The ghost of Charlotte Cray, and other stories
She stood there, looking Mrs. Emily full in the face, but only for a
moment, for, even as she gazed, the lineaments grew less and less
distinct, with the shape of the figure that supported them, until,
with a crash, the apparition seemed to fall in and disappear, and the
place that had known her was filled with empty air.
“Where is she gone?” exclaimed Mrs. Braggett, in a tone of utter
amazement.
“Where is _who_ gone?” repeated Mr. Braggett, hardly able to
articulate from fear.
“The lady in the chair!”
“There was no one there except in your own imagination. It was my
great-coat that you mistook for a figure,” returned her husband
hastily, as he threw the article in question over the back of the
arm-chair.
“But how could that have been?” said his pretty wife, rubbing her
eyes. “How could I think a coat had eyes, and hair, and features? I am
_sure_ I saw a woman seated there, and that she rose and stared at me.
Siggy! tell me it was true. It seems so incomprehensible that I should
have been mistaken.”
“You must question your own sense. You see that the room is empty now,
except for ourselves, and you know that no one has left it. If you
like to search under the table, you can.”
“Ah! now, Siggy, you are laughing at me, because you know that would
be folly. But there was certainly some one here--only, where can she
have disappeared to?”
“Suppose we discuss the matter at a more convenient season,” replied
Mr. Braggett, as he drew his wife’s arm through his arm. “Hewetson!
you will be able to tell Mr. Hume that he was mistaken. Say, also,
that I shall not be back in the office to-day. I am not so strong as I
thought I was, and feel quite unequal to business. Tell him to come
out to Streatham this evening with my letters, and I will talk with
him there.”
What passed at that interview was never disclosed; but pretty Mrs.
Braggett was much rejoiced, a short time afterwards, by her husband
telling her that he had resolved to resign his active share of the
business, and devote the rest of his life to her and Violet Villa. He
would have no more occasion, therefore, to visit the office, and be
exposed to the temptation of spending four or five hours out of every
twelve away from her side. For, though Mrs. Emily had arrived at the
conclusion that the momentary glimpse she caught of a lady in Siggy’s
office must have been a delusion, she was not quite satisfied by his
assertions that she would never have found a more tangible cause for
her jealousy.
But Sigismund Braggett knew more than he chose to tell Mrs. Emily. He
knew that what she had witnessed was no delusion, but a reality; and
that Charlotte Cray had carried out her dying determination to call at
his office and his private residence, _until she had seen his wife!_
THE INVISIBLE TENANTS OF
RUSHMERE.
“On the banks of the Wye, Monmouthshire.--To be Let, furnished, a
commodious Family Mansion, surrounded with park-like grounds. Stabling
and every convenience. Only two and a-half miles from station, church,
and post-office. Excellent fishing to be procured in the
neighbourhood. Rent nominal to a responsible tenant.”
Such, with a few trifling additions, was the advertisement that caught
my eye in the spring of 18--.
“My dear Jane,” I said, as I handed the paper over to my wife, “this,
I think, is the very thing we want.”
I was a London practitioner, with a numerous family and a large circle
of patients; but the two facts, though blessings in themselves, were
not without their disadvantages.
The hostages which I had given to fortune had made that strenuous
action which attention to my numerous patients supplied incumbent on
me; but the consequent anxiety and want of rest had drawn so largely
on my mental and physical resources, that there was no need for my
professional brethren to warn me of the necessity of change and
country air. I felt myself that I was breaking down, and had already
made arrangements with a friend to take my practice for a few months,
and set me at liberty to attend to my own health. And being
passionately fond of fishing, and all country pleasures and pursuits,
and looking forward with zest to a period of complete quiet, the
residence alluded to (if it fulfilled the promise of its
advertisement) appeared to be all that I could desire.
“Park-like grounds!” exclaimed my wife, with animation. “How the dear
children will enjoy themselves.”
“And two and a-half miles from church or station,” I responded
eagerly. “No neighbours, excellent fishing, and at a nominal rent. It
sounds too good to be true.”
“Oh, Arthur! you must write, and obtain all the particulars this very
day. If you put it off, some one will be sure to take the house before
we have time to do so.”
“I shall go and see the city agents at once,” I replied, resolutely.
“It is too rare an opportunity to be lost. Only, don’t raise your
hopes too high, my dear. Advertisements are apt to be deceptive.”
But when I had seen Messrs. Quibble & Lye on the subject, it really
seemed as though for once they had spoken the truth. Rushmere, the
house in question, had been built and furnished for his own use by an
old gentleman, who died shortly afterwards, and his heirs, not liking
the situation, had placed the property in the agents’ hands for
letting. The owners were wealthy, cared little for money, and had
authorised the agents to let the house on any reasonable terms, and it
was really a bargain to anyone that wanted it. They frankly admitted
that the loneliness of the position of Rushmere was the reason of its
cheapness; but when I heard the rent at which they offered to let me
take it, if approved of, for three months, I was quite ready to agree
with Messrs. Quibble & Lye in their idea of a bargain, and that, for
those who liked solitude, Rushmere offered extraordinary advantages.
