Mabin had brought it all upon herself, and she tried to persuade herself that it was quite right and natural, and that she did not mind. And when Rudolph was gone, and she was alone with her hostess, she succeeded in persuading her that she had not felt neglected, but had enjoyed the merriment she had refused to share.
But when she got upstairs into her pretty bedroom, after bidding Mrs. Dale good-night, she had the greatest difficulty in keeping back the tears which were dangerously near her proud eyes.
She did not care for Rudolph, of course not; she wanted him to fall in love with Mrs. Dale, if indeed he had not already done so, and marry her and console her for all her troubles, and stop the persecution of “the cat.” But somehow this hope, this wish, did not give her all the unselfish satisfaction it ought to have done.
And Mabin, wondering what had happened to take the prettiness out of the room and the pleasure out of her acquaintance with Mrs. Dale, fell asleep with her heart heavy and full of nameless grief.
She woke with a start to find a white figure standing motionless in the middle of the room. Mabin sprang up in bed and rubbed her eyes. Was she awake? Or was she only dreaming that the body of a dead woman, stiff, rigid, but in an upright position, was standing like a marble statue between the bed and the nearest window?
She leaped out of bed, and, not without uncanny fears, touched the statuesque figure.
“Mrs. Dale!” she almost shrieked, as the great eyes suddenly turned and fixed a blank, wild gaze upon her face. “Oh, what has happened? What is the matter?”
The figure, which, in white night garments, had looked so unlike the black-robed widow that she had not recognized it, trembled from head to foot. The lips parted, but at first no word escaped them. At last with a strong effort she uttered these words:
“Let me stay here. Let me sit in this arm-chair till morning. Oh, I will not hurt you, or frighten you. But if I go back I shall go mad! This house is haunted, haunted! I have seen——”
A hoarse rattle in her throat seized her, threatened to choke her. With one wild glance round, peering into the corners of the room, she flung herself on the floor, and buried her face in the chair.