_By_ Desmond Coke
_Loyal North Lancashire Regiment_
The Blue Lady wailed disconsolately in the panelled room.
In her mortal life, four hundred years before, she had always been
somewhat behind the times; and now she was in arrears by the space of a
whole Silly Season. She was grappling with the stale problem, “Do we
Believe?”
The Blue Lady concluded, emphatically, that we did not believe; and
hence her wailing. She had seen the age of scepticism coming. For more
than three hundred glad years men had crossed themselves and shuddered
when she went moaning through the sombre rooms of Yewcroft Hall. Secure
in her reputation, she had been content once only in the evening to
interrupt the revelry, and then, conscious that all eyes had been upon
her stately progress, to seek contentedly her spectral couch. But with
the growth of science had risen also disbelief. Once stage-coaches were
discarded, and people came to Yewcroft by a steam-drawn train, she felt
that any other marvel must lose caste. She did not fail to observe that,
as she passed along the rooms, there were those who, though they
trembled, would not turn, and made pretence of not observing her. Then
came the hideous day on which the Hall harboured a deputation from a
Society of Research, who loaded themselves with cameras, dull books, and
revolvers, before spending a night in the Panelled Room. The Blue Lady,
as became a self-respecting ghost, slept elsewhere, and would not show
herself to these ill-mannered creatures; so that next day the Press
declared the famous Yewcroft ghost to be a myth. This was terrible; but
far worse was to come.
The family who had held Yewcroft since feudal times, the Blue Lady’s own
family, showed with old age a preference for sleep, and inasmuch as an
ungrateful populace refused to pay them for this function, reduced means
led to the abandonment of Yewcroft. It was taken by Lord Silthirsk, who
had made tinned meat and a million by methods equally ambiguous. He
turned the moss-hung chapel into a garage, and fitted electric light
throughout the Hall.
The Blue Lady, struck in every vulnerable part, resolved to drive the
Silthirsks out. For the first three days of their residence she missed
no chance of floating in on Lady Silthirsk at moments likely to
embarrass her. Her Ladyship showed no symptoms of annoyance or of fear,
though sometimes, if not alone, she would look up and say, “Oh, here’s
that blue one again,” in tones which the blue one took to be of terror
cleverly concealed. On the fourth day the Silthirsks had a niece to
stay, and the Blue Lady embraced this as a chance to learn what real
impression she had made. Waiting till dessert was on the table, so that
her Ladyship might not think it necessary to hide her fear before the
servants, she swept into the dining-room and passed close beside the
niece.
Elfrida shuddered. “What was that?” she cried.
“What’s what?” asked her aunt; while her uncle said “Banana,” and fell
to his dessert again.
“No—something cold: it made me shudder, just as if something had gone
by.”
The Blue Lady, ambushed behind a vast tooled-leather screen, gloated
over her success.
“Oh, _that_!” said Lady Silthirsk: “that’s one of the fixtures—a spook.
We rather like her—it’s so picturesque and old-world, ain’t it? Some
people can see her—_I_ always can. She’s blue—quite an inoffensive mauvy
blue. Oh, I distinctly like her. She’s a novelty, ye know: and she’ll be
_so_ cooling in the summer!”
But even she started at the ghastly groan which issued from behind the
leather screen.
For some weeks the Blue Lady did not deign to show herself, until Lady
Silthirsk began to find fault. The landlord, she implied, had swindled
her. It became clear to the spectre that all hopes of driving out these
upstarts by terror had been idle dreams.
And now, on Christmas Eve, the night dedicate of old to her compatriots,
she had given herself up to despair. She did not even care to walk. She
wailed disconsolately in the Panelled Room.
It was thus that the Gaunt Baron found her. The Gaunt Baron did not
belong to Yewcroft, but was attached to a neighbouring house, now empty.
With nobody to terrify at home, he found visits to the Blue Lady a not
unpleasing variant of the monotony. Except that she was several
centuries his junior, he felt for her an emotion which went to a
dangerous degree beyond respect. He was pained to find her wailing.
“What, wailing!” he cried, coming on her through the oaken panels, “and
nobody to hear you?”
The Blue Lady raised a tortured face towards him. “Who would not wail?
And who should hear me? Fools! They _can_ not hear me. Many of them do
not even see me. Bah! They have no sense, except the sense of taste:
with truffles before them, they see nothing else.”
“To-night is Christmas Eve.”
The Gaunt Baron made the suggestion in a mild, kindly way, but the Blue
Lady turned upon him almost angrily, as though he had been the culprit.
“Yes! To-night is Christmas Eve. And what are they doing? Where is the
Yule-log? Where is the wassail? Where the dim light of glowing embers?
