Twenty-Five Ghost Stories
room where the rest were. This window was near one end on the ocean
side, and as I came around the corner I stopped as if I had been shot,
and my hair raised straight up on top of my head. Right there in front
of that window stood a woman looking out over the sea, and in her arms
she held a little child. I saw her as plain as I see you now. It seemed
to me like an hour she stood there, but I don’t suppose it was a second;
then she was gone. When I could move I looked around for the other boys,
and they were standing there paralyzed. They had seen the woman, too. We
didn’t say much, and we didn’t sleep much that night, and the next night
we bunked out on the beach. The rest of the crowd made all manner of
fun of us, but we had had all the ghost we wanted, and I never set foot
inside the old house after that.”
“When did it burn down, Captain?” I asked, as Jim relapsed into silence.
“Somewhere about twenty-five years ago. A beach party had been roasting
clams in the old oven, and in some way the fire got to the woodwork. It
was as dry as tinder, and I hope the ghosts were all burnt up with it.”
A MISFIT GHOST.
Every boy with a knowledge of adventurous literature, otherwise “novels
of action,” knows of the “phantom ship,” the spook of the high seas.
But it has not been known that ships themselves are haunted, and that in
the service of the United States Coast Survey there is a vessel now in
commission that is by her own officers supposed to be haunted.
Yet the Eagre, a 140-foot schooner of the coast survey, is looked upon
in the service as a very undesirable vessel to be aboard of. About her
there is an atmosphere of gloom that wardroom jest cannot dispel.
Duty on board her has been shunned as would be a pestilence, and stories
have been told by officers who have cruised aboard her that are not good
for timid people to hear. Officers have hesitated about telling these
uncanny stories, but they have become sufficiently well known to make a
billet to duty aboard the Eagre unwelcome among the coast survey men.
The Mohawk was launched June 10, 1875, at Greenpoint, and she was then
the largest sailing yacht afloat.
William T. Garner, her young millionaire owner, was very proud of his
new craft, and all the then leaders of New York society were invited to
participate in the good time afloat with which her launching was
celebrated. Commodore Garner, then but thirty-three years old, and his
young wife entertained charmingly, and the trim, speedy Mohawk was
christened with unusually merry festivities. Soon after that she was
capsized by a sudden squall off the landing at Stapleton, N. Y., and six
people were drowned like rats in her cabin and forecastle.
Then the Mohawk was raised at a cost of $25,000 and purchased by the
United States Government for the service of the coast survey. Her name
was changed to Eagre, for Jack Tar is proverbially superstitious, and
with the old name it would have been impossible to ship a crew.
Lieutenant Higby King describes his initial experience when he was
assigned to duty on the Eagre in this way:
“She had her full complement of officers minus one when I boarded her at
Newport to complete the list. Every cabin was occupied but the port
cabin by the companion way, and to that I was assigned.
“We had a jolly wardroom mess that night, and I retired from it early,
as I was tired by my journey to join the vessel. The others who were
still at the table regarded my retirement to the port cabin in absolute
silence, having bidden me good-night. Their silence did not lead me to
suspect anything, though I knew that the Eagre had once been the Mohawk.
My cabin door had the usual cabin lock of brass, and the porthole was
also securely fastened. There could have been no one under the bed or
sofa, as beneath each was a facing of solid oak paneling.
“I undressed lazily and left the light burning dimly in my bracket lamp.
I tried conscientiously to go to sleep for I don’t know how long with my
back turned to the light. The noise ceased in the wardroom after a time,
and I knew the others had turned in, but I felt unaccountably nervous
and restless. I turned over and faced the light, thoroughly wide awake,
and there in the single chair sat an elderly man, seemingly wrapt in
deep thought. He was dressed in a blue yachting reefer, and had a long,
gray beard. His hands were clasped in his lap, and his eyes were
downcast. His face was not pale and ghastly, as the faces of ghosts are
popularly supposed to be, but ruddy and weatherbeaten.
“I regarded him in scared silence for I don’t know how long, though it
seemed an hour when he, or it, or whatever it was, disappeared. During
that time the ghost, and such I now believe it to have been, made not a
motion, nor did it say anything. Presently I looked again, and it was
gone.
“At breakfast the others watched me critically as I took my seat. I had
not intended to say anything about my experience, for I thought then I
had seen some sort of hallucination and strongly suspected that I was
verging on insanity. Lieutenant Irving asked me if I had slept well. I
replied that I had. ‘Didn’t you see anything?’ he inquired. I then
frankly admitted that I had and described my experience. Then I learned
that each one of the seven others present had tried the port cabin at
one time or another, and each had seen the self-same apparition. It had
acted in exactly the same way in each case, except in the case of
Irving, who shot at it with his pistol, when it immediately disappeared.
Some of the others had been led by their curiosity to inquire if anyone
lost on the Mohawk resembled the figure, and found that none of the
unfortunate ones at all fitted the description. It had been dubbed by
them the ‘misfit ghost.’ That one experience was enough for me, and
after that I, by courtesy, shared the cabin of another fellow.”
