“In that mad rush from the room along the disused corridors her one endeavour would appear to have been to reach her bedroom—perhaps she had forgotten that Charles had gone OUT—but her efforts were frustrated by the fiendish fury of the flames. The amount of oil on her dress must have made it blaze like a furnace.
“She had barely crossed the gallery into the opposite wing of the house before her scorched and smouldering limbs gave way, and falling to the ground she was speedily burned to ashes; her supreme and final agony being summed up in a despairing cry, so loud and piercing that it was even heard outside by Charles.
“Not daring to approach the house alone, Charles summoned some villagers, and keeping well in their rear, gingerly accompanied them across the lawn to the front entrance.
“There they were met by Mrs. Purvis, chuckling horribly.
“Corridors, gallery and staircase were in flames, and had it not been for the opportune arrival of the vicar the whole place would have been consumed; thanks, however, to his vigour and level-headedness the fire was eventually extinguished, and although the damage done was considerable, the bulk of the property remained unscathed.
“No trace of the unfortunate Mrs. Charles Purvis being found, the precise manner of her death for many years remained a mystery. But the erratic babblings of her mother-in-law supplied material for certain conjectures, which were afterwards confirmed by the lucid and exhaustive confession of the old lady, who regained her reason on her deathbed.
“Though a thorough restoration of the property was effected, Charles would never live at the Hall. A long series of unsatisfactory tenancies succeeded the events I have just related, and the story of a ghost has at length come to stay.
“N.B.—I have good reason for believing the house is still (August 1908) haunted; most probably this will always be the case.”