She waited to see me through the gate, which led by a little lane past the kitchen-garden, and thence by a private road along down into the main one. As I passed the gate into the lawn, on my way out, I paused perhaps half an hour, in the hope of hearing or seeing the marvels of which the woman had spoken. There was no mystic light, blue or yellow, playing lambently over the roof; no sound, sinking and rising, came wildly on the starlit air; all was profound silence and darkness and coldness like that of the grave.
My half-contemptuous pity of the state of mind into which the gardener’s wife had worked herself, gave place to deeper emotions; I turned away, almost running along the smooth, hard-frozen road whose course was clearly discernible in the winter starlight. I met the gardener going home, but did not stop to speak with him—went directly to my lodgings. The fire was out in my room, and I crept into bed, forgetting that I had gone without my tea.
True to my promise, I went the next day to the villa. Mrs. Scott brought the keys, I unlocked the doors, and together we entered the long-vacant place. There is always something impressive, one might say, “ghostly,” about a deserted building. When you enter into it, you feel the influence of those who were last within it, as if some portion of them lingered in the old locality. I confess that I felt an almost superstitious awe and dread, as I stepped over the threshold which I had last crossed with him. How joyful, how full of young and princely life, he had then been, his face lit up, as a man’s face lights up when he attends upon the woman he loves and expects soon to make his own! He was leading Eleanor to a carriage; they had been talking about the improvements they were going to make in the house. How every look and tone came back to me! With a silent shudder, I stepped into the hall, which had that moldy smell of confined air belonging to a closed dwelling. I hastened to throw open the shutters. When I unclosed a door, I flung it wide, stepping quickly in, and raising the windows, so as to have the sunlight before looking much about. I had to do it all, for my companion kept close to me, never stirring from my elbow. I went into every room on every floor, from the kitchen to the garret. Into the latter I only glanced, as Mrs. Scott said there was nothing up there which she wanted, or which required attention. It was a loft, rough-floored, of comfortable hight, with a window at the gable end. The roof ran up sharply in the center, the villa being built in the Gothic style. There was such a collection of rubbish in it as is usual to such places—broken-down furniture, worn-out trunks, a pile of mattresses in a corner, over which a blanket had been thrown to keep them from the dust, some clothing depending from a line, and three or four barrels. Mrs. Scott was standing at the foot of the ladder, which led up into the attic out of a small room, or closet, used for storing purposes. I saw she was uneasy at having me even that far from her, and after a brief survey of the garret, I assured her there were no ghosts there, and descended.
“Help yourself to some of them apples,” said the woman, pointing to some boxes and barrels in the room where we now stood. “They’re winter pippins. John’s going to send them into the city, to the family, in a week or two. We’ve permission to keep ’em here, because it’s dry and cool, and the closet being in the middle of the house, it don’t freeze. It’s a good place for fruit. Hark! What was that?”
“It was a cat,” said I, as I put a couple of the apples in my overcoat pocket. “It sounded like a cat—in the garret. If we shut it up there, it’ll starve.”
I went up the ladder again, looking carefully about the attic, and calling coaxingly to the animal, but no cat showed itself, and I came down, saying it must have been in one of the lower rooms, and had probably run in since we opened the doors.
“It sartingly sounded overhead,” persisted my companion, looking nervous, and keeping closer to me than ever.
I had heard the noise, but would not have undertaken to say whether it came from above or below.
“If that is the material she makes ghosts of, I’m not surprised that she has a full supply,” I thought.
In going out, the woman was careful to close the door, and I could see her stealing covert glances into every corner, as we passed on, as if she expected, momently, to be confronted by some unwelcome apparition, there in the broad light of day. There were no traces of any intruders having made free with the house. The clothes and china closets were undisturbed, and the bureaus the same.