return, and I engaged the village liveryman to drive me to the house
for hire. As we approached Hopefield I saw the Napoleonic figure of
John Stewart Dick in the roadway. He had evidently been waiting for
me. He held up his hand with the superb, impersonal scorn of a Fifth
Avenue policeman, and the driver checked his horse.
"I gave you warning," he said impressively. "If you return to the
house the consequences will be upon your own head."
"Thank you," I replied courteously. "You lay yourself open to the
severest penalties of the law in attempting to intimidate me. I have
enlisted for the whole campaign. Sick chimneys require my immediate
professional attention. If my bark sink, 't is to another sea. Be
good, dear child, let those who will be clever; and kindly omit
flowers."
As the driver slapped his reins, Dick sprang out of the way, muttering
words that proved the shallowness of his philosophic temper. The
liveryman expressed his disapproval of the pragmatist in profane terms
as we entered the grounds.
"There's a heap o' talk in the village," he observed. "They do say the
old lady 's cracked, if I may so speak of her; and that there's ghosts
in the house. And the conduct of the gentlemen at the Prescott is most
remarkable. The word 's passed that they're all dippy about the young
Miss Hollister that lives with her aunt. I reckon all rich people are
a bit cracked. It appears to go with the money. Mr. Bassford
Hollister,--he's the old lady's brother,--he's just as bad as any of
'em. I've drove in these parts fifteen year, and I 've worked a heap
for the rich, but I never seen nothin' like the Hollisters. They say
Mr. Bassford is about broke now. Had his share of the baby-wagon money
and blew it in, and now the old lady's marryin' off the girls and he
gets no money out of her if he takes a hand in that game. She's doin'
it to suit herself. That Bassford is always up to somethin' queer.
Yesterday he sat in the village street countin' the number of people he
saw chewin' gum. Hung around the school-house watchin' the children to
see how many had their jaws goin'. Takin' notes just like the census
man and tax assessor. Told our doctor in the village he was figurin'
the amount of horse-power the American people put into gum-chewing
every year, and expects to find some way of usin' it to run machinery.
It's harmless, Doc says. He calls it just the Hollister idiosyncrasy,
if that's the word. But I reckon it's idiotsyncrasy all right. I wish
you good luck of your place, sir."
He evidently believed me to be some sort of upper servant, and this
added to my joy of the day. With my good humor augmented by the
interview, I entered the house. A strange footman admitted me, and I
went to my room at once without meeting any one else.
The man followed me with a penciled note, signed with Cecilia's
initials, requesting my presence below as soon as possible, as she
wished to see me before dinner. The thought that she wished to see me
at any time filled me with elation; and her few lines scratched on a
correspondence card were a pleasing addendum to our conversation of the
morning. I only wondered whether I should find her the sober, reserved
young woman of our earlier acquaintance, or whether she would choose to
renew the good comradeship of our talk on the train. The finding of my
assistant's telegraphed resignation on my dressing-table, to take
effect in January, had not the slightest effect upon the lofty minarets
in which my fancy now found lodgment. It pleased me to believe that
fighting blood still pulsed in the last of the house of Ames, and that
I had hurled defiance at the organized band of suitors that guarded the
Hopefield gates and picketed the surrounding hills.
My question as to which Cecilia I should find in the library was
quickly answered. Her frank smile, the candor of her eyes, confessed a
new tie between us; we were becoming conspirators within the main
conspiracy, whatever its character might be.
"As to Providence and the cook--what luck?" I asked.
"Oh, I managed that very easily. I ran into some friends who were
going abroad for the winter. They have a staff of unusual servants,
and were anxious to keep them together until their return. I promptly
engaged them all, and they are even now installed. I came up on the
train with them, and as they are unusually intelligent and biddable,
they agreed to stray in in a casual and desultory way through the
afternoon. Aunt Octavia really believed, or pretended she did, which
is just as good, that Providence had sent them, and was delighted. The
laundress--the last to appear--has just arrived, and Aunt Octavia is in
fine humor. She did n't even ask me how I came off in my encounter at
the dentist's. She had filled the pie-pantry and had a good time while
I was gone."
