When Ghost Meets Ghost

by William De Morgan

And yet it only just served its turn. For the daughter's half-hesitating reply:—"But I thought I would look in," if expanded to explanation-point, would have been worded:—"I came to show good-will, more than from any grounded misgivings about your health, ma'am; and now, having shown it, it is time to go." And she might have departed, easily.

But Fate also showed good-will, and would not permit it. Old Mrs. Picture became suddenly alive to the presence of a well-wisher, and to her own reluctance to drive her away. "Oh, but you need not go yet," said she. "Or perhaps they want you?"

Oh dear no!—nobody wanted her. Her friend she came with, her Cousin Keziah, was talking to Mrs. Masham. The pleasant presence would remain, its owner said, and take a seat near the fire. The old lady was glad, for she had had but little talk with anyone that day. Her morning interview with Gwen had been a short one, for that young lady was longing to get away for a second visit to her lover.

Old Maisie, to encourage possible diffidence to believe that a quiet chat would really be welcome to her, made reference to the disappointment such a short allowance of her young ladyship had been, and resuming her high-backed chair, put on her spectacles to get a better view of her visitor—oh, how unconsciously!

Think of the last kiss she gave a sleeping baby, half a century ago!

There was, of course, a topic they could speak of—little Dave Wardle, dear to both. Widow Thrale, fond as she had been of the child, had not Granny Marrable's bias towards monopolizing him. That was the result of a grande passion, generated perhaps by the encouragement the young man had given to a second Granny, so very equivalent to his first. Moreover, there was that obscure reference in his letters to an accident—for axdnt was a mere clerical error. She worded an inquiry after Dave, tentatively.

"I have not seen the dear child for four weeks," said old Maisie. "Oh dear me, yes—four weeks and more! Let me see, when was the accident?... Oh dear!—how the time does slip away!..."

"Was that the accident Dave speaks of in his letter? We could not quite make out Dave's letter. Sometimes 'tis a little to seek, what the child means."

Old Maisie nodded assent. "But he'll soon be quite a scholar and write his own letters all through. I think her ladyship took this one to send it back. I can tell you about the accident. It was owing to the repairs." The old lady pursued the subject in the true spirit of a narrator, beginning at a wrong end, by preference one unintelligible to her hearer. In consequence, the actual fall of the house-wall was postponed, in favour of a description of its cause, which dealt specially with the blamelessness of Mr. Bartlett, and incidentally with the dishonesty of some colleagues of his, of whom he had spoken as "they," without particulars. Her leniency to Mr. Bartlett was entirely founded on the fact that she had conversed with him once on the subject, and had been mysteriously impressed with his simplicity and manliness. How did Mr. Bartlett manage it? A faint percentage of beer, like foreign matter in analyses, is not alone enough to establish integrity. Nor a flavour of clothes.

The wall fell in the end, and Widow Thrale saw a light on the story, after expressing more admiration and sympathy for Mr. Bartlett than was human, under the circumstances. She was much impressed. "And by the mercy of God you were all saved, ma'am," said she. "Her young ladyship and little Dave, and his sister, and yourself!" It really seemed quite a stroke of business, this, on the part of a Superior Power, which had left building materials and gravitation, after creating them, to their own wayward impulses.