LITMIR.BIZ

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Where should I go? Where ought I to go if my adventure were to prove successful?

      I glanced at the narrow, tortuous staircase winding upwards into the grim possibilities of the deserted hall and landings—and—my courage failed.

      Here, at least, I was safe! Should the Unknown approach me, I could escape by the same window through which I had entered. I felt I dare not! I really COULD not go any further. Seized with a sudden panic at nothing more substantial than my own thoughts, I was groping my way backwards to the window when a revulsion of feeling made me pause. If all men were poltroons, how much would humanity ever know of the Occult? We should leave off where we began, and it had ever been my ambition to go—FURTHER.

      My self-respect returning, I felt in my pocket for pencil, notebook and revolver, and trimming my lamp I mounted the stairs.

      A house of such minute dimensions did not take long to explore; what rooms there were, were Lilliputian—mere boxes; the walls from which hung the tattered remnants of the most offensively inartistic papers were too obviously Jerry built; the wainscoting was scarred, the beading broken, not a door fitted, not a window that was not either loose or sashless—the entire house was rotten, paltry, mean; I would not have had it as a gift. But where could I wait to see the ghost? Disgust at my surroundings had, for a time, made me forget my fears; these now returned reinforced: I thought of Miss Rudd’s comparison with a morgue—and shuddered. The rooms looked ghastly! Selecting the landing at the foot of the upper storey, I sat down, my back against the wall—and—waited.

      Confronting me was the staircase leading up and down, equally dark, equally ghostly; on my right was what might once have been the drawing-room, but was now a grim conglomeration of bare boards and moonlight, and on my left was an open window directly overtopping the broad expanse of colourless, motionless water. Twelve o’clock struck, the friendly footsteps of a pedestrian died away in the distance; I was now beyond the pale of assistance, alone and deserted—deserted by all save the slimy, creeping insects below—and the shadows. Yes! the shadows; and as I watched them sporting phantastically at my feet, I glanced into the darkness beyond—and shivered.

      All was now intensely suggestive and still, the road alone attractive; and despite my spartonic resolutions I would have given much to be out in the open.

      The landing was so cramped, so hopeless.

      A fresh shadow, the shadow of a leaf that had hitherto escaped my notice, now attracted and appalled me; the scratching of an insect made my heart stand still; my sight and hearing were painfully acute; a familiar and sickly sensation gradually crept over me, the throbbing of my heart increased, the most inconceivable and desperate terror laid hold of me: the house was no longer empty—the supernatural had come! Something, I knew not, I dare not think what, was below, and I KNEW it would ascend.

      All the ideas I had previously entertained of addressing the ghost and taking notes were entirely annihilated by my fear—fear mingled with a horrible wonder as to what form the apparition would take, and I found myself praying Heaven it might not be that of an ELEMENTAL.

      The THING had now crossed the hall (I knew this somehow instinctively) and was beginning to mount the stairs.

      I could not cry out, I could not stir, I could not close my eyes: I could only sit there staring at the staircase in the most awful of dumb, apprehensive agonies. The THING drew nearer, nearer; up, up, UP it came until I could see it at last—see the shock-head of red hair, the white cheeks, the pale, staring eyes, all rendered hideously ghastly by the halo of luminous light that played around it. This was a ghost—an apparition—a bonâ fide phantasm of the dead! And without any display of physical power—it overcame me.

      Happily for me, the duration of its passage was brief.

      It came within a yard of me, the water dripping from its clinging clothes, yet leaving no marks on the flooring. It thrust its face forward; I thought it was going to touch me, and tried to shrink away from it, but could not. Yet it did nothing but stare at me, and its eyes were all the more horrible because they were blank; not diabolical, as Miss Rudd had described them, but simply Blank!—Blank with the glassiness of the Dead.

      Gliding past with a slightly swaying motion, it climbed upstairs, the night air blowing through the bedraggled dress in a horribly natural manner; I watched it till it was out of sight with bated breath—for a second or so it stopped irresolutely beside an open window; there was a slight movement as of some one mounting the sill: a mad, hilarious chuckle, a loud splash—and then—silence, after which I went home.

      I subsequently discovered that early in the seventies a servant-girl, who was in service at that house, had committed suicide in the manner I have just described, but whether or not she had RED HAIR I have never been able to ascertain.

      P.S.—The Ghost I am informed on very reliable authority, is still (August 1908) to be seen.

MULREADY VILLA, NEAR

       BASINGSTOKE

       THE BLACK CLOCK

       Table of Contents

      Technical form of apparition: Either a phantasm of the dead or sub-human elemental

      Source of authenticity: Eye-witness

      Cause of haunting: A matter of surmise

      When I was reading for the Royal Irish Constabulary at that excellent and ever-popular Queen’s Service Academy in Dublin, I made many friends among my fellow students, certain of whom it has been my good fortune to meet in after life.

      Quite recently, for example, whilst on a visit of enjoyment to London, I ran up against T. at Daly’s Theatre. T, one of the best-hearted fellows who ever trod in Ely Square, passed in second for the Royal Irish Constabulary, and is now a District Inspector in some outlandish village in Connemara.

      And again, a summer or two ago, when I was on the pier at Bournemouth, I “plumped” myself down on a seat near to “G,” who, although never a very great friend of mine, I was uncommonly glad to meet under the circumstances.

      But last year I was unusually lucky, chancing to find, a passenger on the same boat as myself, Harry O’Moore, one of my very best “chums,” from whom I learned the following story:

      “You must know,” he began, as we sat on deck watching the lofty outlines of St. David’s Head slowly fade in the distance, “you must know, O’Donnell, that after leaving Crawley’s I inherited a nice little sum of money from my aunt, Lady Maughan of Blackrock, who, dying quite unexpectedly, left the bulk of her property to my family. My brother Bob had her estate in Roscommon; Charley, the house near Dublin; whilst I—lucky beggar that I am—(for I was head over heels in debt at the time) suddenly found myself the happy possessor of £20,000 and—a bog-oak grandfather clock.”

      Here I thought fit to interrupt.

      “A bog-oak clock!” I exclaimed. “Good gracious me! what a funny legacy! Had you taken a fancy to it?”

      “I had never even seen it!” O’Moore laughed—then, looking suddenly serious: “My aunt, O’Donnell, as I daresay you recollect, was rather dry and satirical. The clock has not been exactly a pleasant acquisition to my establishment; so I fancy she may have bequeathed it to me as a sort of antidote to the exhilarating effect of £20,000. A sort of ‘bitter with the sweet,’ don’t you know! You appear astonished! You would like to hear more about the clock? And you are quite right, too; the history of a really antique piece of furniture is a million times more interesting a subject to discuss than a ton of gold. To begin with, it was almost as new to my aunt as to me; she had only had it a week before she died, and during that brief interval she had made up her mind to leave it to me. Odd, was it not? I thought so, too, at her funeral! Now it seems quite natural; I was her metaphysician, I knew her and understood her idiosyncrasies better than most people. She bought the clock for a mere song from a second-hand furniture dealer in Grafton Street. I was living at the time near Basingstoke in a small house—one of those horrible anachronisms, an up-to-date

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