"Well, I have had an adventure of my own," I remarked, after expressing
my relief that she had solved the servant difficulty with so much ease.
"A committee of gentlemen waited on me in my office on a matter of
grave importance."
She lifted her brows, and folded her hands upon her knees--it was a
pretty way she had.
"Was it the freedom of the city, or some high recognition of your
professional ability, Mr. Ames?"
"Oh, far more exciting! Three gentlemen, representing the suitors'
trust now maintaining headquarters at the Prescott Arms, warned me
solemnly to keep off the grass. In other words, I am not to interfere
with their designs upon the heart of Miss Cecilia Hollister."
She flung open a fan, held it at arm's length, and scrutinized the
daffodils that were traced upon it.
"So they dared you?"
"So they dared me. And I took the dare."
"Why?"
Her eyes met mine gravely, but behind her pretty _moue_ a smile lurked
delightfully.
[Illustration: Her eyes met mine gravely.]
"If I should tell you now it would be flirting, which is a sin."
"I had imagined, Mr. Ames, that that sort of thing came easy to you.
But if it's sinful, of course"--
"But you do not rule me out! You will give me a chance"--
My earnestness caused her manner to change suddenly. Her beautiful
gravity came like a swift falling of starlit twilight. I had never
been so happy as at this moment. Preposterous as were the
circumstances of my presence in the house, the juxtaposition of Cecilia
Hollister gave me unalloyed delight. The animosity of the gentlemen at
the Prescott Arms--an animosity which the interview in my office had
doubtless intensified--quickened my satisfaction in thus being within
the walls that guarded the lady of their adoration. She had not
answered me, and I felt my heart pounding in the silence.
"I want to serve you, now, hereafter, and always," I added. "These men
can have no claim upon you greater than that of any other man who
dares!"
"No, none whatever," she replied firmly.
"And the mystery, the whole story, is in the little silver book!"
She started, flushed, and then laughter visited her lips and eyes. The
book was not in her hands nor in sight anywhere, but I felt that I was
on the right track, and that the little trinket had to do with her
plight and her compact with her aunt. Best of all, the fact that I had
chanced upon this clue gave her happiness. There was no debating that.
"You had best have a care, Mr. Ames. You have spoken words that would
be treasonable if they came from me, and I must not countenance them."
"But you will tolerate from me words that you would not permit another
to speak? Do I go too far?"
She bent her head to one side,--with the slightest inclination, as of a
rose touched by a vagrant wind.
"If I could only half believe in you," she said, "you might really
serve me. So those gentlemen warned you away! Their presumption is
certainly astounding."
"They know nothing of the silver book!"
"They know less than you do,--and you have a good deal to learn, you
know."
"I am dull enough, but I have no ambition but to read the riddle of the
sibyl's leaves. That and the laying of the ghost are my immediate
business. As for the gentlemen at the Prescott, including my old
friend Hartley Wiggins, I am not in the least afraid of them. My hand
is raised against them. If it's a case of the test of Ulysses over
again, I 'm as likely as any of them to bend the bow."
I thought this well spoken, but she seemed amused, though without
unkindness, by the earnestness of my speech.
"If your wit is equal to your valor, you may go far. But"--and she
turned her eyes full upon me--"we must play the game according to the
rules."
"And as for Hartley Wiggins"--
She sat up very straight, and the sudden disdain in her face startled
me. I had forgotten my eavesdropping in the clump of raspberries on
the day of my arrival. Certainly Wiggins had been decidedly in the
race then, and my heart thumped in resentment as I recalled her own
message, all compact of encouragement, which I had borne to Wiggins at
the Prescott Arms.
"I will tell you something, Mr. Ames. This afternoon, as I drove from
the station, I came round by the lake, merely to cool my eyes on the
water, and I saw Mr. Wiggins and my sister seated on a wall in an old
orchard. They were so busily engaged that they did not see me. At
least he did not; but I think Hezekiah did."
"Hezekiah," I answered, relieved by the nature of her disclosure, which
could not but prejudice Wiggins' case, "Hezekiah is fond of orchards.
