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 previous due date. L162
 
 THE 
 
 CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT; 
 
 AND OTHER TALES. 
 
 BY THE AUTHORS OF 
 
 "READY MONEY MORTIBOY," "THIS SON OF VULCAN," 
 "THE GOLDEN BUTTERFLY," ETC., ETC. 
 
 IN TIVO VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON : 
 
 SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE & RIVINGTON, 
 
 CROWN BUILDINGS, i88, FLEET STREET. 
 
 [All rights reserved.)
 
 LONDON : 
 
 PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, 
 STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
 
 
 CONTENTS OF VOLUME I. 
 
 PART I. 
 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT i 
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN 137 
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY 171 
 
 LADY KITTY ... 209 
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER 249 
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE ... 275
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 When Jules Janin once published a collection 
 of tales which, as he modestly owned, would 
 leave nothing behind them when once read, 
 he asked himself why he was putting them 
 together for publication. And the best 
 answer he could find was, " C'est son Altesse 
 ma Vanite qui le veut ainsi." He goes on 
 to say that the reader may be very well con- 
 tent with this motive, " qui est le grand fond 
 de tous les caracteres et de toutes les oeuvres 
 d'ici-bas." 
 
 " Son Altesse ma Vanit^ " frequently tries
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 to conceal himself. His voice may be recog- 
 nised, however, though his features are behind 
 a mask, when he says that his publishers have 
 insisted on the collection of his stories, or that 
 they are issued in response to the earnest 
 solicitation of friends, or in the hope that the 
 work may " be useful in a wider circle," or 
 that they may be " blessed for good," or that 
 they may extend knowledge of the principles 
 for which the gifted and disinterested author 
 is ready to become a second Saint Lawrence 
 if necessary. 
 
 No legion of friends have urged upon us 
 the necessity of giving these tales a second 
 chance of immortality — our friends, indeed, 
 are chiefly concerned about their own immor- 
 tality. Nor do we look to see the following 
 stories work for good, being quite satisfied 
 with the belief that they will work for no 
 harm. On the other hand, if the moral is 
 found to be so good that the Board schools
 
 PREFACE. Vll 
 
 will adopt the work for a text-book, we shall 
 be pleased. But there are no principles ad- 
 vocated, because the authors themselves have 
 none. 
 
 These tales have all appeared before. " The 
 Case of Mr. Lucraft," which came out as one 
 of a series of short tales in the World, has 
 been rewritten, and now contains many ad- 
 ditional details of Mr. Lucraft's surprising 
 adventures, which we had to leave out for 
 want of space in the former appearance of the 
 narrative. We venture to present this singu- 
 lar experience as worthy to be compared 
 with that of Peter Schlemyl, the Shadowless. 
 " Titaiiia's Farewell " is based upon certain 
 well-known lines in Hood's " Midsummer 
 Fairies." 
 
 Always " son Altesse ma Vanit^," and 
 nothing else ? Perhaps not quite. There is 
 one other motive which induces men to write, 
 to publish, to pray for favour at the hands of
 
 Vlll PREFACE. 
 
 critics, to hope that subscribers to Smith and 
 Mudie will read and recommend others to 
 read these books. Every man who has a thing 
 to sell, whether it be the offspring of his brain, 
 or something he has bought from others, or 
 something he has planted in the earth and 
 watched while it slowly grew and ripened, 
 will understand what that motive is, and 
 appreciate its force. Perhaps, as a motive 
 influence, it is even stronger than " son 
 Altesse ma Vanity." 
 
 W. B. ) 
 J. R. )
 
 PART L 
 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL, 
 
 VOL. I,
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 I HAVE more than once told the story of the 
 only remarkable thing which ever happened 
 to me in the course of a longish life, but as no 
 one ever believed me I left off telling it. I 
 wish, therefore, to leave behind me a truth- 
 ful record, in which everything shall be set 
 down, as near as I can remember it, just as it 
 happened, I am sure I need not add a single 
 fact. The more I consider the story, the 
 more I realise to myself my wonderful escape 
 and the frightful consequences which a pro- 
 vidential accident averted from my head,
 
 4 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 the more reason I feel to be grateful and 
 humble. 
 
 I have read of nothing similar to my own 
 case. I have consulted books on apparitions, 
 witchcraft, and the power of the devil as 
 manifested in authentic history, but I have 
 found absolutely nothing that can in any way 
 compare with my own case. If there be any 
 successor to my Mr. Ebenezer Grumbelow, 
 possessed of his unholy powers, endowed with 
 his fiendish resolve and his diabolical iniquity 
 of selfishness, this plain and simple narrative 
 may serve as a warning to young men situated 
 as I was in the year 1823. Except as a moral 
 example, indeed, I see no use in telling the 
 story at all, 
 
 I have never been a rich man, but I was 
 once very poor, and it is of this period that I 
 have to write. 
 
 As for my parentage, it was quite obscure. 
 My mother died when I was still a boy ; and 
 my father, who was not a man to be proud of
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 5 
 
 as a father, had long before run away from 
 her and disappeared. He was a sailor by 
 profession, and I have heard it rumoured that 
 sailors of his time possessed a wife in every 
 port, besides a few who lived, like my mother, 
 inland ; so that they could vary the sur- 
 roundings when they wished. The wives 
 were all properly married in church too, and 
 honest women, every one of them. What 
 became of my father I never knew, nor did I 
 ever inquire. 
 
 I went through a pretty fair number of 
 adventures before I settled down to my first 
 serious profession. I was travelling com- 
 panion and drudge to an itinerant tinker, who 
 treated me as kindly as could be expected 
 when he was sober. When he was drunk he 
 used to throw the pots and pans at my head. 
 Then I became cabin-boy, but only for a 
 single voyage, on board a collier. The ship 
 belonged to a philanthropist, who was too 
 much occupied with the wrongs of the West
 
 6 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Indian niggers to think about the rights of his 
 own sailors ; so his ships, insured far above 
 their real value, were sent to sea to sink or 
 swim as it might please Providence. I sup- 
 pose no cabin-boy ever had so many kicks 
 and cuffs in a single voyage as I had. How- 
 ever, my ship carried me safely from South 
 Shields to the port of London. There I ran 
 away, and I heard afterwards that on her 
 return voyage the Spanking Sally foundered 
 with all hands. In the minds of those who 
 knew the captain and his crew personally 
 there were doubtless, as in mine, grave fears 
 as to their ultimate destination. After that I 
 became steward in an Atlantic sailing packet 
 for a couple of years ; then clerk to a bogus 
 auctioneer in New York ; cashier to a store ; 
 all sorts of things, but nothing long. Then I 
 came back to England, and not knowing 
 what to do with myself, joined a strolling 
 company of actors in the general utility line. 
 It was not exactly promotion, but I liked the
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. *J 
 
 life ; I liked the work ; I liked the applause ; 
 I liked wandering about from town to town ; 
 I even liked, being young and a fool, the 
 precarious nature of the salary. Heaven 
 knows mine was small enough ; but we were 
 a cheery company, and one or two members 
 subsequently rose to distinction. If we had 
 known any history, which we did not, we 
 might have remembered that Moliere himself 
 was once a stroller through France. . Some 
 people think it philosophical to reflect, when 
 they are hard up, how many great men have 
 been hard up too. It would have brought 
 no comfort to me. Practically I felt little 
 inconvenience from poverty, save in the 
 matter of boots. We went share and share 
 alike most of us, and there was always plenty 
 to eat even for my naturally gigantic appetite. 
 Juliet always used to reckon me as equal to 
 four. 
 
 Juliet was the manager's daughter — Juliet 
 Kerrans, acting as Miss Juliet Alvanley.
 
