"Yes, he did," she replied, "and it remains to be proved whether it is true; we should not be too ready to believe all the idle gossip we hear."
"Undoubtedly we should not; but if there is anything against the place, it is better that we should hear it before we decide upon living in it. When I was a boy an aunt of mine took a house, and afterward discovered that a murder had been committed in her bedroom. She didn't have a moment's peace in her life; she used to wake up in the middle of the night, and fancy all sorts of things. I remember her spending an evening with us at home, and starting at the least sound; her nerves were shattered, and my poor dear mother said she couldn't live long. She told us stories of horrid sights she saw in the house, and horrid sounds she heard, and my hair rose on my head. I didn't sleep a wink myself that night. Now, if she had known all this before she took the house, she would have been spared a great deal of suffering."
"Did she die soon after?" asked my practical wife.
"No," I replied; and I could not help laughing at my defeat, the moral of the story being absolutely destructive of the theory I wished to establish; "as a matter of fact, she lived to a good old age."
"I don't quite see the application, Edward," said my wife dryly; and I deemed it prudent to change the subject. Maria is not an unreasonable or an unjust woman, and I gathered from her manner that she intended to hold over her final verdict upon Bob's character until she had ascertained what dependence could be placed upon the information he had given us.
Upon looking through the local directory, the only reference I could find to Lamb's Terrace was the name under the initial L, "Lamb's Terrace."
"It is singular," I said. "The number of the house we are going to is 79, and the presumption is that there are other houses in the terrace, with people living in them, yet there is no list of them in this directory."
My wife turned over the pages, but could find no further reference to the place.
"It is rather singular," she said, and handed me back the book.
A few minutes afterward we were on our way, having been informed by Mr. Gascoigne on the previous day that a North Star 'bus would take us to the neighborhood in which it was situated.