“That’s right. Why you are looking twice the girl you were the first time I saw you. You have put on colour, and look in altogether splendid form.”
“Thanks. Glad to hear I’ve improved,” she answered, with a laugh. “That’s always a satisfactory item of knowledge.” Then she subsided into silence. She was thinking of two or three strange things which had happened since she saw him last—occurrences which had frightened her, utterly intangible, even more so than on that night when she had rushed downstairs in a state of scare to her uncle. But with an effort she had refrained from saying anything to the latter about them. He would only laugh at the whole thing as he had done before and suggest bats or rats, or something of the kind as an explanation. But this man somehow she felt a longing to confide in. There was something about him that seemed to render him in her eyes a very tower of strength and reliability. Had she known what his real line was she would not have hesitated—let alone could she have heard his light, easy, confident boast, when talking with Nashby: “Given time, and make it worth my while, and I’d undertake to dis-ghost every haunted house in England.”
The twilight was merging into darkness now. From the sombre oak-wood with its gnarled branches which had led her to christen it Broceliande, came the crow of a belated pheasant fluttering up to roost, and the surface of Plane Pond, coming into view beneath, stared white, a long, slit-shaped eye. More than ever she felt moved to confide in him. And as if to strengthen her towards this course he suddenly said:
“Something is troubling you. I wouldn’t obtude for the world, but—you have something on your mind.”
“Why do you—why should you think that?” And the half-startled look in the wide-opened eyes, meeting his in their straight glance, confirmed him in his theory.
“Never mind,” he replied, and she was quick to notice the world of sympathetic reassurance in his tone. “I won’t press you for confidence. But remember—if at any time you feel like making it—and I don’t say it to brag, but those who know me would be able to tell you that you might make it to plenty of people who could be of less use to you. Well, if at any time you should want a friend, no matter what the nature of the worry is, you won’t hesitate to apply to me. Will you promise me that much?”
She darted a quick look up at him in the gloaming. More than ever did he seem as a very tower of strength. And then the sheer contrast seemed to suggest bathos. How absurd her shadowy imaginative fears must appear to a man of this stamp. Why, he would smile them down as a mere girlish scare of bogydom. Of course. And yet—why not chance it?
“Well? Won’t you promise that little?”
“Yes. I promise. But—”
She was on the point of keeping that promise then and there, of telling him all, the haunting fear that hung over her in the lonely old house down yonder, at times. At times—not always—that was where the strange part of it came in; and, stranger still, not only during the hours of darkness. Sometimes in broad daylight, when she was alone, would come the chill, shuddering consciousness that there was another Presence beside her, even the stealthy sound of steps, the whisper of voices. But it would come so sporadically, with long intervals between, and otherwise life was so good, that such a strange manifestation did not avail to effect a lasting impression.