Thus one is called salle de Brahma, because it contains a large stalactite, somewhat resembling the idol of that name. Another salle du sacrifice, because its principal attraction is a large flat stone, at the foot of which is another, shaped sausage-wise, and entitled tombeau de la victime. We pace after the guides through these cavernous passages for what appears to me miles, my mind meanwhile being divided between fear that I should leave my boots behind me in the slushy clay, or that either of my children should tumble down or knock her head. Every cavern is like the other, and I look in vain for stalactites which shall remind me of “houris grouped about the sultan,” or “frozen tears.” The guides occasionally produce a fine effect by burning a little red fire, or letting-off a rocket, or climbing singly up the more perilous places, that we may watch the gradual ascent of their flickering lamps, and judge of the height of the larger salles. But I suppose the enthusiastic scribblers in the visitors’ book would consider me the possessor of a very darkened intellect if they heard me affirm that I have seen better effects on the stage, and climbed greater heights with much more convenience. Perhaps I have not a sufficiently appreciative soul for grottoes; but the greater part of the grotto of Rochefort comes up exactly to my idea of a mine, and nothing more.
The “glittering” stalactites are nowhere. The cave is lined with stalactites, but (with the exception of a few white ones) they are all of a uniform pale-brown colour, and have no idea of glittering or being prismatic. The greatest wonder of the grotto is its vastness, which may be estimated from the fact that we are two hours going over it, and then have not traversed the whole on account of fresh works being carried on in parts. We penetrate to its very depths to see the river and the waterfall, but the mud is so excessive that we are compelled to stop, and let the guide descend with his lamp and flash it over the water, which is really very pretty, and, strange to relate, contains good trout.
Then we plough our way upwards again; up fungus-covered ladders, and wet, slippery stairs, upon which it is most difficult to keep a footing, until we arrive at decidedly the finest sight there--the salle du sabbat. Here the guides send up a spirit-balloon, to show us the height and extent of the vast cavern, and we are rather awe-struck, particularly as, in order that we may see the full effect, the other guide plants us on three chairs and takes away both the lamps, leaving us seated in the darkness, on the edge of a precipice. The blackness is so thick about us that we can almost feel it; and the silence is that of death. My youngest girl slips her little hand in mine, and whispers, “Mamma, supposing he weren’t to come back again!” and I can’t say the prospect pleases. However, the balloon reaches the top of the cavern, and is hauled back again; and the guide does come back; and, whilst he is assisting his fellow to pack it away, I sing a verse of “God save the Queen,” for the children to hear the echo, which is stupendous.
Then we see the prettiest thing, perhaps, we have seen yet. At the top of the salle du sabbat there is a kind of breakage in the side, and a large cluster of stalactites. One guide climbs up to this place and holds his lamp behind the group, whilst the other calls out “la femme qui repose;” when lo! before us there appears almost an exact representation of a woman, reclining with crossed legs, and a child on her bosom. It is so good an imitation, that it might be a figure carved in stone and placed there, and I think the sight gave us more pleasure than anything in the grotto. We have come upon several groups of stalactites already, to which the guides have given names, such as l’ange de la résurrection, l’oreille de l’éléphant, and le lion Belge; but though they have, of course, borne some resemblance to the figures mentioned, the likeness is only admitted for want of a better. This likeness, however, is excellent, could hardly be more like; and we are proportionately pleased. With the salle du sabbat and the balloon the exhibition is ended; and we are thankful to emerge into the fresh air again, and to leave slippery staircases and the smell of fungi behind us.
We feel very heated when we stand on the breezy hill again, for the grotto, contrary to our expectation, has proved exceedingly warm, and the exercise has made us feel more so; and daylight looks so strange that we can scarcely persuade ourselves we have not been passing the night down below. We have picked up several little loose bits of stone and stalactite during our progress, and when we reach home, we spread them out before us on the table, and try to remember where they came from. Here is a bit of marble, veined black-and-white; and here is white stone, glistening and silvery. Here is the stalactite, a veritable piece of “frozen tears” and couchant houris.
Well, we have been a little disappointed with the grottoes of Rochefort, perhaps; we have not found the crystallisations quite so purple-and-amber as we anticipated, or the foundations quite so clean; but, after all, it is what we must expect in this life. If the grotto is not so brilliant as we expected, it is at least a very wonderful and uncommon sight; and so in this life, if we can but forget the purple-and-gold, we may extract a great deal of amusement from very small things, if we choose to try. With which bit of philosophy I conclude.
