Thinking of these things against his volition, he quickened his steps; and it was possibly due to the rapidity of his pace and not to extreme nervousness that, in passing under the dense overbranching elm-trees in the drive, which entirely excluded the last faint glimmering of light, the perspiration started on his forehead in large beads and a curious thrill ran down his spine. It was not until he came within view of the house that these uncomfortable symptoms of over-exertion abated somewhat, and he was complacently comparing his masculine temerity with Hannah’s foolish feminine fears of ghosts and such things, when abruptly something, unearthly of shape and terrible in appearance, started up out of the shadows and dashed past him, nearly upsetting him in its furious charge, and disappearing again in the shelter of the trees.
With a yell, more terrifying than any ghostly apparition, Robert started to run, and ran on, passing Mr Chadwick, who, cigar in mouth, was taking an evening stroll, and whom the sexton in his alarm mistook for the Evil One, emitting fire from his mouth. And while Mr Chadwick turned to stare after the amazing sight of the little man running for dear life, and while Diogenes, having hunted an imaginary night-bird, returned more leisurely to the drive and joined Mr Chadwick in his walk, Robert gained the house, gained admittance by the back door, and frightened the Hall servants badly with his blood-curdling description of the horrors he had encountered on the way. It was the cook’s firm conviction, and nothing Robert found to say in expostulation could shake her belief, that he had been drinking.
“If you aren’t drunk,” she announced in conclusion, “you ought to be ashamed of yourself. A grown man to be scared out of his wits by a ghost!”
So unreasonable is feminine logic!
It took Robert some little while to collect his scattered thoughts sufficiently to be able to state the business that brought him there. Had it not been for a glass of wine which a sympathetic parlourmaid brought him, and held for him while he drank, he might not even then have remembered the note in his pocket, and the vicar’s explicit instructions that he was to hand it to Miss Annersley himself. His insistent demand to see the young lady confirmed the cook in her opinion of him; but the sympathetic parlourmaid undertook to acquaint Miss Annersley with the news of his presence and his wish to see her, and finally Robert was conducted to a room which was known as the library, where Peggy, a shining white figure against the dusky background of book-lined walls, received him, with manifest wonder in her grey eyes—a wonder which changed by imperceptible degrees to amusement as, having received and read her note, she listened to Robert’s eloquent tale of the misty sort of thing which had risen out of the ground at his feet, had almost knocked him over, and had then vanished into the ground again.
“And you weren’t afraid?” said Peggy, her hand resting on the writing-table beside which she stood, her admiring gaze on Robert’s ashen face. “But that’s splendid. I wish I were as brave as you. If I had been nearly knocked down by a misty sort of thing I should never be able to pass the spot again. Yet you’ll go back presently, and won’t mind in the least. That’s real courage.”
Robert looked uncomfortable. He wished she had not reminded him of the return journey. He felt far from happy when he thought of it; far from confident that he dared pass the spot again. He had it in his mind to invite the sympathetic parlourmaid to accompany him.
“Are you quite sure it was a ghost?” Peggy asked suddenly. “I don’t see how a misty sort of thing could knock anyone down. Wasn’t it, perhaps, a dog?”
Robert felt offended, and showed it.
“I reckon I knows a dog when I sees one,” he replied with dignity, “an’ I reckon I knows a ghost. Hannah always allows she seen the ghost in the elm avenue, and it was in the avenue as I seed it. Big, it was—big as a elephant, and misty like. There was two of ’em.”