I dare say this was the same one in which I had a charming talk with
her myself. Doubtless she was amusing herself with Wiggins just as she
did with me. She finds the genus homo entertaining."
"She is the dearest girl in the world,--the sweetest, the loveliest,
the brightest. Mr. Wiggins has treated her outrageously. He has taken
advantage of her youth and susceptible nature."
"His punishment is sure," I answered complacently. "Hezekiah laughed
when I mentioned his name. And you frown to-day at the thought of him."
"Aunt Octavia is coming," she remarked, feigning at once a careless
air; but I was content that she let my remark pass unchallenged.
Miss Octavia's entrances were always effective. She appeared to-night
charmingly gowned, but the bright twinkle in her eyes made it clear
that no matter of dress could affect her humor or spirit. She greeted
me, as she always did, as though our acquaintance were a matter of
years rather than of days. I even imagined that she seemed pleased to
find me back again. She asked no questions as to my day's occupations,
but as we went in to dinner sallied forth cheerfully upon a description
of her own activities.
"After I had baked my required quota of pies this morning, I sought
recreation at the traps. The stable-boy who has been pulling the
string for me having struck-work, it most providentially happened that
I espied Lord Arrowood hanging on the edge of the maple tangle beyond
the barn. I summoned him at once and put him to work managing the
traps for me, finding him most efficient. He seemed extremely
despondent, and after I had satisfied myself that two out of three was
not an impossible record for one of my years, I brought him to the
house and made tea for him. I left the room for a moment--I had taken
him into the kitchen where, during the incumbency of the regular cook I
hardly dare venture myself, and he made himself comfortable quite near
the range. The pies on which I had been engaged all morning lay
cooling near him. I had composed twenty-nine pies,--I am an excellent
mathematician, and I could not have been mistaken in the count. What
was my amazement to find, after his lordship's departure, that one pie
was missing! The pan in which it was baked I discerned later, jammed
into a barrel of excellent Minnesota flour. My absence from the room
was the briefest; his lordship must indeed be a prestidigitateur to
have made way with the pie so expeditiously."
"His lordship was doubtless hungry," I suggested. "Even nobility must
eat. I passed Lord Arrowood in the highway early this morning, sitting
upon a stone, with sundry items of hand-baggage reposing beside him. I
have rarely seen any one so depressed."
"He belongs to an ancient house," remarked Miss Octavia. "He is
descended from either Hengist or Horsa,--I forget which, but it does
not greatly matter. The missing pie, I may add, was an effect in
Westchester pippin; and as our American experiment in self-government
bores him, I take it as significant that he chanced upon food that is
the veritable sacrament of democracy."
"Now that the little matter of the servants has been adjusted, we must
have a care lest the newly-arrived phalanx, which Providence so kindly
sent to you to-day, is not stampeded by any further manifestations of
the troubled spirit of the unfortunate Briton who was hanged on the
site of this house."
"Mr. Ames," replied Miss Octavia impressively, "that matter is entirely
in your hands."
"But if I could see the plans of this house, I should be better able to
grapple with his ghostship."
I had thrown this out in the hope of eliciting some remark from her
touching the Swedish maid's visit to Pepperton's office; but Miss
Octavia met my gaze unflinchingly.
"You are a clever man, Mr. Ames, and I have every confidence that you
will not only solve the mystery of the library chimney but find the
ghost that switched off the lights on the stair last night. I prefer
that you should accomplish these feats without any help from the plans.
I myself have no suggestions. I am gratified that you are meeting the
emergencies that have risen here with so much determination, but it is
what I should expect of the son of Arnold Ames of Hartford.
Opportunity is all that any of us need to find ourselves truly great,
and if, in the ordinary course of our lives, the gate does not open
freely, we are justified in picking the lock. When I determined to
seek adventures in my old age, I resolved that I should miss no chance,
and that I should be prepared for any beckoning of the hand of fate.
An odd fancy struck me at the beginning of my new life that Boston
would some day be the starting-point of some interesting experience.
This has not yet developed, but in order that I may be prepared for
anything that may occur I keep a blue-silk umbrella constantly checked
at the Parker House. The presence of the little brass check in my
purse is a constant reminder that Boston may one day call me."
