"May I ask," said my companion, "for the grounds of your statement that so far the ghost has failed to appear?"
"Save for yourself," I answered, "the only person I have seen since entering is the footman."
"And how do you know that the footman is not a ghost?"
"Why," said I, "he carried my bag upstairs, and pocketed the balance of half a crown I gave him to pay for a telegram."
"I never heard a feebler argument," he replied. "It is obvious that you resemble the majority of mankind, who, if they were to see a thousand ghosts every day, would never recognise one of them for what it was. Now, as to the footman——"
But at that moment the individual in question entered the room bringing coffee and cigars. When he had gone Panhandle resumed:
"We were speaking of the footman. But perhaps it would be wiser to deal with the matter in general terms. I have already said enough to satisfy any reasonable judge of evidence that this is a genuinely haunted house. I have now to add that a doubt may be raised as to who is the haunter and who the haunted."
I sat silent, staring at Panhandle with wide eyes of astonishment, for I had no universe of discourse to which I could relate the strange things I was hearing. He went on:
"From what I have told you already you have no doubt drawn the inference that the ghosts are haunting me. But the ghosts themselves are not of that mind. In their opinion it is I who am haunting them. My first discovery of this, which is destined to revolutionise the whole theory of ghosts, was made under circumstances which I will now relate.