A MIDSUMMER’S NIGHTMARE;
OR,
THE AMATEUR DETECTIVE.
I am an author. I am something worse than that--I am a Press writer. I am worse than that still--I am a Press writer with a large wife and a small family. And I am an Amateur Detective! I don’t mean, of course, that I reckon the last item as part of my profession, but my friends always come to me if they are in any difficulty, and set me to do all kinds of queer jobs, from restoring and reconciling a truant husband to his wife, to making the round of the “Homes for Lost Dogs” in order to find Lady Softsawder’s pet poodle. Even Jones couldn’t complete his great work, “The Cyclopædia of the Brain,” without asking my assistance (for a consideration, of course) with his fifth section, “The Origin of Dreams.” Jones is full of fire and imagination, but he does not care for plodding, and he knew me of old for a good steady compiler. I agreed with alacrity. “The Origin of Dreams” would fill those hungry little mouths of mine for three months at the very least. But how to do it whilst they gaped around me!--how to cover the one table in my solitary sitting-room with valuable works of reference at the risk of their being touched by greasy fingers!--how to wade through volume after volume, placing a mental mark there and a material one here, whilst my offspring either surreptitiously removed the one or irretrievably obliterated remembrance of the other, by attracting my attention to the manner in which they attempted to scalp each other’s heads or gouge out each other’s eyes! I tried it for a week in vain.
My Press work I had been accustomed to do at office, but this, which was to be based upon the contents of certain ponderous black-lettered tomes which Jones had been collecting for ages past, must be carried on at home, and the noisy, wearisome day gave me no time for reflection, and left me without energy to labour at night. I was about to resign the task in despair--to tell Jones to give it to some more capable or more fortunate labourer in the wide field of speculation--when Fate came to my rescue in the person of the Hon. Captain Rivers, Lord Seaborne’s son.
“My dad’s in an awful way about his ward, young Cockleboat,” he remarked to me, in his friendly manner, “and he wants your assistance, Trueman, if you’ll give it him.”
“Why, what’s the matter, Captain Rivers?”
“Haven’t you heard? Cockleboat’s made a fool of himself. He fell in love with a nursemaid, or a barmaid, or some such sort of person--he, with his twenty thousand a-year in prospect; and when the governor remonstrated with him--told him ’twas nonsense and couldn’t be, and all that sort of thing, he actually ran away!”
“Left Lord Seaborne’s house?”
“Of course, and without a word of explanation. Now, dad doesn’t want to make the affair public, you know, unless it becomes necessary, so he hasn’t said a word to the police; but he wants you to find out where Cockleboat is--you’re so clever at that sort of thing--and just bring him home again.”
“An easy task, certainly. And you don’t even know which way the lad has gone?”
“Well, we think we’ve traced him to Norwich, and dad thought if you wouldn’t mind going up there for a bit, and keeping your eyes open; of course we should make it worth your while, you know, you might hear something of the young scamp for us.”
“What on earth can be his motive for leaving home?”
“Well, perhaps the lady lives up that way, or Julian may have got it into his head that he’ll work to support her. He is but twenty last birthday, and will not be of age, by his father’s will, for the next five years--very lucky for him, as it’s turned out, that he will not be.”
“True. I think I remember seeing the lad at Lady Godiva’s last season. Didn’t he act there in some private theatricals or charades?”
“I believe he did. Now, Trueman, what’s your decision? Will you go to Norwich for us or not?”
“I will start to-morrow if your father wishes it.”
The offer had come most opportunely; even as Captain Rivers was speaking it had flashed through my mind that here was the very opportunity that I desired to carry out my project of writing the fifth section of Jones’ Cyclopædia;--a remote lodging in one of the back streets of the quiet old city of Norwich, whence I could carry on my inquiries all day, and where I might sit up and write out my notes all night. And Lord Seaborne’s generosity in such cases was too well known to permit of any doubt on the subject whether I should not (by accepting his proposal) be killing two birds with one stone. So I did accept it, with gratitude, and having obtained all the information possible respecting the mysterious disappearance of Master Julian Cockleboat, I packed up the black-lettered tomes, and, embracing my smiling wife and children, who appeared rather pleased than otherwise at the prospect of getting rid of me for a few weeks, started for Norwich.