 8 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 She was eighteen and I was twenty-three, an 
 inflammable and romantic time of life. We 
 were thrown a good deal together too, not 
 only off the stage but on it. I was put into 
 parts to play up to her. I was Romeo when 
 she played her namesake, a part sustained by 
 her mother till even she herself was bound to 
 own that she was too fat to play it any longer ; 
 she was Lady Teazle and I was Charles 
 Surface ; she was Rosalind and I Orlando ; 
 she was Miranda and I Ferdinand ; she 
 was Angelina and I Sir Harry Wildair. We 
 were a pair, and looked well in love scenes. 
 Looking back dispassionately on our per- 
 formances, I suppose they must have been as 
 bad as stage-acting could well be. At least, 
 we had no training, and nothing but a few 
 fixed rules to guide us ; these of course quite 
 stagey and conventional. Juliet had been on 
 the stage all her life, and did not want in 
 assurance ; I, however, was nervous and un- 
 certain. Then we were badly mounted and
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. Q 
 
 badly dressed ; we were ambitious, we ranted, 
 and we tore a passion to rags. But we had 
 one or two good points — we were young and 
 lively. Juliet had the most charming of faces 
 and the most delicious of figures — mind you, 
 in the year 1823 girls had a chance of showing 
 their figures without putting on a page's 
 costume. Then she had a soft sweet voice 
 and pretty little coquettish ways, which came 
 natural to her, and broke through the clumsy 
 stage artificialities. She drew full houses ; 
 wherever we performed all the men, especially 
 all the young officers, used to come after her. 
 They wrote her notes, they lay in wait for 
 her, they sent her flowers ; but what with old 
 Kerrans and myself, to say nothing of the 
 other members of the company, they might 
 as well have tried to get at a Peri in Paradise. 
 I drew pretty well too. I was — a man of 
 seventy and more may say so without being 
 accused of vanity — I was a good-looking 
 young fellow ; you would hardly believe what
 
 lO FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 quantities of letters and billets-doux came to 
 me. I had dozens, but Juliet found and tore 
 them all up. There they were ;■ the note on 
 rose-coloured note-paper with violet ink, 
 beginning with " Handsomest and noblest of 
 men," and ending with " Your fair unknown, 
 Araminta." There was the letter from the 
 middle-aged widow with a taste for the drama 
 and an income ; and there was the vilely- 
 spelled note from the foolish little milliner, 
 who had fallen in love with the Romeo of a 
 barn. Perhaps ladies are more sensible now. 
 At all events, their letters were thrown away 
 upon me, because I was in love already, head 
 over ears, and with Juliet. 
 
 Juliet handed over her notes to her father, 
 who found out their writers and made them 
 take boxes and bespeak plays. So that all 
 Juliet's lovers got was the privilege of paying 
 more than other people, for the girl was as 
 good as she was pretty — a rarer combination 
 of qualities on the stage fifty years ago than
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. II 
 
 now. She was tall and, in those days, 
 slender. Later on she took after her mother ; 
 but who would have thought that so graceful 
 a girl would ever arrive at fourteen stone ? 
 Her eyes and hair were black — eyes that 
 never lost their lustre ; and hair which, 
 though it turned gray in later years, was then 
 like a silken net, when it was let down, to 
 catch the hearts of lovers. Of course she 
 knew that she was pretty ; what prett)' 
 woman does not ? and of course, too, she did 
 not know and would not understand the 
 power of her own beauty ; what pretty 
 woman does ? And because it was the very 
 worst thing she could do for herself, she fell 
 in love with me. 
 
 Her father knew it, and meant to stop it 
 from the beginning ; but he was not a man 
 to do things in a hurry, and so we went on in 
 a fool's paradise, enjoying the stolen kisses 
 and talking of the sweet time to come, when 
 we should be married. One niMit — I was
 
 12 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 • Romeo — I was so carried away with passion 
 that I acted for once naturally and uncon- 
 ventionally. There was a full house ; the 
 performance was so much out of the common, 
 that the people were astonished and forgot 
 to applaud. Juliet caught the infection of 
 my passion, and for once we acted well, 
 because we acted from the heart. Never 
 but that once, I believe, has Romeo and 
 Juliet been performed by a pair who felt 
 every word they said. It was only in a long, 
 low room, a sort of corn exchange or town 
 hall, in a little country town, but the memory 
 of that night is sacred to me. 
 You know the words — 
 
 " See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand ! 
 O, that I were a glove upon that hand, 
 That I might touch that cheek ! " 
 
 And these — 
 
 " O, for a falconer's voice. 
 To lure this tassel-gentle back again ! 
 .Bondage is hoarse and may not speak aloud,
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT, 1 3 
 
 Else would I tear the cave where echo lies, 
 
 And make her airy tongue more hoarse than mine 
 
 With repetition of my Romeo ! " 
 
 Splendidly, we gave them. 
 
 Why, even now, old as I am, the recollection 
 of these lines and the thouofht of that nifjht 
 warm my heart still and fire my feeble pulses. 
 I have taught them to my grandchild. She 
 takes after my poor Juliet, and would succeed 
 on the stage if only her father would let her. 
 But he is straitlaced. Ah ! he should have 
 seen the temptations which beset a girl on the 
 stage in my time. We are Puritans now, 
 almost 
 
 And a good thing, too. It is time for me 
 to own it. 
 
 Well — old Kerrans was in the front looking 
 after the money, as usual, and always with 
 one eye on the stage, to see how his daughter 
 was getting on. He was puzzled, I think, to 
 make out the meaning" of the unaccustomed 
 fire, but he came to the conclusion that if
 
 14 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Juliet was going to remain Miss Juliet, 
 instead of becoming Mrs. Mortimer Vavas- 
 seur (my stage name), he had better interfere 
 at once. 
 
 So after the play, and over the domestic 
 supper-table, he had it out with his daughter. 
 
 Juliet swore that nothing should induce 
 her to marry another man. 
 
 " Bless the girl," said her father ; " I don't 
 want you to marry anybody at all." 
 
 Juliet declared that she never, never would 
 forget me. 
 
 " I don't want you to forget him," Mr. 
 Kerrans replied. " Remember him as much 
 as you like." 
 
 Juliet announced her intention of retiring 
 from the stao^e and oroinof into a convent. 
 There were no convents in England in 1823, 
 so that the threat was not so serious as it 
 would be now. 
 
 Her father promised her that when the 
 company passed by any respectable convent
 
 .THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 5 
 
 on the road, he would certainly knock at the 
 door and inquire about the accommodation 
 and the terms. 
 
 " Lor ! " he said, caressing his weeping 
 daughter, "do you think I want to be cruel 
 to you, my pretty ? Not a bit. Let young 
 Lucraft go and prove himself a man, and he 
 shall have you. But, you see, it wouldn't do 
 to add to the expenses of the company just 
 now, with business so bad and all, would it, 
 my dear ? Why, you might be confined in a 
 twelvemonth, and laid by for half the year 
 ever after, with a troop of young children. 
 Where should we be then ? " 
 
 The next day was Saturday. As usual, I 
 went into the treasury to draw my money, 
 and found the old fellow with rather a red 
 face, and a hesitation in his manner. 
 
 He told me the whole story, just as I have 
 told it to you. And then he gave me my 
 dismissal. 
 
 " Look here," he said, handing me the
 
 1 6 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 money, " you are a capital young fellow^ 
 Lucraft, and a likely actor. There's merit 
 in you. But I can't have you spoiling my 
 Juliet for the stage. So I'm going to put 
 her up without you. After a bit I daresay I 
 shall find another Romeo. You get away 
 to London and find another engagement — 
 there's a week's pay in advance — and when 
 Juliet is married, or when you get rich, or 
 when anything happens to make things 
 different, why, you see, we shall all be glad 
 to see you back. Go and make your fare- 
 wells to Juliet, and don't be more sentimental 
 than you can help. Good-bye, my boy, and 
 good luck to you." 
 
 Good luck ! Had he known the kind of 
 luck which awaited me ! 
 
 I sought my girl, and found her crying. I 
 remember that we forgot all the fine verses 
 of Shakespeare, and just put our faces close 
 to each other, and cried together. 
 
 It did seem hard upon both of us. We
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1/ 
 
 were really and truly in love, and that in a 
 good, honest, determined way. To me there 
 was no other girl in the world except Juliet. 
 To her there was no man besides Luke 
 Lucraft. We had come to an understand- 
 ing for three months, and had been quietly 
 dropping deeper and deeper in love during 
 all that time. 
 
 And now we were to part. 
 
 " Don't forget me, dear Luke," she sobbed. 
 " There are lots of prettier and finer girls in 
 the world than I am, who will try to take 
 away your love from me. I wish I could 
 kill the creatures," she added, stamping her 
 foot. 
 
 Juliet always had a high and generous 
 spirit. I like Avomen to have a high spirit. 
 
 " And will you have no admirers, Juliet ? "" 
 I replied. " Why, half the town " — we were 
 in Lancaster then — " half the town is at your 
 feet already. I intercepted two love-letters 
 yesterday, and I kicked the grocer's appren- 
 
 VOL. I. C
 
 1 8 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 tice the day before for trying to get Mrs. 
 Mould to give you a billet-doux from him- 
 self. Come, dear, we will trust one another. 
 I will try and prove myself a man — get an 
 engagement, make a name on the London 
 stage, and come back with money and an 
 offer to act Romeo to your Juliet at Drury 
 Lane. Think of that, my dearest, and dry 
 your eyes. Your father does not object to 
 me, you know, he only wants me to make an 
 income. Come, Juliet, let us say good-bye. 
 It is only for a short time, and I shall come 
 back with all sorts of reasons in my pocket 
 for persuading your father's consent." 
 
 So we parted, with many more promises 
 of trust and fidelity, and after breaking a 
 sixpenny-bit between us. Juliet's piece is 
 buried with her ; mine is hanging at my 
 heart and will be, before long, buried with 
 me beside her. 
 
 Oh ! the weary journey to London in those 
 days, especially outside the coach, and for
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 9 
 
 a poor man not encumbered with too many 
 wraps. However, I arrived at length, and 
 found myself in the streets that are supposed 
 to be paved with gold, with a couple of 
 sovereigns in my pocket. 
 
