The sharp rustle of her dress as she suddenly rose struck upon my ear.
"Then let us go," she cried, with just a slight quiver of eagerness in
her wonderful voice. I comprehended its culture now. "The place is
ghostly at this hour of the night. I believe that I am really afraid."
With a muttered reassurance, I allowed the full light of the lantern to
fall directly on her face. She _was_ afraid. There was no other
explanation possible for her wild staring eyes and blue quivering lips.
For the instant I hardly knew her; then her glance rose to mine and she
smiled and it was with difficulty I refrained from acknowledging in
words my appreciation of her wonderful flexibility of expression.
"You are astonished to see me so affected," she said. "It is not so
strange as you think--it is superstition--the horror of what once
happened here--the reason for that partition--I know the whole story,
for all my attempts to deny it just now. The hour, too, is
unfortunate--the darkness--your shifting, mysterious light. It was late
like this--and dark--with just the moon to illumine the scene, when
she--Mr. Trevitt, do you want to know the story of this place?--the old,
much guessed-at, never-really-understood story which led first to its
complete abandonment, then to the building of that dividing wall and
finally to the restoration of this portion and of this alone? Do you?"
Her eagerness, in such startling contrast to the reticence she had shown
on this very subject a few minutes before, affected me peculiarly. I
wanted to hear the story--any one would who had listened to the gossip
of this neighborhood for years, but--
She evidently did not mean to give me time to understand my own
hesitation.
"I have the whole history--the touching, hardly-to-be-believed
history--up at my house at this very moment. It was written by--no, I
will let you guess."
The naivete of her smile made me forget the force of its late
expression.
"Mr. Ocumpaugh?" I ventured.
"Which Mr. Ocumpaugh? There have been so many." She began slowly,
naturally, to move toward the door.
"I can not guess."
"Then I shall have to tell you. It was written by the one who--Come! I
will tell you outside. I haven't any courage here."
"But I have."
"You haven't read the story."
"Never mind; tell me who the writer was."
"Mr. Ocumpaugh's father; he, by whose orders this partition was put up."
"Oh, you have _his_ story--written--and by himself! You are fortunate,
Mrs. Carew."
I had turned the lantern from her face, but not so far that I did not
detect the deep flush which dyed her whole countenance at these words.
"I am," she emphatically returned, meeting my eyes with a steady look I
was not sufficiently expert with women's ways, or at all events with
this woman's ways, to understand. "Seldom has such a tale been
written--seldom, let us thank God, has there been an equal occasion for
it."
"You interest me," I said.
And she did. Little as this history might have to do with the finding of
Gwendolen, I felt an almost imperative necessity of satisfying my
curiosity in regard to it, though I knew she had deliberately roused
this curiosity for a purpose which, if not comprehensible to me, was of
marked importance to her and not altogether for the reason she had been
pleased to give me. Possibly it was on account of this last mentioned
conviction that I allowed myself to be so interested.
"It is late," she murmured with a final glance towards those dismal
hangings which in my present mood I should not have been so greatly
surprised to see stir under her look. "However, if you will pardon the
hour and accept a seat in my small library, I will show you what only
one other person has seen besides myself."