They’ll sit in the glare of this new light—a big party—and play what
they call Bridge; and if they feel a mystic chill, will draw the
curtains or turn the hot-air pipes full on.... What do these fools know
about Romance? The word is dead. I saw some of their novels while the
house was shut. Love? Gallantry? Nowhere in the volume. A knock-kneed
weakling making love to his friend’s wife, or two infants puling of
passion like mere vulgar serfs.... Love, for these people, ends with
Marriage, to begin again after Divorce.”
[Illustration: “‘Do a cake-walk, now!’ ‘Encore!’” (page 153).]
“You are bitter.” The Gaunt Baron held his head beneath his arm—a fact
which gave to all his utterances something of the tone of a
ventriloquist.
“Bitter! So would you be bitter! It’s all very well for you, with the
Manor empty;—but me, with these vulgarians!... Baron, these mortals are
beating us: we’re pretty well played out. ‘Played out!’ Look at our very
speech: they’ve ruined that. Do I speak like a woman of the day of Good
Queen Bess? Do you speak like a baron of—of King—like an ancient baron?”
“You do not,—and it was Stephen,” said the Baron quietly.
“Mark me, Baron, we are near the end. Either Lady Silthirsk or myself
leaves Yewcroft. There is no room here for a self-respecting spectre.
They use the headsman’s block for mounting on their horses. If I cannot
drive them out, I go,—and where? Well, if I cannot leave the earth—oh,
why was I ever murdered?—then I must sleep beneath the hedges, till I
find an empty house. Baron, that time is near. I have tried everything,
and nothing seems to frighten them. Lady Silthirsk serves liqueurs in
the old Banquet Hall at midnight, and as I don’t appear,—as though I
should!—she says the theatre, is closed for alterations and repairs. Oh,
it is unbearable, unbearable!”
“Dear lady,” answered the Gaunt Baron, “do not despair. I managed to
say, some minutes ago, that it was Christmas Eve. Let me explain. It is
now close upon the hour of midnight—the time and day on which we ghosts
are thought by men to have our greatest power. Even those who don’t
believe in us are a little influenced by the tradition. As twelve
strikes every one is half expectant. That is your moment. Burst upon
them, wailing and raving. They are sure to see. Some of the guests will
insist on leaving Yewcroft, and the Silthirsks will not like a house
where parties are impossible. Quick! There is the gurgle that preludes
the hall-clock’s striking. In three minutes midnight will be here.
Hasten, sweet dame, hasten! I will be at hand to watch you.”
* * * * *
Downstairs, during this dialogue, Lady Silthirsk had been talking to her
niece. “Elfrida, dear, in a few minutes they’ll all be here for the
midnight _séance_; and I have something that I want to tell you first.”
“Why, what is it, auntie?” asked Elfrida: “you look terribly serious.”
“I am serious, darling girl. Let me be frank. I think it is time that
you were married—not only, understand, because of your poor parents, but
also for your own happiness. And when I see a man who can make you both
rich and happy, well——”
“But who?” interrupted Elfrida.
“_Who?_ My dear girl, are you blind! Why, Bobby!”
“Lord Bancourt?”
“Yes, ‘Lord Bancourt’! Don’t look as though I had shot you! Why, you
silly dear thing, you must know Bobby is madly in love with you. All
this week he has followed you about like an obedient dog, and all the
week you’ve ignored him as though he were a naughty mongrel!”
“Why, I’m sure I’ve treated him just like anybody else. I never——”
“My dear Elfrida, you will be the death of me! Do you think he wants no
more of you? Are you living in the Middle Ages, or is this the Twentieth
century? Do you expect him to come and steal you away by night and
force? Nowadays the girl must do her part. Bobby is a splendid fellow,
an old friend of mine, rich, young, passably good-looking——”
“I think he’s handsome, decidedly,” Elfrida said, without a thought, and
then blushed scarlet.
Her aunt laughed. “And _I_ think you’re in love with him,” she said. “I
know he only wants a little encouragement—not quite so much ice to the
square inch, my dear! Won’t you try, for my sake?”
“I’ll try, auntie, yes: I could be very, very happy with him—if he asked
me: but I don’t think I could—it’s so hard——”
Lady Silthirsk kissed her. “I don’t ask anything, you little goose,
except that you should be just humanly kind to poor Bobby—I think he’ll
do the rest!”
“I’ll _try_,” said Elfrida dubiously.
Her aunt, she reflected, was not of a nature to see how terrible it
would be if people should believe her to be “angling” for Lord Bancourt.
Better that he should choose some one else than that he should marry her
on such a rumour!
“Oh, here they are!” cried Lady Silthirsk, as her husband brought his
flock into the room, shouting:
“I’ve collected every one, gamblers and all, for the _séance_—except
Bobby. Can’t find him.”