I have a great respect for old county towns: there is a dignified sobriety and sense of unimpeachable respectability about them that impress me. I like their old-world institutions and buildings--their butter crosses and market steps; their dingy bye streets with kerbstones for pavements; their portentous churches and beadles; their old-fashioned shops and goods and shopmen. I like the quiet that reigns in their streets, the paucity of gas they light them up with, the strange conveyances their citizens ply for hire--in fact, I like everything with which the world in general finds fault. So it was with a sense of pleasure I found myself wandering about the streets of Norwich, on the look-out for some place in which to lay my head. I had rather have been there than at the seaside, although it was bright July weather, and I knew the waves were frothing and creaming over the golden sands beneath a canopy of cloudless blue sky. I preferred the shaded, cloister-like streets of the county town, with its cool flags under my feet, and its unbroken sense of calm.
I did not turn into the principal thoroughfares, with their gay shops and gayer passengers, but down the less-frequented bye-ways, where children playing in the road stopped open-mouthed to watch me pass, and women’s heads appeared above the window-blinds, as my footfall sounded on the narrow pavement, as though a stranger were something to be stared at. Many windows held the announcement of “Rooms to Let,” but they were too small--too modern, shall I say--too fresh-looking to take my fancy.
I connected space and gloom with solitude and reflection, and felt as if I could not have sat down before a muslin-draped window, filled with scarlet geraniums and yellow canariensis, to ponder upon “The Origin of Dreams,” to save my life. At last I came upon what I wanted. Down a narrow street, into which the sun seemed never to have penetrated, I found some tall, irregular, dingy-looking buildings--most of which appeared to be occupied as insurance, wine, or law offices,--and in the lower window of one there hung a card with the inscription, “Apartments for a Single Gentleman.”
It was just the place from which to watch and wait--in which to ponder, and compare, and compose,--and I ascended its broken steps, convinced that the birth-place of “The Origin of Dreams” was found. A middle-aged woman, with an intelligent, pleasing face answered my summons to the door. The weekly rent she asked for the occupation of the vacant apartments sounded to me absurdly low, but perhaps that was due to my experience of the exorbitant demands of London landladies. But when I explained to her the reason for which I desired her rooms, namely, that I might sit up at night and write undisturbed, her countenance visibly fell.
“I’m afraid they won’t suit you, then, sir.”
“Why not? Have you any objection to my studying by night?”
“Oh, no, sir. You could do as you pleased about that!”
“What then? Will your other lodgers disturb me?”
Her face twitched as she answered, “I have no other lodgers, sir.”
“Do you live in this big house, then, by yourself?”
“My husband and I have been in charge of it for years, and are permitted to occupy the lower floor in consideration of keeping the upper rooms (which are only used as offices in the day-time) clean and in order. But the clerks are all gone by five o’clock, so they wouldn’t interfere with your night-work.”
“What will, then?”
“I’m afraid there are a good many rats about the place, sir. They will breed in these old houses, and keep up a racket at night.”
“Oh, I don’t mind the rats,” I answered, cheerfully. “I’ll catch as many as I can for you, and frighten away the others. If that is your only objection, the rooms are mine. May I see them?”
“Certainly, sir,” she said, as she closed the door behind me and led the way into two lofty and spacious chambers, connected by folding doors, which had once formed the dining saloon of a splendid mansion.
“The owners of the house permit us to occupy this floor and the basement, and as it’s more than we require, we let these rooms to lodgers. They’re not very grandly furnished, sir, but it’s all neat and clean.”
She threw open the shutters of the further apartment as she spoke, and the July sun streamed into the empty room. As its rays fell upon the unmade bed, my eye followed them and caught sight of a deep indentation in the mattress. The landlady saw it also, and looked amazed.
“Some one has been taking a siesta here without your permission,” I said, jestingly; but she did not seem to take my remark as a jest.
“It must be my good man,” she answered, hurriedly, as she shook the mattress; “perhaps he came in here to lie down for a bit. This hot weather makes the best feel weak, sir.”
“Very true. And now, if you will accept me as a lodger, I will pay you my first week’s rent, and whilst I go back to the railway-station to fetch my valise, you must get me ready a chop or a steak, or anything that is most handy, for my dinner.”
