"I heard something jingle behind me, and as I turned around I saw the coins all lying on the shelf again."
The conclusion of this prodigious history found me in a state very nearly approaching stupefaction. It was not so much the facts themselves which it embodied as the suggestions they inspired that appalled me, and the glimpse they seemed to afford of mysteries the human race has for ages shrinkingly guessed at, chilled me to the marrow of my bones. "Can such things be?" was the question I asked myself again and again as I struggled to regain my composure:—and although this experience seemed a natural and fitting sequence in the drama that had been enacted in that house under my own eyes, I am free to say I could not on the instant credit it.
My wife detected my hesitation at once, and said:
"I see you cannot believe what I have told you, and I do not wonder at it:—but it is true, for all that."
"I know you think so," I replied; "and in view of the very many other strange events you have taken part in—and I with you in a number of them—I ought to have no doubts. But this is the most staggering thing I ever heard of. Are you sure you were not dreaming?"
"Well," she said, with a laugh, "I am not in the habit of dreaming at eleven o'clock on a bright, sunny morning, and when I have the care of the house on my hands. And then, the dogs:—do you think they were dreaming, too?"
"Ah, yes!" I exclaimed; "what about the dogs?"
"I told you," she replied, "how they ran to the gate, barking, and then suddenly turned tail and rushed away in a panic as soon as they saw what was there. When Deeming had gone, I went out to look after them, but for a long time I could not find them. I called and I coaxed, but to no purpose. Finally I discovered them out in the farthest corner of the paddock, under the thick bushes, crowded together in a heap, and trembling as though they had been whipped. I had to crawl in and drag them out, but I couldn't induce them to come near the house; at last I had to carry them in, and all the afternoon they have stuck close to me as though they felt the need of protection. It is only half an hour ago that I got them into their kennels and chained them up. You had better go out and see them."
I did so, and found one kennel empty, and both dogs lying close together (as the length of their chains allowed them to do) in the straw of the other. I had never seen them do this before, since each was very jealous of intrusion by the other upon his quarters, and I was impressed by the circumstance. The poor brutes still showed unmistakable evidences of terror, whimpered and whined and licked my hand as I petted them, and set up a concerted and agonized howl of protest when I left them. There was no doubt whatever that they had been horribly frightened—if not by the ghost of Deeming, by what?—it was certainly no merely physical agitation that their actions showed.