 But I was brimful of hope. London was 
 a kindly stepmother who received adopted 
 sons by the thousand, and led them to fame 
 and wealth. I thought of Garrick, of Dick 
 Whittington, and all the rest who came up 
 to town poorer, far poorer than myself, and 
 took comfort. I secured a lodging at a 
 modest rent, and made my way to Drury 
 Lane — the stage door. 
 
 I found no opening at Drury Lane ; not 
 €ven a vacancy for a supernumerary. There 
 were not many London theatres in 1823, 
 and I found the same thing everywhere — 
 more applications than places to give. 
 
 I tried the Greenwich and the Richmond 
 theatres with the same ill success. 
 
 Then I endeavoured to get a country en-
 
 20 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 gagement, but I even failed there. I had na 
 friends to recommend me, and my single 
 experience with Kerrans's strolling troupe 
 did not tell so much in my favour as I had 
 hoped. 
 
 My ambition naturally took a town flight. 
 I had intended to make my appearance on 
 the metropolitan stage as Romeo, my 
 favourite part, and at once to take the town 
 by storm. I was prepared to give them 
 an intelligent and novel interpretation of 
 Hamlet. And I was not unwillino- to 
 undertake Macbeth, Othello, or even Prince 
 Hal. 
 
 When these hopes became evidently 
 grounded on nothing but the baseless fabri- 
 cation of a dream, I resolved on beginning 
 with second parts. Horatio, Mercutio, Paris, 
 were, after all, characters worthy the work of 
 a rising artist. 
 
 Again there seemed no chance. 
 
 The stage always wants young men of
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 21 
 
 general utility. I would go anywhere and 
 take anything. I offered to do so, but 
 although hopes were held out to me by the 
 theatrical agent, somehow he had nothing 
 at the moment in his sfift. Nothing : not 
 even a vacancy for a tragedian at Richard- 
 son's Show ; not even a chance for Bartholo- 
 mew Fair. 
 
 It took me a fortnight to run down the 
 scale from Hamlet, say, to Francis the 
 warder. While I passed through this de- 
 scending gamut of ambition my two sove- 
 reigns were melting away with a rapidity 
 quite astonishing. 
 
 The rent took five shillings. That was 
 paid in advance. Then I was extravagant in 
 the matter of eating, and took three meals a 
 day, finding that not enough to satisfy my 
 vigorous appetite. Once or twice, too, I 
 paid for admission to the pit, and saw, with a 
 sinking heart, what real acting means. My 
 heart failed, because I perceived that I had
 
 22 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 to begin all over again, and from the very 
 bottom of the ladder. 
 
 Then I had to buy a new pair of boots. 
 It was always a trouble to me, the rapid 
 wearing out of leather. 
 
 And then there was something else ; and 
 then one morning I found myself without a 
 sixpence in my pocket. And then I began 
 for the first time to become seriously alarmed 
 about the future. 
 
 I had one or two things which I could 
 pawn — a watch, a waistcoat, a few odds and 
 ends in the way of wardrobe, and a few 
 books — on the proceeds of them I lived for a 
 whole week ; but at last, after spending two- 
 pence in the purchase of a penny loaf and a 
 saveloy for breakfast, I found myself not 
 only penniless, but also without the means of 
 procuring another penny at all, because I had 
 nothing left to pawn. 
 
 Many a young fellow has found himself in 
 a similar predicament, but I doubt whether
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 2$ 
 
 any one ever became so desperately hungry 
 as I did on that day. I recollect that, having- 
 rashly eaten up my sausage before eight 
 o'clock, I felt a sinking towards twelve ; it 
 was aggravated by the savoury smell of 
 roast meat which steamed from the cook- 
 shops and dining-rooms as I walked along 
 the streets. About one o'clock I gazed with 
 malignant envy on the happy clerks who 
 could go in and order platefuls of the roast 
 and boiled which smoked in the windows, 
 and threw a perfume more delicious than the 
 sweetest strains of music into the streets 
 where I lingrered and looked. And at two I 
 observed the diners come out again, walking 
 more slowly, but with an upright and satisfied 
 air, while I — the sinking had been succeeded 
 by a dull gnawing pain — was slowly doubling 
 up. At half-past two I felt as if I could bear 
 it no longer. I had been walking about 
 trying different offices for a clerkship. I 
 might as well have asked for a partnership.
 
 24 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 But I could walk no more. I leaned against 
 a post — it was in Bucklersbury — opposite a 
 dining-room, where hares, fowls, and turkeys 
 were piled in the window among a boundless 
 jDrodigality and wealth of carrots, turnips, 
 and cauliflowers, till my senses swam at the 
 contemplation. I longed for a caldron in 
 which to put the whole contents of the shop 
 front, and eat them at one Gargantuan re- 
 past. My appetite, already alluded to, was 
 hereditary ; one of the few things I can 
 remember of my mother was a constant 
 complaint that my father used to eat her out 
 of house and home. To be sure, from other 
 scraps of information handed down by tradi- 
 tion, I have reason to believe that the word 
 eating was used by a figure of speech — the 
 part for the whole — and included drinking. 
 I was good at both, and as a trencherman I 
 had been unsurpassed, as I said above, in the 
 company, the dear old company among whom 
 I have so often eaten beefsteak and fried
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 25 
 
 onions with Juliet. The door of the place 
 opened now and then to let a hungry man 
 enter or a full man go out, and I caught a 
 glimpse of the interior. Dining-rooms were 
 not called restaurants in those days. They 
 had no gilding, no bright paint, no pretty 
 barmaids, and no silver-plated forks and 
 spoons. Nor were they brilliant with gas. 
 All London — that is, all working London — 
 dined before four o'clock ; the clerks from 
 twelve to two, and the principals, except a 
 few of the big wigs, from two to four. The 
 cheaper rooms were like one or two places 
 still to be found in Fleet Street. There 
 were sanded floors ; there were hard benches, 
 you had your beer out of pewter, not plated 
 tankards ; there was no cheap claret, and 
 the popular ideal of wine was a strong and 
 fiery port. Also, candles stood upon the 
 tables — not wax tzandles, but tallow, with 
 long wicks which required snuffing. They 
 dropped a good deal of mutton fat about the
 
 26 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 table, and it was not uncommon to find your- 
 self eating a little tallow with 3?-our bread, 
 which was not nice even to men of a strong 
 stomach. Finally, you had steel forks, which 
 are just as good, to my thinking, as plated 
 silver, and more easily cleaned. 
 
 I stood by the post and watched with 
 hungry eyes. From within I heard voices, 
 stifled voices, as those sent up a pipe, 
 calling for roast beef with plenty of brown 
 — good heavens ! plenty of brown ; roast 
 mutton, underdone — I loved my mutton 
 underdone ; boiled beef with suet-pudding 
 and fat — I always took a great deal of 
 pudding and fat with my boiled beef ; roast 
 veal and bacon with stuffino- — a dish for the 
 gods ; calves' head for two — ^I could have 
 eaten calves' head for a dozen ; with orders 
 pointing to things beyond my hungry 
 imagination - — huno^er limits the boundaries 
 of fancy — puddings, fish, .soup, cheese, and 
 such delicacies. Alas ! I wanted the solids.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 2/ 
 
 I felt myself growing feebler ; I became 
 more and more doubled up ; I had thoughts 
 of entering this paradise of the hungry, and, 
 after eating till I could eat no longer, calmly 
 laying down my knife and fork and informing 
 the waiter that I had no money. There 
 was a farce in which I had once played 
 where the comic actor sent for the land- 
 lord, after a hearty meal, and asked him 
 what he would do in case a stranger 
 after ordering and eating his dinner should 
 declare his inability to pay. " Do, sir ? " 
 cried the host, " I should kick him across 
 the street." " Landlord," said the low- 
 comedian, and it always told, — " Landlord," 
 he used to rise up slowly as he spoke, and 
 solemnly draw aside his coat-tails, turning 
 his face in the direction of the street-door, 
 — " landlord, Fll trouble you." I used to 
 play the landlord. 
 
 It struck half-past three ; the dead gnaw- 
 ing of hunger was followed by a sharp pain,
 
 28 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 irritating and much more unpleasant. The 
 crowd of those who entered had been 
 followed by the crowd of those who came 
 out, and the heaven of hungry men was 
 nearly empty again. I gazed still upon the 
 turkeys and the hares, but with a lack-lustre 
 eye, for I was nearly fainting. 
 
 Presently there came down the street an 
 elderly gentleman, bearing before him, like 
 a Lord Mayor in a French tale, his enormous 
 abdomen : he had white hair, white eye- 
 brows, white whiskers, and a purple face. 
 He walked very slowly, as if the exertion 
 might prove apoplectic, and leaned upon a 
 thick stick. As . he passed the shop he 
 looked in at the window and wagged his 
 head. At that moment I groaned involun- 
 tarily. He turned round and surveyed me. 
 I suppose I presented a strange appearance, 
 leaning against the post, with stooping figure 
 and tightly buttoned coat. He had big pro- 
 jecting eyes flushed with red veins, which 
 gave him a wolfish expression.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 29 
 
 " Young man," he said, not benignantly at 
 all, but severely, " you look 111. Have you 
 been drinking ? " 
 
 I shook my head. 
 