All appeared to be satisfactory. My landlady assented to everything I suggested, and in another hour I was comfortably ensconced under her roof, had eaten my steak, and posted a letter to my wife, and felt very much in charity with all mankind. So I sat at the open window thinking how beautifully still and sweet all my surroundings were, and how much good work I should get through without fear of interruption or distraction. The office clerks had long gone home, the upper rooms were locked for the night; only an occasional patter along the wide uncarpeted staircase reminded me that I was not quite alone. Then I remembered the rats, and “The Origin of Dreams;” and thinking it probable that my honest old couple retired to bed early, rang the bell to tell my landlady to be sure and leave me a good supply of candles.
“You’re not going to sit up and write to-night, sir, are you?” she inquired. “I am sure your rest would do you more good; you must be real tired.”
“Not at all, my good Mrs. Bizzey” (Did I say her name was Bizzey?), “I am as fresh as a daisy, and could not close my eyes. Besides, as your friends, the rats, seem to make so free in the house, I should burn a light any way to warn them they had better not come too near me.”
“Oh, I trust nothing will disturb you, sir,” she said, earnestly, as she withdrew to fetch the candles.
I unpacked my book-box and piled the big volumes on a side table. How imposing they looked! But I had no intention of poring over them that night. “The Origin of Dreams” required thought--deep and speculative thought; and how could I be better circumstanced to indulge in it than stationed at that open window, with a pipe in my mouth, looking up at the dark blue sky bespangled with stars, and listening (if I may be allowed to speak so paradoxically) to the silence?--for there is silence that can be heard.
When Mrs. Bizzey brought me the candles, she asked me if I required anything else, as she and Mr. Bizzey were about to retire to the marital couch, which I afterwards ascertained was erected in the scullery. I answered in the negative, and wished her good-night, hearing her afterwards distinctly close the door at the head of the kitchen stairs and descend step by step to the arms of her lord and master. But Mrs. Bizzey’s intrusion had murdered my reverie. I could not take up the chain of thought where she had severed the links. The night air, too, seemed to have grown suddenly damp and chilly, and I pulled down the window sash with a jerk, and taking out my note-book and writing-case drew a chair up to the table and commenced to think, playing idly with my pen the while. Soon the divine afflatus (the symptoms of which every successful writer knows so well) came down upon me. I ceased to think--or rather to be aware that I was thinking. My pen ran over the paper as though some other hand guided it than my own, and I wrote rapidly, filling page after page with a stream of ideas that seemed to pour out of my brain involuntarily. Time is of no account under such circumstances, and I may have been scribbling for one hour or for three, for aught I knew to the contrary, before I was roused to a sense of my position by hearing a footfall sound through the silent, deserted house.
Now, although I have described my condition to be such as to render me impervious to outer impressions, I am certain of one thing--that no noise, however slight, had hitherto broken in upon it. It was the complete absence of sound that had permitted my spirit to have full play irrespective of my body; and directly the silence was outraged, my physical life re-asserted its claims, and my senses became all alive to ascertain the cause of it. In another moment the sound was repeated, and I discovered that it was over my head--not under my feet. It could not, then, proceed from either of the old couple, whom I had heard lock themselves up together down below. Who could it be?
My first idea, emanating from my landlady’s information that the noise might proceed from rats, I had already dismissed with contempt. It was the reverberation of a footstep. There could be no doubt about that; and my next thought naturally flew to burglars, who were making an attempt on the safes in the offices above. What could I do? I was utterly unarmed, and to go in pursuit of midnight robbers in so defenceless a condition would be simply delivering myself into their power. I certainly might have shied a couple of Jones’ black-lettered books at their heads, for they were ponderous enough to knock any man down, but I might not take a steady aim, and it is better not to attempt at all than to attempt and fail.
Meanwhile, the sounds overhead had increased in number and become continuous, as though some one had commenced to walk up and down the room. Surely no midnight thief would dare to create so much disturbance as that! Detection of his crime would be inevitable. Or did he trust to the sound sleep of the porter and his wife in the kitchen below, not knowing that I, existent and wakeful, intervened between himself and them? In another minute I believe that I should have cast all consequences to the winds, and rushed, not in, but up to the rescue, forgetting I was a husband and a father, and armed with Jones’ patent self-acting leveller, alone have ascended to the upper storey to investigate the cause of the midnight disturbance I heard. Only--I didn’t! For before I had had time to shoulder my weapons and screw my courage up to the sticking-point, another sound reached my ears that made the patent levellers drop on the table again with a thump,--the sound, not of a step, but a groan--a deep, hollow, unmistakable groan, that chilled the marrow in my bones to such a degree that it would have been a disgrace to any cook to send them up to table.
