'No, I don't speak from knowledge, only from hope. I have never had any
luck--I have never stayed in a dangerous house. The places I go to are
always as safe as Charing Cross. I want to see--whatever there is, the
regular thing. _Is_ there a ghost here?'
'Of course there is--a rattling good one.'
'And have you seen him?'
'Oh, don't ask me what _I've_ seen--I should tax your credulity. I don't
like to talk of these things. But there are two or three as bad--that
is, as good!--rooms as you'll find anywhere.'
'Do you mean in my corridor?' Lyon asked.
'I believe the worst is at the far end. But you would be ill-advised to
sleep there.'
'Ill-advised?'
'Until you've finished your job. You'll get letters of importance the
next morning, and you'll take the 10.20.'
'Do you mean I will invent a pretext for running away?'
'Unless you are braver than almost any one has ever been. They don't
often put people to sleep there, but sometimes the house is so crowded
that they have to. The same thing always happens--ill-concealed
agitation at the breakfast-table and letters of the greatest importance.
Of course it's a bachelor's room, and my wife and I are at the other end
of the house. But we saw the comedy three days ago--the day after we got
here. A young fellow had been put there--I forget his name--the house
was so full; and the usual consequence followed. Letters at
breakfast--an awfully queer face--an urgent call to town--so very sorry
his visit was cut short. Ashmore and his wife looked at each other, and
off the poor devil went.'
'Ah, that wouldn't suit me; I must paint my picture,' said Lyon. 'But do
they mind your speaking of it? Some people who have a good ghost are
very proud of it, you know.'
What answer Colonel Capadose was on the point of making to this inquiry
our hero was not to learn, for at that moment their host had walked into
the room accompanied by three or four gentlemen. Lyon was conscious
that he was partly answered by the Colonel's not going on with the
subject. This however on the other hand was rendered natural by the fact
that one of the gentlemen appealed to him for an opinion on a point
under discussion, something to do with the everlasting history of the
day's run. To Lyon himself Mr. Ashmore began to talk, expressing his
regret at having had so little direct conversation with him as yet. The
topic that suggested itself was naturally that most closely connected
with the motive of the artist's visit. Lyon remarked that it was a great
disadvantage to him not to have had some preliminary acquaintance with
Sir David--in most cases he found that so important. But the present
sitter was so far advanced in life that there was doubtless no time to
lose. 'Oh, I can tell you all about him,' said Mr. Ashmore; and for half
an hour he told him a good deal. It was very interesting as well as very
eulogistic, and Lyon could see that he was a very nice old man, to have
endeared himself so to a son who was evidently not a gusher. At last he
got up--he said he must go to bed if he wished to be fresh for his work
in the morning. To which his host replied, 'Then you must take your
candle; the lights are out; I don't keep my servants up.'
In a moment Lyon had his glimmering taper in hand, and as he was leaving
the room (he did not disturb the others with a good-night; they were
absorbed in the lemon-squeezer and the soda-water cork) he remembered
other occasions on which he had made his way to bed alone through a
darkened country-house; such occasions had not been rare, for he was
almost always the first to leave the smoking-room. If he had not stayed
in houses conspicuously haunted he had, none the less (having the
artistic temperament), sometimes found the great black halls and
staircases rather 'creepy': there had been often a sinister effect, to
his imagination, in the sound of his tread in the long passages or the
way the winter moon peeped into tall windows on landings. It occurred to
him that if houses without supernatural pretensions could look so wicked
at night, the old corridors of Stayes would certainly give him a
sensation. He didn't know whether the proprietors were sensitive; very
often, as he had said to Colonel Capadose, people enjoyed the
impeachment. What determined him to speak, with a certain sense of the
risk, was the impression that the Colonel told queer stories. As he had
his hand on the door he said to Arthur Ashmore, 'I hope I shan't meet
any ghosts.'
'Any ghosts?'
'You ought to have some--in this fine old part.'
'We do our best, but _que voulez-vous_?' said Mr. Ashmore. 'I don't
think they like the hot-water pipes.'
'They remind them too much of their own climate? But haven't you a
haunted room--at the end of my passage?'
'Oh, there are stories--we try to keep them up.'
'I should like very much to sleep there,' Lyon said.
'Well, you can move there to-morrow if you like.'
'Perhaps I had better wait till I have done my work.'
'Very good; but you won't work there, you know. My father will sit to
you in his own apartments.'
'Oh, it isn't that; it's the fear of running away, like that gentleman
three days ago.'
'Three days ago? What gentleman?' Mr. Ashmore asked.
'The one who got urgent letters at breakfast and fled by the 10.20. Did
he stand more than one night?'
'I don't know what you are talking about. There was no such
gentleman--three days ago.'
'Ah, so much the better,' said Lyon, nodding good-night and departing.
He took his course, as he remembered it, with his wavering candle, and,
though he encountered a great many gruesome objects, safely reached the
passage out of which his room opened. In the complete darkness it seemed
to stretch away still further, but he followed it, for the curiosity of
the thing, to the end. He passed several doors with the name of the room
painted upon them, but he found nothing else. He was tempted to try the
last door--to look into the room of evil fame; but he reflected that
this would be indiscreet, since Colonel Capadose handled the brush--as a
_raconteur_--with such freedom. There might be a ghost and there might
not; but the Colonel himself, he inclined to think, was the most
mystifying figure in the house.