 " I am only hungry," I said ; telling the 
 truth because I was really too far gone to 
 hide it — " I am only hungry ; that is the 
 matter with me." 
 
 He planted his stick on the ground, sup- 
 porting both his hands upon the gold head, 
 and wagged his head again from side to side 
 with a grunting sound in his throat like the 
 sawing of bones. 
 
 Grunt ! " Here's a pretty fellow for you ! " 
 Grunt! "Hungry, and he looks miserable."' 
 Grunt ! " Hungry, and he groans." Grunt ! 
 " Hungry — the most enviable condition a 
 man can be in — and he dares to repine at 
 his lot." Grunt ! "What are the lower classes 
 coming to next, I wonder. Aren't you 
 ashamed of yourself? Aren't you a model 
 of everything that is ungrateful and " —
 
 30 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 grunt ! — " and flying in the face of Provi- 
 dence ? He lives in a land of victuals. 
 London is a gigantic caravan, full of the most 
 splendid things, the most glorious things to 
 eat and drink ; it only wants an appetite ; 
 and he's got that, and he laments ! " 
 
 "What is the use of an appetite if you 
 have no money to satisfy it with ? " 
 
 Grunt ! " Is it a small appetite, as a rule, 
 or is it a large appetite ? " 
 
 " Large," I replied. "It is an awkward 
 thing for a poor beggar like me to have such 
 a devil of a twist. I was born with it. 
 Very awkward just now." 
 
 " Come with me, young man," he grunted. 
 " Go before me. Don't talk, because that 
 may interfere with the further growth of 
 your appetite. Walk slowly and keep your 
 mouth shut close." 
 
 He came behind me, walking with his 
 chuckle and grunt. 
 
 " So. What a fine young fellow it is ! "
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 3 1 
 
 Grunt ! " What room for the development 
 of the Alderman's Arch ! What a back- 
 bone for the support of a stomach ! What 
 shoulders for a dinner- table, and what legs 
 to put under it ! Heavens ! what a diner 
 might be made of this boy if he only had 
 money." Grunt ! " Youth and appetite — 
 health and hunger — and all thrown away 
 upon a pauper ! What a thing, what a thing ! 
 This way, young man." 
 
 Turninor down a court leadinof out of 
 Bucklersbury he guided me to a door, a 
 little black portal, at which he stopped ; then 
 stooping to a keyhole of smaller size than 
 was generally used in those days, he seemed 
 to me to blow into it with his mouth ; this 
 was absurd, of course, but it seemed so to 
 me. The door opened. He led the way 
 into a passage which, when the door shut 
 behind us, as it did of its own accord, was 
 pitch dark. We went up some stairs, and 
 on the first landing the old gentleman, who
 
 32 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 was wheezing and puffing tremendously, 
 opened another door, and led me into a 
 room. It was a large room, resplendent 
 with the light of at least forty wax candles. 
 The centre was occupied by a large dining- 
 table laid for a single person. Outside it 
 was broad daylight, for it was not yet four 
 o'clock. 
 
 " Sit down, young man, sit down," puffed 
 my host. " Oh dear ! oh dear ! Sit down, 
 do. I wish I was as hungry as you." 
 
 I sat down in the nearest chair, and looked 
 round the room. The first thing I remarked 
 was that I could not see the door by which 
 we had been admitted. The room was octa- 
 gonal, and on every side stood some heavy 
 piece of furniture : a table with glass, a case 
 of bookshelves, a sofa, but no door. My 
 head began to go round as I continued my 
 observations. There was no window either, 
 nor was there any fireplace. Then I felt a 
 sudden giddiness, and I suppose I fell back-
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 33 
 
 wards on my chair. It was partly the faint- 
 ness of hunger, but partly it was the strange 
 'room, and that old man glaring at me with 
 his great wolfish eyes. 
 
 When I recovered I was lying on a sofa, 
 and soft cold fingers were bathing my head, 
 and pressing a perfumed handkerchief to my 
 lips. I opened my eyes suddenly and sat up 
 completely recovered. At the foot of the 
 sofa stood my entertainer. 
 
 " Easy with him, Boule-de-neige ; make 
 him rest for a moment. Perhaps his hunger 
 has been too much for him." 
 
 I turned to see who Boule-de-neiefe was. 
 He was a negro of the blackest type, as 
 ancient and withered as some old ourano- of 
 tropical woods ; his cheeks hung in folds, and 
 his skin seemed too much for his attenuated 
 body ; his wool was white, and his gums were 
 almost toothless ; and his nose so flattened 
 with age as to be almost invisible, looking at 
 him as I was looking, in profile. His hands 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 were as soft as any woman's, but icy cold ; 
 and his eyes were red and fiery. 
 
 " Boule-de-neige, what do you think of 
 him ? " 
 
 " Him berry fine young man, massa : him 
 beautiful young man ; got lubly abbatite 
 develoffed, I tink ; him last long time, much 
 longer time dan last oder young man. Cluck ! 
 Him poor trash, dat young man ; dam poor 
 trash ; use up and go to de debbel in a 
 month. Cluck ! Dis young man got lubly 
 stumjack, strong as bull. Cluck-cluck ! How 
 much you tink him eat to night ? " 
 
 " We shall see, Boule-de-neige. We will 
 try him with a simple dinner, and then pro- 
 nounce on his performances. Young men do 
 not always come up to their professions. But 
 he looks well, and perhaps, Boule-de-neige — 
 perhaps — ah ! " He nodded with a deep 
 sigh. 
 
 " What time massa dine himself ? " 
 
 " I don't know," the old gentleman an-
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 2)5 
 
 swered, with another heavy sigh. " Perhaps 
 not till nine o'clock ; perhaps not then. It all 
 depends on this youth. Vanish, Boule-de- 
 neige, and serve." 
 
 There was evidently something in my 
 host's mind by the way he sighed. Why did 
 it depend upon me ? And did Boule-de-neige 
 go through the floor ? Did the table sink 
 when he disappeared, and come up loaded 
 with dishes ? It seemed so. 
 
 I sprang from the couch. The sight and 
 smell of the food brought back my raging 
 hunger. 
 
 " Let me eat ! " I cried. 
 
 " You shall. One moment first — only a 
 single moment. Young man, tell me again 
 and explicitly the nature and extent of your 
 appetite. Be truthful ; oh, be truthful ! Our 
 little tongues should never lie for mutton- 
 chop or apple-pie. You know the hymn. I 
 hope you have been religiously brought up, 
 and know that hymn."
 
 36 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ** I've got a devil of an appetite. What is 
 there to lie about ? " 
 
 " My dear young friend, there are many 
 kinds of appetites. Yours may be fierce at 
 first and promise great things, and then end 
 in a miserably small performance. I have 
 known such, and mourned to see them. Is 
 it a lasting appetite, now ? Is it steady 
 through a long dinner ? Is it regular in its 
 recurrence ? " 
 
 " You shall see something of my perform- 
 ance," I laughed, insensate wretch. " You 
 shall see. I never had a long dinner in my 
 life, because I always make short work of 
 mine. It is steady through a good many 
 pounds of steak, and as regular as a clock." 
 
 " That is, always something. Steak is as 
 healthy a test as I know. Is it, secondly, an 
 appetite that recovers itself quickly ? That is 
 very important. Is it a day-by-day or an 
 hour-by-hour appetite ? Is it good at all 
 times of the day ? "
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 37 
 
 " Alas, I wish it were not ! " 
 
 " Hush, young man ; do not blaspheme ! 
 Tell me, if you eat your fill now — it is half- 
 past four — when do you think you might 
 be ready again ? " His eyes glistened like a 
 couple of great rubies in the candlelight, and 
 his hands trembled. 
 
 " I should say about eight. But I might 
 do something light at seven, I daresay. Just 
 now I feel as if I could eat a mountain." 
 
 "He feels as if he could eat a mountain ! 
 Wonderful are the gifts of Providence ! My 
 dear young friend, I am very thankful — 
 deeply thankful — that I met you. Sit down 
 and let me take the covers off for you ; I 
 long to see you eat. This is a blessed 
 day — a truly blessed day ! I will wait upon 
 you myself No one else. Boule-de-neige, 
 vanish ! " 
 
 As he was about to take off the covers he 
 stopped short. 
 
 '* Stay. You are without occupation ? "
 
 3b FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 *' I can get none." 
 
 " You are of any trade ? " 
 
 " I am an actor." 
 