I knew then that I must have been mistaken in my first theory, and that the sounds I overheard, whether they proceeded from mortals or not, had no connection with the nefarious occupation of housebreakers. But they had become a thousand times more interesting, and I listened attentively.
The groan was followed by some muttered words that sounded like a curse, succeeded by louder tones of reproach or anger. Then the footsteps traversed the floor again, and seemed to be chasing someone or something round and round the room. At last I heard another groan, followed by a heavy fall.
I started to my feet. Surely Mr. and Mrs. Bizzey must have been roused by such an unusual commotion, and would come upstairs to learn the reason! But no!--they did not stir. All was silent as the grave below, and above also. The noises had suddenly ceased. I appeared to be alone in the empty house. It was all so strange that I put my hands up to my head and asked myself if I were properly awake. I was hardly satisfied on this point before the sounds recommenced overhead, and precisely in the same order as before. Again I listened to the pacing feet--the groan--the curse--the chase--the fall! Each phase of the ghostly tragedy--for such I now felt sure it must be--was repeated in rotation, not once, but a couple of dozen or more times; and then at last the disturbance ceased as suddenly and as unexpectedly as it had commenced.
I looked at my watch. It was three o’clock, and already the early birds on the look-out for the worm had begun to herald the dawn with a few faint twitters in the trees in the cloister. I threw off my clothes impatiently, and lying down in my bed, gave myself up, not to sleep, but reflection on what was best to be done. I had not the slightest doubt left as to the cause of the noises I had heard. My landlady might ascribe them to rats, but were she closely questioned she would probably acknowledge the truth--that she knew the sounds to proceed from spirits, popularly called ghosts; which accounted for all her hesitation and change of countenance when speaking to me about the apartments, also for the low price she asked for her rooms, and her evident wish to dissuade me from sitting up at night.
Naturally the poor woman was afraid she should never secure a lodger if the truth were known; but as far as I was concerned, she was altogether mistaken--I was not afraid of her ghosts. On the contrary, as I lay in bed and thought on what had just occurred, I congratulated myself that, by a third strange coincidence, my visit to Norwich promised to turn out all that I could desire.
I must “lay” these ghosts, of course--i.e., if they interfered with my graver work; but to have the opportunity of doing so was the very thing my heart was set upon. Is my reader surprised to hear this? Then I must take him further into my confidence.
When I confessed I was an author, Press writer, amateur detective, and father of six children, I did not add the crowning iniquity, and write myself down a believer in ghosts and spiritualism. Every man acknowledges himself a spirit, and to have been created by the power of a spirit. Most men believe that spirits have the capability of free volition and locomotion, and many that they have exercised these powers by re-appearing to their fellow spirits in the flesh. But to assert publicly that you believe in all this because you have proved it to be the truth, is to throw yourself open to the charge of being a dupe, or a madman, or a liar. Therefore I had preferred until then to keep my faith a secret. My children’s bread depended in a great measure on the reputation I kept up as a man of sense, and I had not dared to risk it by attempting to put my theories into practice. Not that I was entirely ignorant of the rules pertaining to the science of spiritualism. Under cover of the darkness that hides all delinquencies, I had attended several circles gathered for the sole purpose of investigating the mysteries of other worlds; but it had always been accomplished with the utmost secrecy, as my wife was hysterically disposed, and the mere mention of a spirit would have upset the house for days together.
I had never, therefore, had the opportunity of pursuing spiritualism on my own account; and until the day broke I lay awake, congratulating myself on the good luck that had thrown me, cheek by jowl, with a party of ready-made ghosts, whom a very little encouragement would, I trusted, induce to pay me a visit in my own apartments.
All the next day I wandered through the streets of Norwich and in the country surrounding them, speculating--not on the whereabouts of Julian Cockleboat, nor “The Origin of Dreams”--but how I should persuade my landlady to help me unravel the mysterious occurrence of the night before. At last I bethought me that “honesty is the best policy” after all, and decided that I would make a clean breast of my suspicions and desires. If Mrs. Bizzey were a sensible woman, she would prove only too ready to aid me in ridding her apartments of visitors that must injure their reputation; and, at all events, I could but try her. So I opened the subject on the very first opportunity. The woman was clearing away my tea-things the same evening, when she remarked that I had not eaten well.
