“A trap composed of three or four stout fellows armed with cudgels,” suggested Foxwell, “would doubtless serve to hold the creature till Rashleigh and I could arrive with our swords.”
“But a ghost is like air, is it not?” said Lady Strange. “It can’t be caught, or stopped, or even felt.”
“I have always suspected that a ghost that can be seen can be felt, especially if it wears clothes,” replied Foxwell. “However it be, here is an opportunity to settle the question,—if the ghost continues to haunt the same place. We will set our trap this evening; if we catch nothing, we’ll try again to-morrow; and so on, till something occurs, or we grow tired. We had best tell nobody of our purpose: the ghost may have accomplices. Pray let none of the servants know, but the men I employ in the affair.”
He bestirred himself at once in preparations, glad of having found fresh means, not only of distracting his own thoughts somewhat from the letter in Squire Thornby’s possession, but also of blinding his guests to the disturbance of mind which that matter still caused him.
His plans were simple. Choosing three men rather for stoutness of heart than for stoutness of body, though they were not deficient in the latter respect either, he instructed them to post themselves, while it was still day, in well-concealed places at different sides of the garden. Two, the gardener and the groom, were provided with cudgels, while the keeper took a fowling-piece, which he was not to fire except in extreme circumstances. At the appearance of the ghost in the garden, the keeper was to utter a signal, whereupon Foxwell and his guests—who were to pass the evening as usual at the card-table—would come forth as quietly as possible, the gentlemen with their swords ready to enforce the intruder’s surrender. Should the ghost attempt flight before the gentlemen could arrive, the three servants were to close round him, using their weapons only as a last resource, and after due warning—for the ghost was probably a gentleman, and Foxwell would have it treated as such. The three watchers were to go singly to their places of concealment, entering the garden directly from a postern in the ruinous eastern wing of the house, so that nobody outside of the garden itself could see them.
“And is not the pretty pouting niece to be admitted to this sport?” asked Rashleigh.
“By no means,” replied Foxwell, with a frown. “She has elected to keep out of all our amusements, we can spare her company in this. If the young prude finds satisfaction in holding aloof, for God’s sake let her do so. She disapproves of so many things we do and say, ’tis very like she would disapprove of this. Threatening a ghost with a cudgel, egad!—she might take it into her head to play the spoil-sport—you know the malice of excessive virtue.”
So nothing was spoken of the matter at dinner. This meal—which occurred at the London hour, in the late afternoon—was now the only regular occasion upon which Georgiana joined the company. For the passing of her days, she had her books, the care of her wardrobe and apartments, her music, drawing, embroidery, and walks—for she took these, though never on the side of the house toward the park, lest Everell might risk his safety by approaching her. She still met that gentleman each evening, at a later hour now than at first; and he it was that occupied her thoughts all the day, whatever the employment of her hands and feet. She acknowledged to herself her love for him, and wondered, sometimes with hope but oftener with deep misgiving, what the end would be. At times she had a poignant sense of the danger he was in by remaining near her, but she shrank even then from sending him away, for their separation must be long and might be eternal. As deeply as he, though less vehemently, did she lament the circumstances that compelled them to be secret and brief in their meetings. She was by no means of that romantic turn of mind which would have made the affair the more attractive for being clandestine. People who do romantic things are not necessarily people of romantic notions: it is a resolute fidelity to some cause or purpose, that leads many a generous but matter-of-fact hero or heroine into romantic situations. Indeed, is it ever otherwise with your true hero and your true heroine? Are not the others but shams, or at best poseurs? Georgiana followed courageously where love led; but because she really loved, and not because the conditions were romantic: she was no Lydia Languish—she would joyfully have dispensed with the romance.
On this particular evening, the conversation at dinner took a turn which gave it a disquieting significance to her, though she bore no part in it herself. Lady Strange had mentioned a certain young lord as having died because he preferred his love to his life. Foxwell had politely laughed. Lady Strange had somewhat offendedly stood by her assertion, whereupon Foxwell had declared the thing unknown in nature. Mrs. Winter supported him; but Rashleigh took his cousin’s side, saying, “What! no man ever died for love, then? Surely there have been cases, Bob.”
“Men have been brought to death by their love-affairs, I grant you,” said Foxwell, “but that is because circumstances arose which they had not foreseen, and from which they could not escape. They have even risked their lives to prosecute their amours, but risking one’s life upon fair odds is a vastly different thing from deliberately offering it in exchange for the indulgence of one’s love. That is what my lady’s words really mean: ‘preferring one’s love to one’s life.’ Such bargains are mentioned in ancient history—as of the youth who, being deeply in love with a queen, agreed to be slain at the end of a certain time if he might pass that time as her accepted lover. Only such an act can really be described as giving one’s life for love; and not the getting killed unintentionally in some matter incident to a love-affair.”