The very air seemed charged and surcharged with the permeating power. People watching incoming trains had a listless, far-away look, as though watching for the dim spirits which were constantly expected from the other land, but which never came. The clamorous cabmen raised their sing-song voices as if only expecting, though more than desiring, only shadowy freight. The regular loiterers had long hair, cadaverous faces, and large, lustrous eyes, and where females appeared, they were generally in pinched faces, flowing hair, long pantaloons and short gowns, as if ready for a grand Amazon-march upon the gullible public.
On the way to the hotel every other stairway held the sign of one or more clairvoyants, mediums, or astrologists, and every manner of business seemed to have the ghostly trail upon it. The pedestrians upon the streets, the men at their counters, the workmen at their trades, the women at their various employments, the common laborers at their most menial toil, each and every, from the highest to the lowest, seemed to have a weary, listless air, as if constant wrestling with communicating spirits healthier and more robust than themselves, had left a chronic exhaustion upon and with them.
At the hotel the register was thin and ghostly, the office was deserted and dreary, the meals were served in a listless, dreamy way, as if the guests were ghosts and the waiters not so good. In fact, the whole place and everything in it was tinctured with the common craziness, and gave the healthy, wide-awake stranger the impression of having suddenly come upon a community of mild lunatics, who were quite happy in the conviction that they were directing the affairs of both earth and heaven, and establishing pleasant, intramural relations between their chosen Hoosier City and the beautiful City beyond the River; all of which would be very pleasant and profitable if anybody had ever come back from the undiscovered country to give us its geographical outlines, define its limits, or explain any profit that has accrued from becoming a monomaniac on a subject that has no relation whatever to the common needs and duties of life, and has never been known to give to the world or its society a single healthful, helpful nature or intellect.
Mr. Bangs was neither pleased with the hotel, or able to get much information while there, and consequently changed his quarters to Mrs. Deck's boarding-house, a long, rambling brick building, that at one time had been a fine residence after the Southern style. It was covered with moss and vines, and had a snug, pleasant appearance, while everything about the house had an air of quaint, attractive restfulness. Every person who has ever been in Terre Haute for a few days' stay, as Bangs was, will remember the genial old soul who presided over the destinies of this particular boarding-house—the fat, garrulous, whimpering, but kind-hearted Mrs. Deck; her charming daughter, the blooming Belle Ruggles, by a former and more fortunate marriage, with her fair face and wealth of golden hair, flitting about the house—which was also the abode of spirits, mysterious materializations and unexplainable rappings—like a good, sensible spirit that she was, and letting her good sense and kind ways into the cobwebbed rooms and dark places, like an ever-changing though constant flood of sunlight; and "Old Deck," as the boys called him, who believed in another kind of spirits still, and, when opportunity offered, became so full of them that he held a grand and extended "seance" on his own account.
People not only sought Mrs. Deck for good board, but for reliable neighborhood gossip; and Mr. Bangs, learning of her reputation as a repository of news as well as a liberal dispenser of creature comforts, changed his quarters from the hotel to her place, and found from a few days in her company that she was a sort of historian, having at her tongue's end numberless incidents connected with the growth of the city and the family relations of every class of people in or near it.
He learned from her where the Hosfords had lived, but could get nothing particular regarding the woman herself, as Mrs. Deck had never seen her, and only knew of her by reputation, which she was sure had been good.
Mr. Bangs at once went into the country neighborhood where the Hosfords had lived, and found that they had removed to some point in Wisconsin, near Sheboygan Falls, the neighbors had heard, but he could not find that there had been a single trace of trouble at Terre Haute. All those who had known them spoke of them both in the highest terms. They had both been staunch members of the Methodist Church, and though plain, quiet farmers, had been considered prominent people in the neighborhood.
Hosford was remembered as a slow-going, easy-conditioned, good-natured fellow, but as honest as the day was long; and no one had ever known aught against his wife, save that some of the old gossips thought that she had brought too much jewelry and fine clothing into the neighborhood with her. This, however, she had judiciously kept out of sight as much as possible, and, as far as could be learned, had led in every respect an exemplary life.
From this point Mr. Bangs proceeded to Kalamazoo. The Nettleton family were gone, no one knew where; but here he was told of the escapade to Detroit of Lilly Nettleton years before, enough of which had floated back to her native place—coupled with the old people's later sorrows, which were largely dilated upon—to account for the breaking up of the family and its members being scattered broadcast.
Accidentally at Kalamazoo, in conversation with the clerk at the Kalamazoo House, who had formerly been employed at Detroit, and who was "up to snuff," as he termed it, Bangs learned of Mother Blake, who had informed the clerk of Bland's unfortunate experience with one Lilly Mercer. He also got from the clerk a description of Mother Blake sufficiently comprehensive to enable him to find her if she were still at Detroit, where he at once proceeded.