A discussion of the Parker House umbrella followed, Cecilia and I
joining, and it proved so fruitful a topic that it carried us to our
coffee.
Coffee-making, in a machine she had herself contrived, was always
attended with rites that required deliberation, and while she performed
them Miss Hollister continued to amuse us.
"You may not know," she remarked, in one of her charming irrelevant
outbursts, "that the most important furniture transactions effected in
this country are those negotiated daily by the head-waiters of the
Fifth Avenue restaurants. Such is, I assure you, the fact. These
gentlemen, who have attained front rank among our predatory rich, allow
no one to dine at the inns they dominate who does not first purchase a
table and chairs at a profit of at least two hundred per cent over the
original Grand Rapids cost, the furniture thus purchased reverting in
every case to the party of the first part after the purchasers have
eaten to their satisfaction. The Fifth Avenue head-waiters are not
only the most absolute autocrats of our time, but the most acute
students of human nature among us. The sale of the tables by the lords
of the dining-rooms is alone worth a fortune every season at our
fashionable victualing houses and, in addition, the humbler members of
the minor orders of waiters, who merely fetch and carry, are obliged to
share their gratuities with their august chiefs."
"The system is iniquitous," I declared. "It's enough to pay two prices
for the food without buying the hotel furniture."
"The system, Mr. Ames, is wholly admirable, if you will pardon me for
expressing a difference of opinion. We cannot do less than admire the
austere genius before which mere plutocrats and men of affairs meekly
bow. In making my own investments I would rather have the advice of
Alphonse at the Hotel Pallida than that of the president of the
strongest trust company on Manhattan Island. The varying size of the
sums he receives for the dining-room furniture is the best possible
indication of the condition of the market. When a citizen of Pittsburg
will pay no more than one hundred dollars for the use of a table to eat
from at the Pallida you may be sure that a panic impends. By the way,
I proposed to Alphonse last winter the organization of a limited
company of leading head-waiters to control the waiting industry of
Fifth Avenue. It was my idea that some special forms of torture might
be devised for calculating persons--usually readers of New York letters
in provincial newspapers--who think a waiter entitled to only ten per
cent of the bill, and this could best be managed by an arrangement
between the five or six magnates who control the more gilded and
imposing refectories. I suggested the placing of a special mark in the
hats of the ten-per-cent fiends, so that wherever they dine the symbol
of their indiscreet frugalities would be apparent to the initiated eye.
It is another of my notions that the head-waiter and his humble slave
should present a formal bill for their services, while the hotel or
restaurant should merely be tipped. In this way the more important
service would receive its due consideration. The sole office of the
proprietor is to provide the head-waiter a place in which to follow his
profession. Alphonse is impressed with my ideas, and has even offered
to make me a director of the company."
"I suppose that you won the regard of Alphonse, the magnificent, only
by the most princely tips through many years of acquaintance, Miss
Hollister."
"On the other hand, Mr. Ames, I never gave him a cent in my life; but
last Christmas, in recognition of his friendliness in warning me
against an alligator-pear salad, at a moment when that vegetable was at
the turn of the season, I knit him a pair of blue worsted bed-room
slippers, which he received with the liveliest expressions of delight."
Three suitors were announced at this moment, and I slipped away without
excuses, while Miss Octavia and Cecilia adjourned to the library.
The ghost, I had sworn, should not baffle me another night.
XIII
I DISCOVER TWO GHOSTS
As I crossed the second-floor hall, I passed the Swedish maid, walking
toward Miss Octavia's room. I was somewhat annoyed to find, on looking
over my shoulder to make sure of her destination, that she, too, had
paused, her hand on Miss Octavia's door, and was watching me with
interest. She vanished immediately; but to throw her off the track I
went to my own room, closed the door noisily, and then came out quickly
and ran up to the third floor.