“Oh, I wish he were here—the Lady will surely walk on Christmas Eve,”
said the hostess. “If she doesn’t, I mean to demand my money back! Oh,
there’s the hour! Sit quiet, every one.... Blue Lady forward, please!
There, look!—there!”
She pointed excitedly at the old gallery, once for minstrels, now
arrogated by a pianola organ. Behind its oaken pillars passed a vague
female figure, dressed in blue, moaning horribly, and waving distraught
arms above her flowing hair.
Immediately cries of every sort rose from the watchers.
“I can’t see her.” “It’s a cinematograph!” “What ho, Lord Bobby!” “Gad,
she’s gone slick through the music-stool.” “I still can’t see her.” “No,
there’s nothing there.” “Do a cakewalk, now!” “Encore!”
As she vanished some one clapped his hands, and with a laugh the whole
party joined in the applause.
The scene had not been very impressive. From a theatrical point of view
the ghost’s entrance had been ruined by the number and the temper of its
audience. Those who had not seen it scoffed; those who had, till
reminded of the music-stool seen dimly through the figure, half-believed
the Blue Lady to be an _alias_ of Lord Bancourt. Then, as one by one
they realised that what had passed was in very truth a ghost, the guests
hushed their laughter, until the babel sank almost into silence.
It was in such a lull that Bobby entered. “Why, what a stony _séance_!”
he exclaimed. “Missing me? or seen a ghost?”
“Yes—so delightful! The Blue Lady actually came,” said Lady Silthirsk,
who alone seemed totally unruffled.
Bobby laughed—the unforced laugh of healthy youth. “Oh-ho! I see why you
were silent. But you can’t green me, thanks: I’m not quite so verdant—oh
no, not at all!”
“We have seen it—really,” one or two guests hastened to assure him.
Lord Bancourt laughed more heartily than ever. “Why, I believe you’ve
honestly deceived yourselves! This is glorious! You really think you saw
the ghost!”
“Who could doubt?” asked a plump dowager, who intended henceforth to
adopt a pose intensely spiritual. “What doubt exists, when the great
After lifts its veil? Have _you_ ever seen a ghost, Lord Bancourt?”
Bobby tried to hide his smiles. “I’m afraid—and glad—I haven’t. If I
did, I should go off my nut, I think. But I don’t think I ever shall!”
With these words he moved towards the circle of ghost-seers, and chose,
with unerring aim, of all the vacant chairs, that next Elfrida.
Lady Silthirsk beamed contentedly.
“I seem to have missed a lot,” said the irrepressible Bobby, as he sat
down, and added impudently, “but I hope that I’ve been missed a lot?”
Elfrida remembered her aunt’s warning, but she also fancied (as the
self-conscious will) that all the gathering, still somewhat silent, had
heard the question, and would hear the answer. She could fancy their
scorn at her “scheming tactics.”
Bobby looked expectantly towards her.
“It was certainly a unique experience,” she said stiffly.
Bobby’s face fell.
Lady Silthirsk shrugged her shoulders.
* * * * *
“There!” exclaimed the Blue Lady, safe within the Panelled Room, “I knew
how your mad scheme would work. You heard: they catcalled, they encored
me, asked for some new dance. They gave me a round of applause when I
went off. I can stay here no longer, to be insulted.”
“Always impetuous!” said the Gaunt Baron quietly. “You rushed off after
the applause: I waited, and heard what alters the whole question.”
“Namely——?” asked the Lady, in ill temper.
“Lord Bancourt did not see you—has never seen a ghost—doesn’t believe in
them. He said distinctly, ‘If I saw one, I should go off my nut,’—this
being schoolboy and smart for going mad.”
“I begin to see.” The Blue Lady brightened visibly.
“Exactly. You must catch him alone—no more of these convivial
audiences—and then drive him mad. He is an old friend of Lady Silthirsk,
rich and titled; she would not stay here after that. You must wreak your
worst on him.”
“I can only wail,” she answered gloomily; “I have no chains, or blood,
or severed head——”
The words inspired the headless Baron.
“Ah,” he cried, “I will come and help—to-night. I ought not to show
myself out of my own house, but——”
“Oh, what is etiquette in such a crisis? Baron, dear Baron, you have
saved me. I am an old-fashioned woman, and at such a time I need a
man....”
* * * * *
It was night. It had, to be precise, been night for several hours, and
the whole household was at length tucked up in bed. Sleep had come none
too easily to at least three members,—to Elfrida worrying about the real
sentiments of Bobby, to Bobby worrying about the real sentiments of
Elfrida, and to Lady Silthirsk worrying about the real sentiments of
both. The last named, in particular, tossed long upon her sleepless bed.