“I am afraid you sit up too much at night, sir, to make a good appetite.”
“Other people seem to sit up in this house at night as well as myself, Mrs. Bizzey,” I replied, significantly.
“I don’t understand you,” she said, colouring.
“Why, do you mean to say you never hear noises;--that you were not disturbed last night, for instance, by the sound of groans and voices, and of some one falling about in the upper rooms?”
“Oh, sir, you don’t mean to tell me as you’ve heard them already!” exclaimed Mrs. Bizzey, clasping her hand and letting a teacup fall in her agitation. “If you go too, you’ll be the third gentleman that has left within a fortnight on that account; and if a stop ain’t put to it, the house will get such a name that nobody will put a foot inside the door for love or money.”
“But I don’t mean to go, Mrs. Bizzey; on the contrary, I should be very sorry to go; and if you and your husband will consent to help me, I will do my best to stop the noises altogether,” for the idea of forming a little circle with these worthy people had suddenly flashed into my mind.
“How can me and my good man help you, sir?”
“Is Mr. Bizzey at home? If so, go downstairs and fetch him up here, and I will explain what I mean to you both at the same time.”
She left the room at once, and in a few minutes returned with a dapper-looking little old fellow, in knee-breeches and a red plush waistcoat, who pulled his forelock to me on entering.
“This is Mr. Bizzey, sir, and I’ve been telling him all you say as we came up the stairs.”
I leant back in my chair, folded my hands, and looked important.
“I suppose you must have heard the science of spiritualism mentioned?” I commenced, grandly.
“The science of what, sir?” inquired Mr. Bizzey, with a puzzled air.
“Of spiritualism--i.e., the power of converse or communication with disembodied spirits.”
“Lor’! you never mean ‘ghosts,’ sir?” said the old woman.
“I do, indeed, Mrs. Bizzey. I suppose you believe that spirits (or ghosts, as you call them) may re-appear after death?”
“Oh, yes,” interposed the husband; “for I mind the night that my poor mother lay dying, there was an apparition of a turkey-cock that sat upon the palings opposite our cottage, and when it fluttered off ’em with a screech, just for all the world like a real turkey, you know, sir, she turned on her side suddenly, and give up the ghost. I’ve always believed in apparitions since then.”
“And when my sister Jane lay in of her last,” chimed in Mrs. Bizzey, “there was a little clock stood on the mantel-shelf that had always been wound up regular and gone regular ever since she was married; and we was moving a lot of things to one side, and we moved that clock and found it had stopped; and the nurse, she said to me, ‘Mark my words if that’s not a warning of death;’ and, sure enough, Jane died before the morning, which makes me so careful of moving a clock since then that I’d rather go three miles round than touch one if a body lay sick in the house.”
“I see that you both take a most sensible view of the business, and are fully alive to the importance attached to it,” I answered; “I hope, therefore, to secure your assistance to find out what these unusual and mysterious noises in your house portend, and what the authors require us to do for them.”
Then--whilst the old man scratched his head with bewilderment, and the old woman looked scared out of her seven senses--I explained to them, as well as I was able, the nature of a séance, and asked them if they would come and sit at the table with me that evening and hold one.
“But, lawk a mussy, sir, you never want to speak to them!” cried Mrs. Bizzey.
“How else are we to ascertain for what reason these spirits disturb your lodgers and render your rooms uninhabitable by their pranks?”
“I should die of fright before we had been at it five minutes,” was her comment; but her husband was pluckier, and took a more practical view of the matter.
“You’ll just do as I bid you, missus, and hold your chatter. There’s no doubt these noises are a great nuisance--not to say a loss--and if this gentleman will be good enough to try and stop them, and can’t do without us, I’ll help him for one, and you will for another.”