Bassford Hollister's mysterious exit had lingered in my mind as the
most curious incident of the eventful Friday night. Having been
baffled in my effort to get hold of the architect's plans, my thought
now was to await in the upper part of the house a repetition of the
various phenomena that had so puzzled me. By the process of exclusion
I had eliminated nearly every plausible theory, but if the ghost
manifested himself with any sort of periodicity (and the hour of the
chimney's queer behavior had been nine) I was now prepared to meet him
in the regions he had chosen for his exploits. When it is remembered
that I had always been most timorous, not at all anxious to shine in
any heroic performances, it will be understood that the atmosphere of
Hopefield Manor was exerting a stimulating effect upon my courage. Or,
more likely, my inherent cowardice had been brought into subjection by
my curiosity.
I had a pretty accurate knowledge by this time of the position and
function of all the electric switches between the lower hall and the
fourth floor, but I tested them as I ascended, glancing down now and
then to make sure I was not observed. From the sound of voices in the
library I judged that most of Cecilia's suitors must now have arrived,
and so much the better, I argued; for with Miss Octavia and her niece
fully occupied, I could the better carry on my ghost-hunt above stairs.
At a quarter before nine I switched off the lights on the third and
fourth floors, and established myself at the head of the stairway, and
quite near the trunk-room door. This door I had opened, as I fancied
that if Bassford Hollister were at the bottom of the business, he would
probably wish to find his way to the roof again. So far as I was able
to manage it, the stage was in readiness for the entrance of the
goblin. And I may record my impression, that as we wait for a
visitation of this sort, it is with a degree of credence in things
supernatural, to which we would not ordinarily confess. In spite of
ourselves we expect something to appear, something unearthly,
impalpable, and unresponsive to those tests we apply to the known and
understood.
The clock below struck nine upon these meditations, and almost upon the
last stroke I heard a sound that set my nerves tingling. I crouched in
the dark waiting. Some one was coming toward me, but from where? The
bottom of a well at midnight was not blacker than the fourth floor, but
the switch lay ready to my hand, and my pockets were stuffed with
matches of the sort that light anywhere. The stairways were all
carpeted, as I have said, and yet some one was ascending bare treads,
lightly, and with delays that suggested a furtive purpose. Meanwhile,
as a background for this unreality, murmurs of talk and occasional
laughter rose from the library.
This concealed stairway, wherever it was, could not be of interminable
length, and I had counted, I think, fifteen steps of that strange
ascent when it ceased. I heard a fumbling as of some one seeking a
latch, and suddenly a light current of air swept by me, but its clean
fresh quality was not in itself disturbing. I stooped and struck a
match smartly on the carpet and at the same time clicked the switch. I
should say that not more than ten seconds passed from the moment the
soft rush of air had first advertised the opening of a passage near me
until the hall was flooded with the glow of the electric lamps
overhead. My match had also performed its office, but finding the
electric current behaving itself normally, I blew it out. What I saw
now interested me immensely.
In the solid wall, near the stair, and almost directly opposite the
trunk-room, a narrow door had swung outward,--a neat contrivance, so
light in its construction that it still swayed on its concealed hinges
from the touch of the hand that had released it. How it had opened or
what had become of the prowler who had unlatched it remained to be
discovered. It seemed impossible that whoever or whatever had climbed
the hidden stairway had descended, nor had I been conscious of a
ghostly passing as on the previous night. I had only my senses to
apply to this problem, and their efficiency was minimized for a moment
by fear.
The opening in the wall engaged my attention at once, and I was
steadied by the thought that here was a practical matter susceptible of
investigation. I stepped within the door and lighted a candle; and
just as the wick caught fire, click went a switch somewhere, and out
went the hall lamps. But having, so to speak, put my foot to the
mysterious stair I would not turn back, and I continued on down the
steps.
Great was my astonishment to find that I had apparently stepped from a
new into an old house. The stair treads were worn by long use, the
plaster walls that inclosed them were battered and cracked, and I
seemed to have plunged from the glory of Hopefield into some dim lost
passage of a domicile of another era, that lay within or beneath the
walls of the Manor. As I slowly descended, holding high my candle, I
recalled, not without a qualm, the story of the British soldier whom
tradition or superstition linked to the site of Miss Hollister's
property. This stairway might certainly have been built in the early
days of the republic, and it refuted my disdain of the ghost-myth on
the theory that new houses are inhospitable to spirits.