Lieutenant Irving and others corroborate the story of Lieutenant King,
and as additional evidence that the Eagre is haunted, Lieutenant Irving
describes a New Year’s eve experience of the Eagre’s officers, that is,
to say the least, novel in the way of supernatural manifestations.
“It was at mess. The first toast, ‘Sweethearts and Wives,’ had been
drunk, as it always is by Yankee sailors the world over on occasions of
festivity. Everyone was feeling happy, or, as Thackeray has it,
‘pleasant,’ when suddenly the sliding-doors separating the wardroom from
the companion way closed slowly with a loud, squeaking noise. They had
seldom been closed, and it took the entire strength of a man to start
them from their rusty fastenings. Yet upon this occasion they started
easily and closed tightly, while the officers jumped to their feet in
breathless astonishment. Half a dozen men hauled them open in haste, but
not a soul was behind them or anywhere about. ‘It must be our old friend
of the port cabin,’ suggested one, and in awe-stricken silence the
health of the ‘misfit ghost’ was drunk.”
AN UNBIDDEN GUEST.
My cousins, Kate and Tom Howard, married at Trinity, at Easter time,
concluded to commence housekeeping by taking one of those delightfully
expensively furnished, unfurnished cottages, with which the fashionable
watering place of W---- abounds, from whose rear windows one might
almost take a plunge into the surf, the beach beginning at the back
door. They went down quite early in May, being in a great hurry to try
their domestic experiment; and, as the evenings were still cold, they
spent them about the open fire, “spooning.”
It was upon one of those nights, about eleven o’clock, that they were
startled by a noise, as of some small object falling, soon followed by
the sound of heavy footsteps, and then quiet again reigned supreme. At
once Tom, poker in hand, boldly started in search of the burglar,
followed by Kate, wildly clutching at his coat-tail, and in a state of
tremor. They looked upstairs, under the various beds, Kate suggesting
that in novels they were always to be found there.
The dining-room was next explored, where all seemed well, and, lastly
the kitchen, where they found what was evidently a solution of the
mystery. The burglar had entered by the back door, which was found to be
unlocked and slightly ajar. The first excitement subsiding, they
returned again to the dining-room, where Tom, upon closer inspection,
then discovered that one of a pair of quaint little pepper-pots, wedding
gifts, was missing, and other small articles on the sideboard had been
slightly disturbed.
The next morning, when Kate mildly remonstrated with the queen of the
kitchen for her carelessness, she received a shock by being told that it
was her usual custom to leave the door open, “so that it would be aisy,
convanient loike for the milkmaid.” They parted with her, and a new maid
was engaged, whose chief qualification for the place was that she was
most faithful in the discharge of her duties, especially in “locking
up.”
While they mourned the loss of the pepper-pot, still it seemed so
trifling when they thought of that lovely repousse salad bowl, sent by
Aunt Julia, which stood near by, that nothing was said of the loss
outside of the family, and the little household settled into its normal
state once more of “billing and cooing.”
About a fortnight later, Tom started out one night with an old
fisherman, one of the natives, and a local “character,” to indulge in
that delightful pastime, so dear to the heart of man, known as
“eeling,” and, as the night was dark, the eels were particularly
“sporty,” so that it was well on towards the “wee sma’ hours” when Tom
at last returned to the cottage.
He found all excitement within. Kate was in hysterics, and the new maid,
also weeping, was industriously applying the camphor bottle to her
mistress’ nose. The burglar, or ghost, as they had now decided, the
windows and doors being found to be securely locked this time, had been
abroad again, but had succeeded in purloining nothing. His royal
ghostship had amused himself, apparently, by simply walking about.
“Oh, Tom! he had on such heavy boots and was so dreadfully bold about
it,” said Kate, tearfully.
From that time Kate became nervous and refused to be left alone. Tom
started whenever a door creaked, and the “treasure” departed hurriedly,
saying, “Faith, the house is haunted, sure.”
After that Kate spent her days in “girl hunting,” and her nights in
answering shadowy advertisements that never materialized. They tried
Irish, English, Dutch, and a “heathen Chinee,” with a sprinkling of
“colored ladies” to vary the monotony. They seemed about to become
famous throughout the length and breadth of the land as “the family
that changes help once a week,” when they landed Treasure No. 2.
Shortly after her advent we were all asked down to W----, to help
celebrate their happiness, and incidentally to christen the new dinner
set. We were not a little surprised at finding Kate so pale and Tom
rather distrait. However, after a delightful dinner, that should have
filled with pleasure the most exacting bride, we adjourned to the
piazza, leaving the men to the contemplation of their cigars. We were
enthusiastic in our praise of the house, and congratulated Kate in
securing such a prize, when, to our horror, she burst into tears, and
said: “Oh, girls, it’s a dreadful place; it’s haunted!” and then
tearfully proceeded with the details, until we all felt creepy and
suggested the parlor and lights.
It was not until long afterwards that Kate discovered that Tom had also
related the “ghost story” to the men, that evening, to which Ned Harris
had said, laconically, “Rats,” and Bob Shaw laughingly remarked, “Tom,
old chap, you really shouldn’t take your nightcap so strong.”