Mrs. Bizzey protested, and wept, and was even refractory, but it was all of no avail, and before we separated it had been agreed we should meet again at ten o’clock, and hold a séance. There was some whispering between the old couple after that that I did not quite understand, but as it ended by Mrs. Bizzey ejaculating, “Nonsense; I tell you the house will be quiet enough by ten o’clock,” I concluded he was referring to some expected visitor, and dismissed the subject from my mind. As soon as they had disappeared I delivered myself up to self-gratulation. I was really going to hold a séance, under my own direction and the most favourable circumstances with a large haunted house at my command, and no one to be any the wiser for my dabbling in the necromantic art. I took out an old number of the “Spiritualist,” and referred to the directions for forming circles at home. I prepared the paper, pencils, and speaking tubes, and symmetrically arranged the table and chairs.
Nothing was wanted when Mr. and Mrs. Bizzey entered my room at the appointed hour--he looking expectant, and she very much alarmed. I was prepared for this, however, and insisted upon their both joining me in a glass of whisky and hot water before commencing the sitting, alleging as a reason the fact that the presence of spirits invariably chills the atmosphere, whether in summer or winter. So I mixed three bumping tumblers of toddy, strong enough to give us the courage we required for the occasion; and after we had (according to the directions) engaged for some little time in light and friendly conversation, I induced my friends to approach the table.
It was now, I was glad to see by my watch, about half-past eleven--just about the time when the mysterious sounds had commenced the night before; and having lowered the lamp, much to Mrs. Bizzey’s horror, until it was represented by a mere glimmer of light, I instructed her husband and herself how to place their hands upon the table, linked with mine, and the séance began.
I had enjoined perfect silence on my companions, and after we had been sitting still for about fifteen minutes, during which I had watched in vain for some symptoms of movement on the part of the table, we all heard distinctly the sound of a foot creeping cautiously about the upper rooms, upon which Mrs. Bizzey, too frightened to shriek, began to weep, and her husband, in order to stop her, pinched her violently in the dark.
“Hush!” I exclaimed, almost as agitated as the woman. “Do not disturb them for your life, and whatever you may see, don’t scream.”
“La, sir, you never mean to say that they’ll come downstairs!”
“I cannot say what they may do. I think I hear a step descending now. But remember, Mrs. Bizzey, they will not hurt you, and try and be brave for all our sakes.”
We were in a state of high nervous excitement for the next five minutes, during which the same noises I had heard the night before were repeated overhead, only that the courses were louder and delivered with more determination, and the falls appeared to succeed each other like hail.
“Oh, sir, what are they a-doing?” exclaimed Mrs. Bizzey, paralysed with terror. “They must be killing each other all round.”
“Hush!” I replied. “Listen, now. Some one is pleading for love or for mercy. How soft and clear the voice is!”
“It sounds for all the world like my poor sister Jane when she was asking her husband to forgive her for everything she had done amiss,” said the old woman.
“Perhaps it is your sister Jane, or some of your relations,” I replied. “She may want you to do something for her. Would you be afraid if she were suddenly to open the door and come into the room?”
“Oh, I don’t know, I’m sure, sir; but I hope she mayn’t. It makes me curdle all over only to think of it.”
“They’re quieter now. Let us ask if there is any one present who wishes to speak to us,” I said; and addressing the table to that effect, I commenced to spell out the alphabet rather loudly--“A, B, C,” etc.
Whether from my nervousness, or the united strain we laid upon it, I know not, but the table certainly began to rock at that juncture, though I could make neither head nor tail of its intentions. Treating it in the orthodox manner by which Britons invariably attempt to communicate with a foreigner who does not understand one word of the language spoken, I began to bawl at the table, and my A, B, C, must have reverberated through the empty house.
Again the old woman whispered mysteriously to the old man, but he dismissed her question with an impatient answer; and my attention was too much attracted in another direction at that moment to give much heed of what they were doing. My ear had caught the sound of a descending footstep, and I felt sure the spirits were at last about to visit us in propriæ personæ. But dreading the effect it might have on Mrs. Bizzey’s nerves, I purposely held my tongue, and applied myself afresh to a vigorous repetition of the alphabet, striving to cover the approaching footstep by the noise of my own voice, although I was trembling with excitement and delight at the successful issue of my undertaking. At last I plainly heard the footstep pause outside the door, as though deliberating before it opened it. The old man was apparently too deaf or too absorbed to notice it, and his wife was in a state of helpless fright. I alone sufficiently retained my senses to see the door slowly open, and a white-robed figure--a real, materialised spirit--stand upon the threshold. The gesture of delight, which I could not repress, roused my companions from their reverie; and as soon as Mrs. Bizzey turned and saw the figure, she recognised it.