 " A bad trade — an un-Christian trade. 
 Actors are vagabonds by act of parliament. 
 Actors can never be in a state of grace! I 
 shall be happy in being a humble instru- 
 ment in removing you from a calling fatal 
 to the Christian warrior. Why did you 
 leave your last situation ? No dishonesty ? 
 No embezzlement ? No tampering with 
 accounts ? " 
 
 "Sir, I have always been an honest man. 
 And, besides, I have never been tempted by 
 the handling of other people's money." 
 
 " Ha ! You have got no wife ? " 
 
 " No, sir ; I am unmarried." 
 
 " You have got no I trust I am 
 
 taking to my bosom no deceiver of women. 
 You are not the father of an illegitimate 
 offspring, I hope and pray." 
 
 *' No, sir ; I am not."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 39 
 
 " Younor man, you are about to enter upon 
 a most serious act, perhaps the most serious 
 act of your Hfe, and these questions may 
 appear to you trivial and tedious. As a 
 Christian, and a member of the congregation 
 
 of Mr. But never mind ; you are 
 
 hungry now, and wish to eat. We will talk 
 after dinner." 
 
 He took off the covers. The table was 
 spread with a dozen different dishes, all served 
 up together. Others I noticed, standing with 
 bottles' and decanters, on a large sideboard. 
 As my generous benefactor removed the 
 silver covers, his face, which had assumed 
 during his questioning an austere gravity, 
 suddenly lit up, and he laughed aloud as the 
 perfume of the hot food mounted to his 
 nostrils. He seemed all at once a different 
 man. 
 
 " Gently, gently, my dear young friend. 
 Here is a dinner fit for a king ; fit for inc, if 
 I could eat it. Oh ! my dainty Boule-de-
 
 40 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 neiee ! Ha ! is it riofht to waste such a 
 dinner upon a youth whose only dreams are 
 of a sufficiency of steak ? Young man, in 
 after years — ahem ! — in after days you will 
 remember this dinner. You will recall every 
 item in this most delicious bill of fare which 
 Boule-de-neige has set before you. Let me 
 teach you to eat it properly. Weigh your 
 morsels." 
 
 Heaven ! how I cursed his delay. He 
 kept one great hand between me and the 
 dishes, for fear, I suppose, that I should 
 pounce upon them and clear them off all at 
 once. 
 
 • " Patience, patience. Consider each mouth- 
 ful. Try to be thankful that cooks have 
 brought their divine art to such perfection. 
 Carry back your thoughts to — grunt — to time 
 when all mankind fed upon imperfectly 
 cooked steak. Think that all the treasures 
 of the East and West have been ransacked 
 to furnish for me this meal, and that you will
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 4 1 
 
 never, never, never see such a dinner again as 
 long as you live." 
 
 At all events I never saw such a meal 
 again as long as he lived. 
 
 " We will now," he said, with a backward 
 wave of his right hand, " consider dinner as a 
 science." 
 
 " Oh, sir ! " I exclaimed, " I am so hungry." 
 
 " It's beautiful to see you hungry, but I 
 must not let you hurry. Eat as much as you 
 like when you begin, but gently, gently — 
 easily and gently. Think of the future. 
 Think of me." 
 
 I stared at him in wonder. 
 
 " Think of you, sir ? " 
 
 "Why, what would happen to me if you 
 really destroyed your appetite, or even your- 
 self in swallowing a bone ^ " 
 
 I thought he must be mad. 
 
 "Young man," he went on. "You will 
 say a grace before meat, if you remember 
 one."
 
 42 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 I did not 
 
 " Then I will say one for you. Oh ! 
 wretched trade of stage acting. He does not 
 even know a single grace before meat." 
 
 Then he began to help me — and we went 
 on with dinner without further interruption. 
 He kept up a running accompaniment of 
 comment as I devoured the meal, and his 
 manner gradually lost all its solemnity, until 
 before I was more than half throuQfh the 
 dinner he was dancing about, slapping his leg 
 with delight, and laughing till he grew almost 
 black in the face. 
 
 Why he was so pleased I could not tell. 
 I was soon to learn. 
 
 " These are plovers' eggs. No better 
 thing ever discovered to begin your dinner 
 with. Alderman Stowport says oysters are 
 better. That is rubbish. I do not despise 
 oysters — Why, he has eaten the whole six ! 
 Bravo ! bravo ! an excellent beg-inninof. Let 
 me take away the plate, my dear sir. Now
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 43 
 
 we have turtle soup — gently, my young 
 friend, gently. Ah, impetuous youth ! 
 More ? Stay — green fat. Humour, humour 
 your appetite ; don't drive it ; calipash and 
 calipee. It's really sinful to eat so fast. He 
 takes all down without tasting it. No — no 
 more ; you must give yourself a fair chance 
 and not spoil your dinner with too much 
 turtle." He put the soup aside, and took 
 the cover off another dish. "Salmon — with 
 cucumber. Lobster-sauce — bless me, it's like 
 a dream of fairyland ! Fillet of sole — a beau- 
 tiful dream to see him. Ho! ho! he's a Julius 
 Ccesar the Conqueror. Croquet de volaille — 
 gone like a cloud from the sky. Don't wolf 
 the food, my friend ; there is a limit to the 
 cravings of nature imposed by the claims of 
 art ; taste it. Ris de veau — smiles of the 
 dear little innocent, confiding calf — a little 
 more bread with it ? Mauviettes en caisse, 
 larks in baskets — sweet, rapturous, singing 
 larks, toothsome cocky oily larks. He eats
 
 44 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 them up, bones and all. Ha ! ha ! Pause, 
 my dear sir, and drink something. Here are 
 champagne, hock, and sauterne ; never touch 
 sherry, it's a made-up wine, even the best of 
 it. Come, a little champagne." 
 
 " I generally take draught-beer, sir," I 
 replied modestly. " That is the drink to 
 which I have been accustomed and — not too 
 much of it ; but, if you please, a little fizz will 
 be acceptable." 
 
 I drank three glasses in rapid succession, 
 and found them good. He meanwhile 
 nodded and winked with an ever-increasing 
 delight which I failed to understand. 
 
 " Now, my Nero, my Paris of Troy, my 
 Judas Maceabseus " — he mixed up his names, 
 but it mattered nothing — " here is saddle of 
 mutton, with potatoes, cauliflower, currant- 
 jelly. More champagne ? It's worth sums 
 of money to see him. Curry ? More cham- 
 pagne ? Curry of chicken ? Cabob curry 
 of chicken, young Alexander the Great ?
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 45 
 
 Plenty of rice ? Ho, ho, ho ! Plenty of 
 rice, he said ; why, he is a Goliath — a Go- 
 liath of Gath, this young- man ! " 
 
 He really grew so purple that I thought 
 he would have a fit of some kind. But the 
 flattery pleased me all the same, and I went 
 on eating and drinking as if I was only just 
 bec^innino-. 
 
 " Quail or becassine — snipe, that is ? He 
 takes both, like Pompey. More champagne ? 
 Jelly, my Heliogabalus, my modern Caracalla, 
 apricot-jelly ? Cabinet pudding ? He has 
 two helpings of the pudding. King Solomon 
 
 in all his 'glory never More champagne ? 
 
 A little hock to finish with ? He takes his 
 hock in a tumbler, this young Samson. 
 Cheese — Brie — and celery. A glass of port 
 with the cheese. He takes that in a tumbler 
 too, like Og, King of Bashan," 
 
 I was really overwhelmed with the splen- 
 dour of the dinner, the classical and biblical 
 flattery, and the extraordinary gratification
 
 46 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 which my really enormous hunger caused 
 this remarkable old gentleman. He clapped 
 his hands ; he nodded his head ; he slapped 
 his legs ; he winked and grinned ; he smacked 
 his lips ; he evinced every sign of the most 
 unbounded delight. When I had quite 
 finished eating, which was not before we 
 had got through the whole list of courses, 
 he gave me a bottle of claret, and watched 
 me while I rapidly disposed of it. Then he 
 produced from a sideboard, where I certainly 
 had not seen it a moment before, a small cup 
 of strong black coffee with a tiny glass of 
 liqueur. As for my own part, I hope I have 
 made it clear that I dined extremely well ; in 
 fact, I had never even dreamed of such a 
 dinner in my life. It was not only that I was 
 half starved, but that the things were so 
 good. Imagine the astonishment of a young 
 strolling actor, whose highest dreams were 
 of sufficient beefsteak, not of the primest 
 part, at such a magnificent feed. I felt as
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 47 
 
 If I had dropped unexpectedly into a fortune. 
 I had. 
 
 " How do you feel now ? " my host asked, 
 a shade of anxiety crossing his brow.
 
 48 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 There was still the strange look in my 
 host's eyes — a sort of passionate and eager 
 longing. 
 
 " I am very well, thank you, sir, and more 
 grateful than I can tell you," 
 
 " Hang the gratitude ! Tell me if you feel 
 any sense of repletion ? Does the blood 
 seem mounting to the head ? Are you quite 
 free from any giddiness ? No thickness in 
 the speech ? It's wonderful, it's providential, 
 my finding you. Such a windfall ; and just 
 when I most wanted it. Our blessings truly 
 come when we least expect them." 
 
