CHAPTER XIII—THE FAMILY SKELETON
The old-fashioned housekeeper—A ghost which fought the servant— Jealously guarding the family secret—An adventure while primrose gathering—A silent dinner-party—Dwarfs who live with the children
IN the days of romance the Secret Chamber was part of every mansion that had any claim to antiquity. Every old castle, every nobleman's seat, had in it a room which could be used on an emergency for the stowing away of something or somebody that it was not considered advisable for the visitors or the retainers to see.
Many of these secret chambers still exist, and the families to whom they belong are rather proud of them. The housekeeper who takes you over an ancient seat will conduct you to a room at the end of a passage—sometimes you can approach it through a sliding panel—and tell you in parrot fashion the tragedy connected with it. Occasionally there is a ghost attached to the story, and the housekeeper assures you that many members of the family have seen it.
The gruesomeness of the room in which a murder was committed three hundred years ago is heightened when your guide points to a stain on the floor and tells you that all the processes of modern scrubbing and cleaning have failed to remove it.
There is a house in the North of England which has a secret room, the exact position of which is only revealed to two people—the heir-at-law and the family solicitor. Hundreds of visitors have tried in vain to find it.
There is a country house which has a secret room in which there lives an old lady—a very ghostly old lady, for she died and was buried a hundred years ago. Only on rare occasions does she appear to the other occupants, and then she is attired in an old-fashioned brown dress, with a lace cap on her head and a bunch of keys in her hand.
My friend and collaborator, the late Frederic Clay, went to stay at this house. He knew nothing of the story. After he had been shown to his room to dress for dinner an old lady, attired in brown, and carrying a bunch of keys in her hand, came in.
He thought she was the housekeeper, and said he was quite comfortable and wanted nothing. Then she went away.
At dinner he said to his hostess—a relative: "What a dear old lady your housekeeper is! But what an old-fashioned way she dresses!—she looks as if she had stepped out of an old romance."