After a while he amused himself by once more exploring all the rooms on the ground floor, and then he mounted to his bedroom, determined to unpack and put everything straight for the night. After that he thought that it might be pleasant to have a stroll amid the roses of the now moon-lit garden.
He found, however, that it took longer to put things tidy than he had anticipated, and, furthermore, he made one or two curious discoveries in the room which he had determined to occupy. There was a large hanging cupboard, and here, very much to his amusement, he came across some articles of feminine apparel—a jacket, a cape, a straw hat, and sundry other garments which he did not venture to examine more closely.
"I think it must be true," he smiled to himself, "that this room has not really been so long unoccupied. No doubt Mrs. Willis finds it more to her taste than the cottage. Or perhaps Mrs. Willis has a daughter," he added, as he glanced critically at the dainty straw hat and marked the juvenile cut of the jacket. "I really don't think that Mrs. Willis can be the owner of these!"
A little later he found a hairpin lying on the floor, and became still more convinced that his room must have been occupied by some member of the Willis household. The fact troubled him, however, not at all, and he laughed to himself as he recalled the gardener's nervousness of manner when he had drawn attention to the roses upon the mantelpiece. "Whoever has made herself at home here," he told himself, "must at any rate have a nice idea of comfort and the beauty of things. I can make every allowance for people who like flowers."
He was stooping over the portmanteau which he was engaged in unpacking, and, at that moment, it seemed to him that he heard a faint sound in the house, as of the opening and shutting of a door. He raised himself to his knees and listened, but all was still.
"I didn't think I was so imaginative," he muttered, after a moment. "I suppose that comes of being alone in a half-furnished house—so far away from everything, too." He glanced round the room and at the open window, which looked out upon the lawn—a lawn intersected by dark shadows and silver streaks of moonlight. "It never struck me before, either," he went on, "that there might be a ghost at Partinborough Grange; it's just the place for one." He laughed at himself, not being in reality nervous, and, if anything, rather enjoying the sense of his isolation. He decided that he would finish his unpacking quickly, and then make his way to the garden. The night was soft and balmy, and the air was fragrant with roses. It would be better there than in the house.
He bent himself once more to his task, throwing out his belongings to either side of him in the careless way of a man. Then of a sudden, he paused, a pair of shoes in one hand, a case of razors in the other, and listened attentively. Another moment and he had dropped shoes and razors and started to his feet.
He did not know if he was afraid, though certainly at the first moment a cold shiver had run down his spine, and there had been a peculiar sensation as if perspiration were about to break out on his brow. He felt hot and cold at the same time, and yet he was not conscious of any actual fear.
It was such a strange thing to be happening in an empty house, and, at first, Mostyn had hardly believed his ears. But now there was no doubt about it—someone was in the hall, and that someone was playing the organ.
The sound had at first come so softly that it had been really like a breath of wind stirring in the pipes; Mostyn had thought that it must be something of the sort, till he had remembered that there was practically no wind that night. Yet it was possible that the sound was due to some perfectly natural cause quite apart from human agency.