 This was strange language, but the whole 
 proceedings were so strange that I hardly
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 49 
 
 noticed it. Besides, I was extremely comfort- 
 able after my dinner, and disposed to rest. 
 
 " Now," he went on, " while you are di- 
 gesting — by the way, the digestion is, I trust, 
 unimpaired by drink or excess ? Quite so ; 
 and what I expected in so good and so gifted 
 a young man. Like an ostrich, as you say. 
 Ho, ho ! ha, ha ! like an ostrich !. It is, indeed, 
 too much. Tell me, now, something, gently 
 and dispassionately, so as not to injure your 
 digestion, about your history." 
 
 I told him all. While I related my simple 
 story he interrupted now and then with some 
 fresh question on the growth, the endurance, 
 the regularity of my appetite, to which I gave 
 satisfactory answers. When I had quite 
 finished he went to the table — I noticed then 
 that all traces of the dinner had disappeared 
 — and laid out a document, by which he 
 placed a pen. Then he drew a chair, sat 
 down in front of me, and assumed a serious 
 air. 
 
 VOL. I. E
 
 50 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " Come," he said peremptorily, " let us get 
 now to business." 
 
 I had not the smallest notion what the 
 business was but I bowed and waited. Per- 
 haps he was going to offer me a clerkship. 
 Visions of a large salary, to suit my expansive 
 appetite, came across my brain. 
 
 "In your case," he began, "the possession 
 of so great an appetite must be attended with 
 serious inconveniences. You have no money ; 
 in a few hours you will be hungry again ; you 
 will endure great pain and suffering, greater 
 than is felt by men less largely endowed with 
 the greatest blessing — I mean with appetite." 
 
 " Yes," I said, " it is a great trouble to me 
 this twist of mine, especially when I am hard 
 up." 
 
 He almost jumped out of his chair. 
 
 " Why, there," he cried, " what is the use of 
 words ? We are agreed already. Nothing 
 could be more fortunate. Let us have no 
 more beating about the bush. Young man, I
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 5 1 
 
 will rid you of this nuisance ; I will buy your 
 appetite of you." 
 
 I only stared. Was the old gentleman 
 mad ? 
 
 " It is a strange offer, I know," he went 
 on, " a strange offer, and you have probably 
 never heard a more remarkable one. But 
 it is genuine. I will buy your appetite of 
 you." 
 
 " Buy my — buy my appetite ? " 
 
 " Nothing easier. Read this." 
 
 He gave me the paper which he had laid 
 on the table, prepared in readiness, I suppose, 
 for me. It was as follows : 
 
 " I, Luke Lucraft, being in sound mind and 
 in good health, and of the mature age of 
 twenty-four, do voluntarily and of my own 
 free will and accord agree and promise to 
 resign my appetite entirely and altogether for 
 the use of Ebenezer Grumbelow from the 
 day and hour of the execution of this deed. 
 In return whereof I agree to accept a monthly 
 
 LIbKARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF IIUN(
 
 52 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 allowance of ^30, also to date from the 
 moment of signature, with a sum of ^50, to 
 be placed in my hands. I promise also that 
 I will carefully study to preserve by regular 
 habits and exercise the gift of a generous 
 appetite ; that I will not work immoderately, 
 sit up late, practise vicious courses, or do 
 anything that may tend to impair the regular 
 recurrence of a healthy and vigorous hunger. " 
 
 Then followed a place for the signature 
 and one for the witnesses. 
 
 " You see," he went on, " I ask for no 
 unpleasant condition. I give you a free life, 
 coupled with the simple condition of ordinary 
 care. Do you agree ? " 
 
 " I hardly know ; it is so sudden." 
 
 " Come, come " — he spoke with a harshness 
 quite new — " come, let us have no nonsense 
 of that sort. Do you agree ? " 
 
 I read it over ao^ain. 
 
 " Give me a little time," I said. " Let me 
 reflect till to-morrow morning."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT, 
 
 OJ 
 
 " Reflect ! " his face flushed purple, and his 
 bloodshot eyes literally glared. " Reflect ! 
 what the devil does the boy want to reflect 
 about ? Has he got a penny, a friend, or a 
 chance in the whole world ? I will give you 
 five minutes — come." He rose up and stood 
 before me. As I looked in his face a curious 
 dimness came over my eyes ; he seemed to 
 recede before me ; he disappeared altogether. 
 When I heard him speak again his voice 
 sounded far, far off, but thin and clear, as if 
 it came through some long tube. " Luke 
 Lucraft," it said, '' see yourself." 
 
 Yes ; I saw myself, and though oiUsidc of 
 what I saw, I felt the same emotions as if I 
 had been the actual performer in the scenes I 
 witnessed. 
 
 I was standing where the old gentleman 
 met me, starving still, and suffering pangs far 
 worse than those under which I groaned at 
 three o'clock. The day was advanced ; the 
 diners had all gone away, and the dining-
 
 54 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 room waiters were putting up the shutters. 
 I spoke to one of them timidly. I told him 
 I had eaten nothing- since the morning, and 
 begged for a plate of broken victuals. He 
 looked in my face, called a brother servant, 
 and they kicked me from the door. People 
 were rougher in London fifty years ago. 
 Then I slunk away, and wandered some- 
 where among the winding streets and lanes 
 of the old city. London at night was not so 
 empty and deserted as it is now, and the 
 streets had people in them. Some of them 
 were well dressed — the wealthy merchants 
 had not, even then, all left off living in the 
 city ; some were clerks going home ; some 
 were women out for an evening's walk. The 
 bells rang out the hours from the city clocks, 
 and I crept along the walls wondering what 
 would become of me, and how I should find 
 an end of my present misery. 
 
 Then I begged. Took off my hat and 
 held it in my hand while I asked for some-
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 55 
 
 thing — anything- — the smallest coin that would 
 get a piece of bread. 
 
 The men passed me by with pitiless and un- 
 believing eyes. Heavens ! if they had been 
 hungry once, only once, in all their lives, 
 they would never again have refused the 
 petition of a beggar, even though he was 
 the most lying mendicant who ever disgraced 
 the words of charity which passed his lips. 
 But they gave me nothing. 
 
 The wome'n edged away from me and 
 passed on the other side if I timidly pressed 
 my claim. They had nothing to fear from 
 me. At last I asked a girl. She was more 
 unfortunate than myself, but she was not 
 hungry, and she gave me a shilling. 
 
 Then I found a shop open, and bought a 
 plate of meat. That spent — I saw myself 
 slinking, ashamed and wretched, again along 
 the cold and empty streets. When I could 
 walk no more I found myself in Co vent 
 Garden Market, and threw myself under
 
 56 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 shelter of a roof at least, among the stalks 
 and leaves and straw which littered the 
 place. 
 
 I awoke early, and hungry again. I rose 
 and resumed my miserable walk. 
 
 Hope by this time was dead within me ; 
 I could think of nothing but my intolerable 
 hunger; could feel nothing but the pain which 
 would not leave me ; could look at nothing 
 but food in the window. 
 
 I begged again and begged all day without 
 success. 
 
 It was a rougher time, that, than the 
 present. More than one man laid his stick 
 across my back with an impatient admonition 
 to get to work, you lazy rogue. But I was too 
 feeble to retaliate or to remonstrate. Was 
 there no charity in the world ? I passed other 
 beggars in the streets who looked fat and 
 comfortable. People gave them money, but 
 they would give me none. The time wore on 
 and my craving for food became irresistible.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 5/ 
 
 I passed a shop which had a tray outside 
 of baked potatoes. The owner had his back 
 to me. I stole one. Yes, I stole one. No 
 one saw me. He did not see me as I slunk 
 past him with guilty face, and swiftly sped 
 round the nearest corner to eat the stolen 
 morsel. 
 
 What is the use of a single baked potato ? 
 Presently I returned to the same place with 
 the intention of taking another. But they 
 were all gone. I went on looking for another 
 provision shop. I came to a place where hot 
 smoking sausages were bubbling in a pan 
 over a charcoal fire. The shop stood at a 
 corner. There was only a girl minding it. 
 I deliberately walked in, took a sausage from 
 the pan, hot as it was, and stepped out again 
 before her astonishment even prompted her 
 to cry out. 
 
 The time seemed intolerably long. All 
 these scenes passed before me, not as the 
 quick and steady flight of the rapidly falling
 
 • > 
 
 58 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 moments, but as if the agony and the shame 
 were dehberately lengthened out. 
 
 Then came a third time when I stole, 
 maddened by the dream of hunger. This 
 time I was detected, pursued, and appre- 
 hended. The misery and shame of the hour 
 when I stood before the magistrate, in that 
 horrible vision of a possible future, I cannot 
 even yet forget. With this a constant sense 
 of unsatisfied and craving hunger ; a feeling 
 as if hunger was the greatest evil in the 
 whole world ; a longing to get rid of it. 
 Last scene of all, I was lying dead, starved 
 to death with hunger and cold, in a miserable, 
 bare, and naked garret. 
 
