On the other side, however, visions which had nothing sacred in them
began to be heard of, and "Connie's ghost," as it was called in the
house, had various vulgar effects. A housemaid became hysterical, and
announced that she too had seen the lady, of whom she gave a description,
exaggerated from Connie's, which all the household were ready to swear
she had never heard. The lady, whom Connie had only seen passing, went to
Betsey's room in the middle of the night, and told her, in a hollow and
terrible voice, that she could not rest, opening a series of
communications by which it was evident all the secrets of the unseen
world would soon be disclosed. And following upon this, there came a sort
of panic in the house; noises were heard in various places, sounds of
footsteps pacing, and of a long robe sweeping about the passages; and
Lady Mary's costumes, and the head-dress which was so peculiar, which all
her friends had recognized in Connie's description, grew into something
portentous under the heavier hand of the foot-boy and the kitchen-maid.
Mrs. Prentiss, who had remained, as a special favor to the new people,
was deeply indignant and outraged by this treatment of her mistress. She
appealed to Mary with mingled anger and tears.
"I would have sent the hussy away at an hour's notice, if I had the power
in my hands," she cried, "but, Miss Mary, it's easily seen who is a real
lady and who is not. Mrs. Turner interferes herself in everything, though
she likes it to be supposed that she has a housekeeper."
"Dear Prentiss, you must not say Mrs. Turner is not a lady. She has far
more delicacy of feeling than many ladies," cried Mary.
"Yes, Miss Mary, dear, I allow that she is very nice to you; but who
could help that? and to hear my lady's name--that might have her faults,
but who was far above anything of the sort--in every mouth, and her
costume, that they don't know how to describe, and to think that _she_
would go and talk to the like of Betsy Barnes about what is on her mind!
I think sometimes I shall break my, heart, or else throw up my place,
Miss Mary," Prentiss said, with tears.
"Oh, don't do that; oh, don't leave me, Prentiss!" Mary said, with an
involuntary cry of dismay.
"Not if you mind, not if you mind, dear," the housekeeper cried. And then
she drew close to the young lady with an anxious look. "You haven't seen
anything?" she said. "That would be only natural, Miss Mary. I could well
understand she couldn't rest in her grave,--if she came and told it all
to you."
"Prentiss, be silent," cried Mary; "that ends everything between you and
me, if you say such a word. There has been too much said already,--oh,
far too much! as if I only loved her for what she was to leave me."
"I did not mean that, dear," said Prentiss; "but--"
"There is no but; and everything she did was right," the girl cried with
vehemence. She shed hot and bitter tears over this wrong which all her
friends did to Lady Mary's memory. "I am glad it was so," she said to
herself when she was alone, with youthful extravagance. "I am glad it was
so; for now no one can think that I loved her for anything but herself."
The household, however, was agitated by all these rumors and inventions.
Alice, Connie's elder sister, declined to sleep any longer in that which
began to be called the haunted room. She, too, began to think she saw
something, she could not tell what, gliding out of the room as it began
to get dark, and to hear sighs and moans in the corridors. The servants,
who all wanted to leave, and the villagers, who avoided the grounds after
nightfall, spread the rumor far and near that the house was haunted.