It Pays to Smile

by Nina Wilcox Putnam

The hall below was completely dark, and I must have taken a wrong turning, because in what seemed about two minutes I was completely lost. For once my nerves gave way completely. I wanted to shriek but could only make a little clicking sound which nobody seemed to hear. Then I began to run, because I thought something was after me—I did not know what. I couldn't see anything, and yet I felt overpowered by terror. It flashed across my brain that perhaps Sandro—or rather, Wilkes—did not need to unlock his door in order to leave his room; perhaps he came through the closed door and only kept it locked to prevent people from discovering that he didn't really exist.

The thought gave new impetus to my speed, and for time uncounted I flew about that horribly vast and silent mansion as noisily and irrationally as if I were myself some poor lost spirit. I seemed wholly unable to find my way back to my own apartment or to locate any familiar door at which I might venture to knock and beg for help. And the realization that those two night prowlers in the garden might at any moment break into whatever part of the house I was in at the instant did nothing to induce a greater serenity of mind.

Moreover, I could not seem to find a flight of stairs leading upward, and when at length I emerged from the service wing it was to find myself in the ghostly main hall once more. And there it was that a sudden unexpected encounter with reality shocked me back to some degree of common sense.

From this main hall, which was two stories in height a corridor led directly to the library at the extreme left end of the main building.

Other rooms opened from the corridor, of course, but the door directly at the end was that of the Madonna room, as I called it, and as I, emerging from the servants' entrance, advanced toward the foot of the main stair I stood as if rooted to the ground, for from that far doorway gleamed a faint light.

Now though it is true that anything pertaining to the supernatural, mesmeric or ghostly is capable of upsetting my equanimity to a very considerable degree, in the realm of obviously human activity I have never been a coward or a laggard. Never shall it be said that the last Freedom Talbot, the tenth to bear that illustrious name, ever disgraced it by cowardice, though but a mere woman. Not for nothing did I bear the title of those men who had given their lives and made their fortunes in the cause for which they were baptized.

"In time of danger an ounce of action is worth a pound of theory," my dear father used to say; and his precepts are in my blood no less than in my mind. And upon this occasion I was not backward.

There was no time now to give the alarm; it was, as the saying goes, up to me. Waiting only long enough to put my right foot back into its knitted slipper, the heel of which had come off during my flight, I immediately stalked to one of the suits of armor which guarded the staircase, and removed the great sword which lay within its hollow grasp. Thus armed I began a stealthy progress toward the library door.

The sword was heavy and difficult to carry but I was in no mood to be put off by a trifle of that kind. Whatever those two villains were up to in that library I was determined to put an end to immediately. I had no fear that a common thief would dare to shoot at my gray head, and the now perfect respectability of my situation gave me confidence. Nevertheless I took care to make no unnecessary noise. Grasping my weapon in such a manner as to be ready for any emergency I sidled along the wall of the corridor, concealing myself behind the portière which hung at the door, and cautiously peeked within.