In most small towns there is a good deal of unkind gossip and scandal, but I really think that in this respect the town I refer to was unrivalled. It seemed to me that the people were never so happy as when saying malicious things about each other, and they meanly victimised those whose limited means would not permit of their taking legal action against them.
I have often wondered what made these people so peculiarly unkind.
As soon as I had settled down in Norwood, I wrote “Ghostly Phenomena,” which was reviewed at length by Andrew Lang in the “Morning Post.” About that time I had the great pleasure of meeting Mrs. E. M. Ward. The rencontre happened thus. The Misses Enid and Beatrice Ward, Mrs. Ward’s youngest daughters, were getting up some theatricals, and, being short of a man, asked a lady, with whom I was acquainted, if she knew of anyone who would help them out of the difficulty. She wrote to me, with the result that I took part in the play, and thus had the good fortune to meet the Wards, with whom, I am happy to say, I have kept in touch ever since.
A year or so afterwards I edited Mrs. Ward’s reminiscences, which was, almost without exception, well received by the Press. Some papers, “Vanity Fair” and the “Weekly Graphic,” for instance—the “Graphic” has always been very kind and fair to me,—giving the book several lengthy and highly eulogistic notices. Mrs. Ward is a believer in ghosts, and in her reminiscences there is a very interesting first-hand experience of hers with the Superphysical. Mrs. Ward’s children, apart from the fact that they inherit talent from their mother and father, and grandfather, their great-grandfather, James Ward, R.A., and their great-great-uncle, George Morland, R.A., are very interesting in themselves and possess exceptional personal attractions.
A year after I first visited their house, I was commissioned by the Editor of “The Weekly Despatch,” Mr. Beuley, to write a series of ghostly experiences for that paper. In order to do this I made pilgrimages to all parts of the country, and in my zeal to find ghosts occasionally encountered objects of a very different nature. On one occasion, in Brighton, I had taken advantage of a slightly open window to enter a tiny house I had been told was very badly haunted. It was a very dark night, and being unable to find my matches, I had to grope my way about. I was in a room with apparently never ending walls—they seemed to go round and round without any outlet at all. At last, however, I managed to discover a doorway, and, passing through it, I felt my way to a staircase, which I climbed up, till I came to what I judged to be a landing. There all further speculations were brought to an abrupt end by my suddenly falling over some large, soft object on the floor. In an instant, there was a loud yell, and I found myself rolling over and over clawing and clutching at some foul and unsavoury mass, that seemed to have fastened itself on to me with the intention of first probing out my eyes, and then throttling me. The small flask of whiskey that I happened to have on me undoubtedly saved me from total annihilation. The moment the claw-like hands touched the flask, I was free.
I staggered to my feet, searched again, and, this time, fortunately found the match-box and struck a light.
Crouching on the floor in front of me was a long, thin, scraggy creature with an absolutely bloodless face and two big, round, protruding black eyes. Its hair was matted like a mop and tossed about anywhere; its clothes, or rather rags, were buttonless, and only held together, here and there, by pieces of filthy string. A more disgusting, and at the same time pitiable, spectacle could not be imagined.
It was fortunate for me that I had had previous experience of such sights in the parks and commons of London, otherwise I should have been terrified out of my wits. As it was, I only just managed to pull myself together, and realising that what I saw before me was not a ghost, but a material and now, as far as I was concerned, harmless being, I spoke to it.
“Well,” I said, “at any rate you seem to like my whiskey. How long have you been here?”
The flask was gradually lowered, and a voice, which I decided was that of a woman—for up to the present I hadn’t been able to decipher its sex—gurgled, “I sleep here every night. This is my house.”