 By what black art did the old man delude 
 my senses ? It was a lie, and he knew it. I 
 should have got some honest work, if only 
 to wheel bricks or carry loads. 
 
 " There is your future, young man " — there 
 came up from the distance the voice of the 
 tempter — " a gloomy prospect : a miserable
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 59 
 
 life : a wretched ending. Now look at the 
 other side." 
 
 The scene changed. I saw myself, but in 
 another guise. My hunger had vanished ; I 
 felt it no more. 
 
 This time I was happy, light-hearted, and 
 cheerful. I remembered scenes of misery 
 through which I had just passed, and the 
 recollection added more sweetness to my 
 present enjoyment. It seemed as if I should 
 never be hungry any more, and never feel 
 the want of food. I was like a Greek god 
 in my exemption from the common weakness 
 of humanity. I was rich, too, and knew that 
 I had the command, somehow, of all that 
 money could buy. 
 
 I was sitting in a garden, and around me 
 were troops of girls. I heard the rustle of 
 their dresses, caught the laughter from their 
 lips, watched the lustre of their eyes, saw 
 the moonlight dance among their waving 
 locks as they ran and played among the
 
 €0 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 trees and flowers. One of them sat by me 
 and sang to a guitar — 
 
 Life is made for love. Ah ! why 
 Should its sweetness e'er be marred ? 
 
 List ! the echoes will not die, 
 
 Still the sweet word "love" to guard. 
 
 Nought but love. Oh ! happy youth 
 Free from need of baser thought, 
 
 Stay with us, and learn this truth. 
 Set with song, with music wrought. 
 
 Thine is love, an endless feast ; 
 
 Beauty — sweeter far than wine ; 
 Joy, from lower cares released — • 
 
 Never star rose bright as thine. 
 
 I knew, somehow or other, that this was 
 allegorical, and, as if I expressed my thought, 
 the scene changed, and I was in real life. 
 
 Chambers in London, such as I had read 
 of, overlooking St. James's Park. I sat 
 in them in the midst of books and pictures. 
 I had no business to call me away from my 
 indolent ease ; I had no anxiety about the 
 future. I got up and strolled about the
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 6 1 
 
 Streets looking at the shops. If I fancied a 
 thing I bought it. I went to picture galleries 
 and saw the latest works of art. I went to 
 the theatre, and saw the performance from a 
 comfortable box : I went riding in the park. 
 
 Then my fancy returned to my first love, 
 and I saw myself walking in a country lane 
 with Juliet. She was sweeter to look upon 
 than ever, and more delightful in her frank 
 and innocent love for me. We rambled alone 
 under the hedges while I gathered flowers 
 for her, and talked of the happy, happy days 
 when we should be one, soon now to arrive, 
 and of the sweet, loving life which should 
 be ours far away from the troubles of the 
 world. 
 
 Dreams ; idle dreams ; but sweet to me, 
 after the agony of the last, as a draught of 
 water to a parched traveller on Sahara. 
 
 The pictures changed as fast as my fanc}- 
 wandered from one thine to another. In all I 
 was the same — free from the downward and
 
 62 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 earthly pressure of want and hunger, relieved 
 from anxiety, with plenty of money, and full 
 of all sweet and innocent fancies. 
 
 Lies again. But by what power could this 
 necromancer so cheat and gull my brain ? 
 
 " Very different scenes these, my dear 
 young friend," he said in a winning voice, 
 " are they not ? Now," he went on, and his 
 voice was quite close to me, " you have had 
 your five minutes." 
 
 The cloud passed from my eyes. I was 
 sitting again in the octagonal room, the old 
 man before me, watch in hand, as if he was 
 counting the seconds. 
 
 " Five minutes and a quarter," he growled. 
 " Now choose." 
 
 " I have chosen," I replied. " I accept 
 your offer." 
 
 The influence of the things I had seen was 
 too strong upon me. I could neither reason 
 nor reflect. 
 
 " I accept your offer."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 63 
 
 "Why, that's brave," he said, with a 
 gigantic sigh of rehef. "That's what I ex- 
 pected of you. Boule-de-neige — Boule-de- 
 neige ! 
 
 H© clapped his hands. 
 
 Instantly the horrible old negro appeared 
 behind his master's chair, as if he had sprung 
 up from the ground. I believe he had. He 
 looked more like a devil than ever, grinning 
 from ear to ear, and his two eyes glowing in 
 the candlelight like two great coals. The 
 light fell too upon the seams and wrinkles of 
 his face, bringing them out like the hills and 
 valleys in a raised map. Strange as it all was 
 to me, this ancient servitor produced the 
 strangest effect upon me of anything. 
 
 " Boule-de-neige is witness for us," said the 
 old gentleman. " Boule-de-neige, this young 
 gentleman, Mr. Luke Lucraft, is about to 
 sign a little deed, to which, as a matter of 
 form, we require your signature too as 
 witness."
 
 64 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " Cluck ! " said the negro. " Dis young 
 gegleman berry lucky — him berry lucky. 
 What time massa take him dinner ? " 
 
 "When do you think you shall be fairly 
 hungry again ? " he asked me. " Now, no 
 boastings — no false pretence and pride — - 
 because it will be the worse for you. Answer 
 truthfully. It is now six." 
 
 " I should say that at nine I should be able 
 to take some supper, and at ten I shall cer- 
 tainly be hungry again. As an ordinary rule 
 I should be ready a great deal earlier, but I 
 have taken such an immense dinner." 
 
 " Good." He turned to Boule-de-neige. 
 " You see, the young man is modest and 
 promises fairly. I shall have supper — a 
 plentiful supper — at ten punctually. Mr. 
 Lucraft will now sign." 
 
 I advanced to the table and took up the 
 pen, but there was no ink. 
 
 " Cluck ! " said the infernal negro with 
 another grin — " cluck ! Massa wait lill}'- bit."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 65 
 
 He took my left hand in his soft and cold 
 paw. I felt a sharp prick at my wrist. 
 
 " You will dip the pen," said the old 
 gentleman, " in the blood. It is a mere 
 form." 
 
 " Cluck ! " said Boule-de-neige. 
 
 " A mere form, because we have no ink 
 handy." 
 
 "Cluck-cluck!" 
 
 I signed my name as desired and, following 
 the directions of the old gentleman, placed 
 my finger on the red wafer at the margin, 
 saying, " I declare this my act and deed." 
 
 Then I gave the pen to Boule-de-neige. 
 He signed after me in a firm flowing hand, 
 " Boule-de-neige." As I looked, the letters 
 seemed somehow to shape themselves into 
 " Beelzebub." I looked at him with a kind 
 of terror. The creature grinned in my face 
 as if he divined my thought, and gave 
 utterance to one of his hideous " clucks." 
 
 Then I began to feel the same faintness 
 
 VOL. I, ■ F
 
 66 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 which I had at first experienced. It mounted 
 upwards from my feet slowly, so that I heard 
 the old gentleman's voice, though I saw 
 nothing. It grew gradually fainter. 
 
 " Supper at ten, Boule-de-neige," he was 
 saying ; " I feel getting hungry already. 
 What shall I do with myself till ten o'clock ? 
 I am certainly getting hungry. I think I 
 can have it served at half-past nine. O, 
 blessed day! O, thankful, blessed day! Boule- 
 de-neige, it must be supper for three — for 
 four — for five. I shall have champagne — the 
 Perrier Jouet — the cura^oa punch afterwards. 
 Curagoa punch — I haven't tasted it for three 
 months and more. Oh, what a blessed- 
 blessed— blessed " 
 
 I heard no more because my senses failed 
 me altogether, and his voice died away In my 
 ears. 
 
 When I came to myself I was leaning 
 against the post in Bucklersbury, where I had 
 met the old man.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 67 
 
 A whiff of Stale cooked meat from the 
 cook-shop, which caught me &s I opened my 
 eyes, produced a singular feeling of disgust. 
 *' Pah," I muttered, " roast mutton ! " and 
 moved from the spot. My hunger was gone, 
 that was quite certain. I felt a quietness 
 about those regions, wherever they may be, 
 which belong to appetite. I was almost 
 dreamy in the repose which followed a 
 morning so stormy. I walked quietly away 
 homewards in a kind of daze, trying to make 
 out something of what had happened. The 
 first thing I found I could not remember was 
 the name of the old gentleman. When that 
 came back to me and under what circum- 
 stances I will tell you as we get along. Bit 
 by bit I recalled the whole events of the 
 afternoon, one after the other. I saw the old 
 man, with his purple face and bloodshot eyes 
 and white hair ; I saw the wrinkled and 
 seamed old negro ; I saw the octagonal room 
 without doors or windows ; the splendid
 
 68 FROM TPIE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 dinner; the host watching my every gesture ; 
 I remenibered everything except the name of 
 the man to whom I had sold — my appetite. 
 
