“My aunt, poor dear, was very much upset at the occurrence.
“She could not imagine how it was other people could see the ghost while she could not. And her scepticism was but natural; she was unable to grasp the idea that the psychic faculty is a gift, only granted to the few, and as rare as that either of music or painting.
“Other reasons for her incredulity in this particular occult manifestation lay in the enigmatical nature and purport of the phenomenon.
“In what category of ghosts would one classify a headless dog; Was it the spirit of a dog that had been decapitated on earth?
“She had never gathered from the Scriptures that beasts had souls—what then was this phantom of a dog?
“I suggested it might be a Poltergeist or Elemental, one of those purely bestial creations that for various reasons which you explained at your recent lecture—always haunt certain localities?”
“Yes!” I said, interrupting Miss Medley, “the sub-animal type of elemental is fairly common—if you refer to the June number 1908 of the magazine published by the Society for Psychical Research you will see an extremely well authenticated case of the haunting of a village by a white pig with an abnormally long snout and I could enumerate many other similar instances. But continue!”
“My aunt,” Miss Medley went on, “informed me that the house had once been occupied by a lady who had lived a very selfish—not to say sensual life. She had settled down at Burle, after having been divorced twice, and her weekly routine was one incessant whirl of pleasure.
“She died without the consolation of the Church, surrounded by a crowd of fawning money-hunters and over-gorged poodles, so that for this, as well as other reasons I think there may be an alternative solution to the haunting. Is it not possible that what I saw was actually the spirit of this worldly woman, which thoroughly brutalised by long indulgence in sensuality had gradually adapted that shape most befitting IT.”