"Happily few do understand them," he replied. "I have given you this in strict confidence, Miss Hereford; you will, I am sure, regard it as such. No one knows of it except my mother; but she would not like you to speak of it to her."
"Certainly not. Then the servants do not know it?"
"Not one: not even Hill. It would be most disagreeable to me were the unpleasant fact to reach them; neither might they be willing to remain in a house where there was a sleepwalker. The last time the roving fit was upon me, some of them unfortunately saw me from the upper window; they recognised me, and came to the conclusion, by some subtle force of reasoning, explainable only by themselves, that it was my 'fetch,' or ghost. It was the first time I had ever heard of ghosts of the living appearing," he added, with a slight laugh.
"Do you think they saw you last night?" was my next question.
"I hope not," he replied, in a tone meant to be a light one; but that, to my ear, told of ill-concealed anxiety.
"But—Mr. Chandos!—there are no windows in the servants' part of the house that look this way!" I exclaimed, the recollection flashing on me.
"There is one. That small Gothic window in the turret. The fear that some of them may have been looking out is worrying my mother."
"It is that, perhaps, that has made Lady Chandos ill."
"Yes; they took me for my own ghost," he resumed, apparently not having heard the remark. "You now perceive, possibly, why I have told you this Miss Hereford? You would not be likely to adopt the ghostly view of the affair, and might have spoken of what you saw in the hearing of the servants, or of strangers. You have now the secret: will you keep it?"
"With my whole heart, sir," was my impulsive rejoinder. "No allusion to it shall ever pass my lips." And Mr. Chandos took my hand, held it for a moment, and then departed, leaving me to digest the revelation.