“That depends. Show me one and I might.”
“Well,” commented Leighton; “this is the ghost room, and here we are. Perhaps your skepticism will find something to try its teeth on. In honor of St. Maur we ought to have a demonstration.”
“Splendid!” laughed David. “But you don’t mean it. People never mean what they say when they talk approvingly of ghosts. You are known for a skeptic yourself, Mr. Leighton. You accept nothing that has not passed muster with science.”
“There may be a science of ghosts,” retorted the savant. “Science is not limited to any department of human knowledge. A scientific theory is based on a collection of facts. How do you know I have not made a collection of ghost-facts?”
“And so have a new theory of ghosts to offer!”
“You don’t really think those old monks come back, uncle?” objected Una.
“Oh, I’m not going to tell the secrets of my laboratory so easily—and to such a pair of tyros,” was the evasive answer.
They stood before the great fireplace which a thrifty ancestor had built into the east wall, and enjoyed to the full the warmth that had not as yet reached the remote spaces of the gloomy chamber. It needed a fire to bring some show of comfort to this wilderness of dust and cobwebs. A few pieces of colonial furniture stood out in the melancholy wastes—a faded lounge, a gargantuan dresser, several stiff-backed chairs still nursing their puritanism. At the far end of the room various objects of a decidedly modern appearance, suggesting the workshop of a physicist, aroused David’s curiosity. For an explanation of these he turned to Leighton.
“Is this your laboratory?” he asked.
“What do you think of it?” was the reply. “Plenty of space, isn’t there? A man could have a score of ghosts here—ghosts of monks, you know—nosing about for their comfortable old quarters.”