She was puzzled. She could half understand Elfrida’s foolish diffidence:
she could not understand Bobby’s idiotic silence. Why did he not speak?
He was not of a sort to be lightly daunted by the fear of a rebuff. Or
had she made a false diagnosis? Was he not in love at all?
And at length even she turned over on her side with a contented groan.
Sleep reigned over Yewcroft Hall.
But in Bobby’s room, far off along the west wing, dark deeds were
decidedly afoot. For more than half an hour a headless Knight, clanking
horribly in every joint of his dim-gleaming armour, had chased to and
fro a blue-clad Lady, who wailed in awful wise and tossed arms of agony
to the wall-papered ceiling.
Through all this Lord Bancourt slept smilingly upon his noble bed.
Then the Gaunt Baron consulted with the Blue Lady, and a change of
tactics was the result. The armoured figure now rattled round the room,
rousing more noise than any antiquated motor, the while a frantic dame
pursued him with blood-curdling wails.
Bobby stirred a little, murmured sleepily, turned over, and showed every
symptom of having relapsed into even deeper slumber.
The ghosts were in despair.
“Dawn draws on,” said the Gaunt Baron suddenly. “I always knew when I
was beaten. Come, sweet dame. A man who can sleep like that will make
his mark some day in the House of Lords.”
He vanished, and, after one despairing glance, the Blue Lady flung
herself angrily through the oaken door.
It was at this moment, by a subtle irony of fate, that Lord Bancourt
awoke. The sense of some presence lingered with him, and he sat upright
in bed. His sleepy eyes were caught by a blue skirt which vanished from
the doorway; his sleepy mind failed to perceive that the door had not
been open.
“Whew!” he said, and lay thinking, thinking deeply—for Lord Bancourt.
He was very young, and, like most young nobles, not inclined to
underestimate his own importance. After the first moment of surprise, he
felt no doubt as to the wearer of the blue skirt. It was Elfrida. He was
rather unobservant as to women’s dresses “and all that, you know”: but
he felt fairly certain that she had worn a blue costume at dinner. Yes,
it could be no one else. It was almost certainly Elfrida.
Elfrida’s iciness was but a cloak. When she had snubbed him by day, she
would creep in by night and gaze upon his sleeping, moonlit face! How
beautiful!
His heart thrilled at the revelation. He had hesitated, so far, to
speak. It would never do for him—Lord Bancourt—to risk refusal by a
nobody. His mother, in her long course of tuition, had taught him proper
pride. But now....
Now, at the first chance, he would throw himself, his rank, his wealth,
his everything before the nobody, and feel no fear as to the verdict.
To-morrow—to-morrow!
And when to-morrow came, as it does sometimes come despite the proverb,
he rose early and went out in the garden. As he had shaved each morning,
he had seen Elfrida walking in the grounds below. He had never dared to
join her. Everything, to-day, was different, though the weather was
certainly absurdly cold for early rising.
She was there before him, in among the white, hoar-laden, yew walks. She
turned at his coming. “You are early this morning, Lord Bancourt.”
“Ah,” he responded meaningly, “the early bird catches the first worm.”
It struck him, for the moment, as a compliment, and rather neat. But he
pined for something less indefinite. “Elfrida,” he said, going close to
her, “I may call you Elfrida?—I could not wait. You encouraged me last
night, you gave me hope, and now—I want more. You won’t take even that
away? I want far more. I want you—I want you to be my wife. Will you,
Elfrida? Don’t be cruel. I want you to say ‘yes’!”
Elfrida’s head was in a whirl. She did not know how she had encouraged
him. She could remember nothing of last night, except that she had lost
a chance—that he had seemed offended. She could not guess at what had
changed his attitude. She only knew that what her aunt wanted—above all,
what she herself longed for—had somehow come to pass; only knew that her
loved one’s arms were round her. She said “Yes.”
* * * * *
“Sweet dame,” said the Gaunt Baron, later, in the Panelled Room, “I have
been scouting, and, alas! bring evil news. Lord Bancourt took you last
night for Elfrida, was encouraged to propose, and is accepted. Lady
Silthirsk is delighted, says the wedding shall be here, and she must
turn this dear chamber into a dressing-room. She says she will clear out
the musty panelling. It is all unfortunate.”
“Unfortunate!” wailed the Blue Lady. “It all comes of listening to a
man. See what your mad scheme has done!... Baron, forgive my
bitterness,—I am defeated. I told you these mortals had vanquished us. I
set out to do a little evil, in the good old way, and see what I have
done! I have made everybody happy! Farewell. Yewcroft must know me no
more. Farewell, farewell for ever!”
With an abysmal groan she vanished through the panelling. Unless she has
found an ancient, empty house, she is perhaps sleeping underneath the
hedges.