They looked into every room and closet, they neglected no hiding place from garret to cellar, but no one, either ghost or being, was discovered. Mr. Lawrence went up to Ada's room to see if she were recovering from her agitation.
She was lying in bed pale, but very quiet, attended by her maid. He sent the girl away, and told his daughter what Willis had seen, and how vainly they had searched the house.
"Papa, what do you think?" asked she, in low, awe-struck tones. "Was it, indeed, as the man asserts, the restless spirit of my sister? It was like her, only paler and more shadowy, as a spirit well might be."
"Ada, I do not know what to think," said her father in low, moved tones, "I am lost in a maze of doubt and conjecture. Can it be that my daughter's soul cannot rest while her poor desecrated body remains uncoffined?"
"It may be so," said Ada, weeping. "What a mournful tone was in that voice as it breathed your name!"
He started up, pacing the floor in wild agitation.
"I must go down to Lance," he said. "We will go and see the detective again to-night, and learn if any clew has been found. We must find her body if skill and money combined can accomplish it; I cannot bear for her restless soul to be seeking its body at my hands!"
Mrs. Vance had retired to her room in a state of abject terror.
She believed that she had seen and heard the veritable spirit of the girl she had murdered, instigated thereto by jealousy.
Her bold and venturesome spirit had never yet felt the promptings of remorse for her dreadful deed. She rejoiced that Lily was dead, and that the shameful stigma of suicide lay upon her memory; though she was the daily witness of the bereaved family's sorrow, though she saw that Lancelot Darling was aged as if ten years had passed over his head in the past few weeks, still she felt no grief for her sin, and kept on her resolute way, swearing in her secret soul to win the young man whom she passionately adored, and whose wealth and position made him the most eligible parti in the whole city. Love and ambition alike spurred her on to the attainment of her cherished object.