Armed with the necessary authority, I found my way down into
Monmouthshire, to inspect the premises on the following day; and when
I saw Rushmere, I felt still more disposed to be surprised at the
opportunity afforded me, and to congratulate myself on the promptitude
with which I had embraced it. I found it to be a good-sized country
house, comfortably furnished, and, to all appearance, well built,
standing in enclosed grounds, and on a healthy elevation; but,
notwithstanding its isolated situation, I was too much a man of the
world to believe, under the circumstances, that its greatest
disadvantage lay in that fact. Accordingly, I peered eagerly about for
damp walls, covered cesspools, unsteady joists, or tottering
foundations, but I could find none.
“The chimneys smoke, I suppose?” I remarked, in a would-be careless
tone, to the old woman whom I found in charge of the house, and who
crept after me wherever I went.
“Chimbleys smoke, sir? Not as I knows of.”
“The roof leaks, perhaps?”
“Deary me, no. You won’t find a spot of damp, look where you may.”
“Then there’s been a fever, or some infectious disorder in the house?”
“A fever, sir? Why, the place has been empty these six months. The
last tenants left at Christmas.”
“Empty for six months!” I exclaimed. “How long is it, then, since the
gentleman who built it died?”
“Old Mr. Bennett, sir? He’s been dead a matter of fifteen years or
more.”
“Indeed! Then why don’t the owners of the place sell it, instead of
letting it stand vacant?” thought I to myself.
But I did not say so to the old woman, who was looking up in my face,
as though anxious to learn what my decision would be.
“No vermin, I hope?” I suggested, as a last resource. “You are not
troubled with rats or mice at night, are you?”
“Oh, I don’t sleep here at night, sir, thank heaven!” she answered in
a manner which appeared to me unnecessarily energetic. “I am only
employed by day to air the house, and show it to strangers. I go home
to my own people at night.”
“And where do your people live?”
“Better than half a mile from here, sir, and ours is the nearest
cottage to Rushmere.”
And then--apprehensive, perhaps, that her information might prove a
drawback to the letting of the property--she added, quickly,--
“Not but what it’s a nice place to live in, is Rushmere, and very
convenient, though a bit lonesome.”
I perfectly agreed with her, the “lonesomeness” of the situation
proving no detraction in my eyes.
On my return to London I gave my wife so glowing a description of the
house and its surroundings, that she urged me to conclude the bargain
at once; and, in the course of a few weeks, I and my family were
transplanted from the purlieus of Bayswater to the banks of the Wye.
It was the middle of May when we took possession, and the country wore
its most attractive garb. The children were wild with delight at being
let loose in the flower-bespangled fields, and, as I watched the
tributaries of the river, and perceived the excellent sport they
promised me, I felt scarcely less excited than the children. Only my
wife, I thought, became inoculated with some of the absurd fears of
the domestics we had brought with us from town, and seemed to consider
the locality more lonely and unprotected than she had expected to find
it.
“It’s a charming place, Arthur,” she acknowledged, “and marvellously
cheap; but it is certainly a long way from other houses. I find we
shall have to send for everything to the town. Not even the country
carts, with butter and poultry, seem to call at Rushmere.”
“My dear Jane, I told you distinctly that it was two and a-half miles
from church or station, and you read it for yourself in the paper. But
I thought we looked out for a retreat where we should run no risk of
being intruded on by strangers.”
“Oh yes, of course; only there are not even any farmhouses or cottages
near Rushmere, you see; and it would be so very easy for anyone to
break in at night, and rob us.”
“Pooh, nonsense! What will you be afraid of next? The locks and bolts
are perfectly secure, and both Dawson and I have firearms, and are
ready to use them. Your fears are childish, Janie.”
But all my arguments were unavailing, and each day my wife grew more
nervous, and less willing to be left alone. So much so, indeed, that I
made a practice of seeing that the house fastenings were properly
secured each night myself, and of keeping a loaded revolver close to
my hand, in case of need. But it damped my pleasure, to find that Jane
was not enjoying herself; and the country looked less beautiful to me
than it had done at first. One night I suddenly awoke, to find that
she was sitting up in bed, and in an attitude of expectation.
“My dear, what is the matter with you?”
“Oh, hush! I am sure that I hear footsteps on the stairs--footsteps
creeping up and down.”
I listened with her, but could detect no sound whatever.
“Lie down again, Jane--it is only your imagination. Every one is fast
asleep in bed.”
“I assure you, Arthur, I am not mistaken. Once they came quite near
the door.”
“If so, it can only be one of the servants. You don’t wish me to get
up and encounter Mary or Susan in her night-dress, do you? Consider my
morals!”
“Oh no, of course not,” she replied with a faint smile; yet it was
some time before she fell to sleep again.
It was not many nights before my wife roused me again with the same
complaint.
“Arthur, don’t call me silly, but I am _certain_ I heard something.”
To appease her fears, I shook off my drowsiness, and, with a lighted
candle, made a tour of the house; but all was as I had left it.
Once, indeed, I imagined that I heard at my side the sound of a quick
breathing; but that I knew must be sheer fancy, since I was alone.
The only circumstance that startled me was finding Dawson, the man
servant, who slept on the ground floor, also awake, and listening at
his door.