“The superstition remains then?”
“The villagers are absolutely rabid about it. There are at least a dozen who declare that they have seen the ghost of Roger Unthank, and a score or more who will swear by all that is holy that they have heard his call at night.”
“Does he still select the park and the terrace outside the house for his midnight perambulations?” Dominey enquired.
The lawyer hesitated.
“The idea is, I believe,” he said, “that the ghost makes his way out from the wood and sits on the terrace underneath Lady Dominey's window. All bunkum, of course, but I can assure you that every servant and caretaker we've had there has given notice within a month. That is the sole reason why I haven't ventured to recommend long ago that you should get rid of Mrs. Unthank.”
“She is still in attendance upon Lady Dominey, then?”
“Simply because we couldn't get any one else to stay there,” the lawyer explained, “and her ladyship positively declines to leave the Hall. Between ourselves, I think it's time a change was made. We'll have a chat after dinner, if you've no objection.—You see, we've left all the trees in the park,” he went on, with an air of satisfaction. “Beautiful place, this, in the springtime. I was down last May for a night, and I never saw such buttercups in my life. The cows here were almost up to their knees in pasture, and the bluebells in the home woods were wonderful. The whole of the little painting colony down at Flankney turned themselves loose upon the place last spring.”
“Some of the old wall is down, I see,” Dominey remarked with a frown, as he gazed towards the enclosed kitchen garden.
Mr. Mangan was momentarily surprised.
“That wall has been down, to my knowledge, for twenty years,” he reminded his companion.