“I think wherever their souls may be they neither know nor care anything about it,” said Zéphyrine with an air of superior modesty. “But you ought to learn how these ideas were suggested to my good old mistress. I bring you the manuscript that Madame d’Ionis, her daughter-in-law, Madame Caroline as we call her here, has herself unearthed by means of directions given in some old scribblings found in the archives of the family. This perusal will interest you more than my conversation, and I am going to wish you good evening after having preferred a little petition, however.”
“With all my heart, my dear young lady, what can I do for you?”
“Do not tell any one in the world, unless Madame Caroline, who will not mind, that I have forewarned you, for madame the dowager would scold me, and would trust me no longer.”
“I promise, and what must I say to-morrow if I am questioned in regard to my dreams?”
“Ah! that, monsieur, is a case in which you must have the kindness to invent something, a dream without sense or connection, whatever you please, provided it includes the three young ladies, otherwise madame the dowager will be like a soul in torment, and will accuse me of not putting the loaves, and carafes and salt-cellar in their places, or rather that I have warned you, and that your incredulity has prevented the ghosts from making their appearance. She is convinced of these ladies’ bad temper and of their refusal to show themselves to those who ridicule them beforehand, were it only in their thoughts.”
Left alone, after having promised Zéphyrine to lend myself to the fancy of her mistress, I opened and read the manuscript of which I shall only relate the circumstances relative to my story. That of the d’Ionis, young ladies appeared to me purely legendary, recounted by Madame d’Ionis on the faith of documents of slender authenticity, which she herself criticised in that light and mocking strain which was the fashion of the day. I pass over then in silence the chronicle of the three dead ladies, thus coldly commented upon, and which had appeared more interesting to me in the sober words of Zéphyrine and will only relate the following fragment, transcribed by madame d’Ionis from a manuscript dated 1650, and revised by an ancient chaplain of the castle.
“It is a fact that I have heard in my youth that the castle of Ionis was haunted by three spirits, exhibiting the appearance of ladies richly dressed, who without menacing any one appeared to be seeking something in the rooms and closets of the house. Masses and prayers recited for their benefit proving ineffectual to prevent their return, some one conceived the idea of causing three white loaves to be blessed, and of putting them in the room where the demoiselles d’Ionis had expired. That night they came without making any noise or frightening any one by their appearance, and it was discovered on the following day that they had nibbled the loaves after the manner of mice but had taken nothing away, and on the following night they had recommenced complaining and making the doors creak and bolts groan. For this reason some one conceived the idea of giving them three pitchers of clear water, which they did not drink, but a portion of which they spilled. At length the prior of Saint —— suggested that they might be entirely appeased by offering them a salt-cellar with white salt, on account of their having been poisoned by a loaf without salt, and as soon as this was done they were heard singing a very beautiful song in which we are assured that they promised, in Latin, to bestow blessings and good fortune upon the younger branch of the Ionis family to whom their property had reverted. This took place, I am told, in the time of King Henri IV, and since then nothing further has been heard of them; but for a long time a belief existed in the d’Ionis family, that by making them this offering at midnight they could be drawn thither and the future revealed through them. It is even said that if the three loaves, three carafes and a salt-cellar should by chance be discovered on a table in the aforesaid castle, astounding things would be seen and heard in this place.”
To this fragment Madame d’Ionis had added the following reflection: “It is much to be regretted for the sake of the d’Ionis family that this fine miracle should have ceased; all its members would then have been virtuous and wise: but, though I have in my hands a formula of invocation arranged by some astrologer formerly attached to the house, I have no hopes that the green ladies will ever reappear here.”
I remained for some time absorbed, not from the effects of this perusal, but rather on account of Madame d’Ionis’ pretty handwriting and her elegant revision of the other reflections that accompanied the legend. I did not then make, as I permit myself to-day, any criticism on the easy scepticism of this beautiful lady. I fully sympathized with her on this point. It was the fashion to regard fantastical things not from an artistic but from an ironical point of view. People prided themselves upon not crediting nurses’ tales or the superstitions of former ages. I was, besides, strongly disposed to fall in love. They had spoken to me so much at home of this amiable person, and my mother had recommended me so strongly on my departure, not to allow my head to be turned that it was already partially accomplished. So far I had only been in love with two or three of my cousins, and these affections, rehearsed in verses as chaste as my flame, had not consumed my heart to such an extent that it was not ready to lend itself to burning much more seriously.
I had brought with me a bundle of law papers that my father had made me promise to look over. I opened it conscientiously; but after having read several pages with my eyes, without taking in the sense of a single word, I soon found out that mode of study was perfectly useless and wisely determined to renounce it. I thought I could make up for my laziness by seriously thinking over the d’Ionis law suit, that I had at the end of my fingers, and I prepared the arguments with which I was to convince the countess of the steps she ought to take. Only, each of these wonderful arguments terminated, I know not how, with some amorous madrigal which had no direct connection with the procedure.