“It’s Jane!” she screamed. “It’s my own poor sister Jane come back from the grave to visit me again, with her red hair and blue eyes; I can see ’em as plain as plain. I’ll die of the shock, I know I shall!”
“Nonsense!” I exclaimed sternly, fearful, lest by her folly she should scare the newly-born spirit back to the spheres. “If it is your sister, speak to her as you used to do. Tell her you are glad to see her, and ask if she wants anything done.”
“Oh, Jane!” said the old woman, half falling upon her knees, “don’t come a-nigher me, for mercy’s sake! I never kept nothing of yourn back from the children except the old blue dress, which it wouldn’t have been no use for them to wear, and the ring, which I had asked you to give me a dozen times in your life, and you had always refused. I’d give ’em both back now if I could, Jane, but the gownd have been on the dust-heap these twenty years past, and the ring I sold the minute my man was laid up with rheumatis. Forgive me, Jane, forgive me.”
“Why, what on earth are you making such a row about?” replied the spirit.
I leapt to my feet in a moment.
“This is some shameful hoax!” I exclaimed. “Who are you, and what do you do here?”
“I should think I might put the same question to you, since I find you sitting in the dark, at dead of night, with my landlord and landlady.”
“Lor’, Mr. Montmorency, it’s never you, sir!” ejaculated old Bizzey, with a feeble giggle.
The voice seemed familiar to me. Who on earth was this Mr. Montmorency, who had intruded upon our séance at the most important juncture? I turned up the lamp and threw its light full upon his features. “Good heavens!” I exclaimed, “it’s Julian Cockleboat.”
The young man was equally astonished with myself.
“Did Lord Seaborne send you after me?” he said, guessing the truth at once. “And how did you find out I was lodging here?”
“Aha, my boy!” I replied, unwilling to deny the kúdos with which he credited me, “that’s my secret. Do you suppose I have gained the name of the amateur detective among my friends for nothing? No, no! I am in Norwich expressly for the purpose of restoring you to your guardian, and as I knew that to show my hand more openly would be to scare you off to another hiding place, I devised this little plan for making you reveal yourself in your true character.”
“Did Robson tell you, then, that I had taken an engagement at the theatre here?”
“Never you mind, Mr. Cockleboat; it is quite sufficient that I knew it. This is a proper sort of house to play hide-and-seek in, isn’t it?”
I was dispersing the table and chairs again with angry jerks as I spoke, fearful lest my attempted investigation of the occult mysteries should be discovered before I had removed its traces.
“Still I can’t understand how you discovered that Mr. Montmorency was myself, although naturally my night rehearsals must have disturbed you. But you told me you had no other lodgers,” continued Julian Cockleboat reproachfully, to the Bizzeys.
“And you said the same thing to me,” I added, in similar tones.
“Well, sir--well, Mr. Montmorency, I’m very sorry it should have happened so,” replied the landlord, turning from one to the other, “but it’s all my old woman’s fault, for I said to her--”
“You did nothing of the sort,” interrupted his better half; “for when I come to you and told you as a second gentleman wanted rooms here, it was you as said, ‘Let him have the little room upstairs, and no one will be ever the wiser if he takes his meals out of a day.’”
“But we never thought--begging your pardon, Mr. Montmorency--as you’d take such a liberty with the upper offices as to make noises in them as should disturb the whole house.”
“Well, what was I to do?” replied the young man, appealing to me. “They’ve given me three leading parts to get up at a fortnight’s notice, and if I don’t study them at night I have no chance of being ready in time.”
“In fact,” I said, oracularly, “you’ve been cheating each other all round. Mr. Bizzey has cheated his employers by letting apartments to which he has no right; you have cheated the Bizzeys by using one which you never hired of them; and I have--” “cheated myself,” I might have added, but I stopped short and looked wise instead.
“And it was never no ghosts after all!” said Mrs. Bizzey, in accents of disappointment, as her husband marched her downstairs.
There is nothing more to tell. I reconciled Mr. Julian Cockleboat to his guardian and his destiny; and I wrote “The Origin of Dreams,” the best part, by the way (as all the critics affirmed), of “The Cyclopædia of the Brain.” I made more money by my little trip than six months of ordinary labour would have brought me; and Lord Seaborne speaks of me to this day, amongst his acquaintances, as the “very cleverest amateur detective he has ever known.”