 . It was so strange that I laughed when I 
 thought of it. I must 'have been drunk: he 
 gave me a good dinner and I took too much 
 wine ; but, then, how was it that I remembered 
 clearly every, even the smallest, detail ? 
 
 On the bed in the one room which con- 
 stituted my lodging I found a letter. It was 
 from a firm of lawyers, dated that evening at 
 half-past six — only half an hour after I signed 
 the paper — stating that they were empowered 
 by a client, whose name was not mentioned, 
 to give me the sum of ^30 monthly, to begin 
 from that day, and to be paid to me per- 
 sonally. How did they get their instruc- 
 tions, then ? And it was all true ! 
 
 I was too tired with the day's adventures 
 to think any more ; and though it was only 
 nine o'clock I went to bed and fell fast asleep. 
 In an hour I awoke again, with a choking
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 69 
 
 sensation, as if I was eating- too much. I 
 knew instantly what was going on, and by 
 a kind of prophetic insight. The old man 
 was taking his supper, and taking more than 
 was good — -for me. I sprang from the bed 
 gasping for breath. Presently, as I gathered, 
 he began to drink too much as well. My 
 brain went round and round. I laughed, 
 sang, and danced ; and soon after, with a 
 heavy fall, I rolled senseless on the carpet, 
 and remembered nothing more. 
 
 It was early in the morning when I awoke, 
 still lying on the floor. I had a splitting 
 headache. I had fallen against some corner 
 of the furniture and blackened one eye. I 
 had broken two chairs somehow or other. I 
 was cold, ill, and shaken. I got into bed, 
 and tried to remember what had happened. 
 Clearly I must have made a drunken beast of 
 myself over the dinner, and reeled home with 
 my head full of fancies and dreams ; perhaps 
 the dinner itself was a dream and a halluci-
 
 JO FROM THE SUPERNATUEAL. 
 
 nation too ; if so, the pangs of hunger wouH 
 soon recommence. But they did not. Then 
 I fell asleep, and did not awake again till the 
 clock struck twelve. How ill and wretched 
 I felt as I dressed! My hand shook, my eyes 
 were red, my face swollen. Surely I must 
 have been intoxicated. I had been, up to 
 that day at least, a temperate man, partly no 
 doubt from the very wholesome reason which 
 keeps so many of us sober — the necessity of 
 poverty; but of course I had not arrived at 
 four and twenty years and seen so much of 
 the world without recognising the signs of too 
 much drink, I had them, every one ; and, as 
 most men know too well, they are all summed 
 iip in the simple expression, " hot coppers." 
 Alas ! I was destined to become only too* 
 familiar with the accursed symptoms. In- 
 voluntarily, when I had dressed myself, I put 
 my hands in my pockets, those pockets so 
 often empty ; there was money, gold — sove- 
 reigns — my pocket was full of them. I
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 7 1 
 
 counted them in a stupor. Forty-nine, and 
 one rolled into the corner — fifty ; it was part 
 of the sum for which I had sold my appetite ; 
 and on the table lay the letter from Messrs. 
 Crackett & Charges, inviting me to draw 
 thirty pounds a month. 
 
 Then it was all true ! 
 
 I sat down and, with my throbbing temples 
 and feverish pulse, tried to make it out. 
 Everything became plain except the name of 
 
 the purchaser — Mr. — Mr. I remembered 
 
 Boule-de-neige, the house, the room, and the 
 dinner, but not the name of that arch-deceiver, 
 the whole of whose villany I was far from 
 realising yet; and until it was told me later on 
 I never did remember the name. 
 
 It was strange. Men are said to have sold 
 their souls to the devil for money, bartering 
 away an eternity of happiness'tbr a few years 
 of pleasure ; but as for me I had exchanged, 
 as it seemed at first sight, nothing but the 
 inconvenience of a healthy appetite with
 
 72 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 nothing to eat for the means of living com- 
 fortably without it. There could be no sin in 
 such a transaction ; it was on a different level 
 altogether from the bargain made by Faust. 
 And there were the broad, the benevolent 
 facts, so to speak' — my pocket full of sove- 
 .reigns, and the letter instructing me to call 
 at an office for thirty pounds monthly. 
 
 Benevolent facts I thought them. You 
 shall see. You think, as I thought, that no 
 sin could be laid to my door for the 
 transaction. You shall judge. You think, as 
 I thought, that no harm could follow so simple 
 a piece of business. You shall read. On my 
 way out I met the landlady, who gave me 
 notice to quit at the end of the week. 
 
 " I thought you were a quiet and a sober 
 young man," she said. " Ah, never will I 
 trust to good looks again. Me and the 
 lodgers kept awake till two in the morning 
 with your singing and dancing, let alone 
 banging the floor with the chairs. Not
 
 THE CASE OF I\IR. LUCRAFT. 73 
 
 another hour after your week's up, if you was 
 to pray on your knees, shall you stay. And 
 next door threatening the constables; and 
 me a quiet woman for twenty years." 
 
 My heart sank again. But after all, per- 
 haps it was I myself, not the good old 
 gentleman, my kind patron and benefactor, at 
 all, who was the cause of this disturbance. 
 It was undoubtedly true that I had taken a 
 great quantity of wine with my splendid 
 dinner. I begged her pardon humbly, and 
 passed out. 
 
 It was now nearly one o'clock, but I felt no 
 desire for breakfast. That was an experience 
 quite novel to me. Still I went to a coffee- 
 house, according to habit, and ordered some 
 tea and a rasher. When they came I dis- 
 covered, with a horrid foreboding of worse 
 misfortune behind, that my taste was gone. 
 Except that one thing was solid and the other 
 liquid, I distinguished nothing. Nor did my 
 sense of smell assist me ; as I found later, my
 
 74 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 nose was affected agreeably or disagreeably, 
 but it lost all its discriminating and critical 
 powers. Gunpowder, sulphuretted hydrogen 
 gas, and tobacco offended my nose. So did 
 certain smells belonging to cookery. On the 
 other hand, certain flowers, tea, and claret 
 pleased me, but I was unable to distinguish 
 between them. Not only could I not taste 
 things, but I had no gratification in eating 
 them. I ate and drank mechanically, because 
 I knew that the body must be kept going on 
 somethinof. 
 
 All this knowledge, however, and more, 
 came by degrees. After making a forced 
 breakfast I bent my steps to the lawyers', 
 who had an office in Lincoln's-inn Fields. 
 
 The letter was received by a conceited 
 young clerk in shiny black habiliments, a 
 turned up nose, and a self-satisfied manner. 
 
 " Ha ! " he said, " I thought you would soon 
 come round to us after the letter. Sign that. 
 You haven't been lone. None of them are."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 75 
 
 It was a receipt ; and I was on the point of 
 asking if it was to be signed in blood, when 
 he settled the question by giving me the ink. 
 
 " There, Luke Lucraft, across the eight- 
 penny stamp. I'm not allowed to answer 
 any questions you may put, Mr. Lucraft, nor 
 to ask you any ; so take your money, and 
 good-morning to you. I suppose, like the 
 rest of them, you don't know the name of 
 your benefactor, and would like to — yes ; but 
 you needn't ask mc ; and I've orders not to 
 admit you to see either Mr. Charges or Mr. 
 Crackett. They'd trouble enough with the 
 last but one. He broke into their office 
 once drunk, and laid about " him with the 
 ruler." 
 
 I burst into a cold dew of terror. 
 
 " However, Mr. Lucraft, I hope you will 
 be more fortunate than your predecessors." 
 
 " Where are they ? Who are they ? " 
 
 " I do not know where they are, not for 
 a certainty," he replied with a grin. " But
 
 76 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 we may guess. Dead and buried they are, 
 all of them. Gone to kingdom come ; all 
 died of the same thing too — D.T. Delicious 
 Trimmings killed them. Poor old gentleman ! 
 He's too good for this world, as everybody 
 knows, and the more he's taken in the more 
 he's deceived. Anyhow, he's very unlucky 
 in his pensioners. He did say when the 
 last went off that he would have no more ; 
 he wept over it, and declared that his bounty 
 was always abused ; but there never was 
 such a benevolent old chap. I only wish he'd 
 take a fancy to me." 
 
 " What did you say is his name, by the 
 way?" 
 
 The clerk looked at me with a cunning 
 wink. 
 
 "If you don't know, I am sure I do not," 
 he said. " Here is the cheque, Mr. Lucraft, 
 and I hope you will continue to come here 
 and draw it a good deal longer than the 
 other chaps. But there's a blight on all the
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. ']J 
 
 pensioners. Lord, what a healthy chap Tom 
 Kirby — he was a Monmouth man — looked 
 when he first came for his cheques ! As 
 stronof as a bull and as fresh as a lark." 
 
 " A good appetite had he ? " 
 
 " No ; couldn't eat anything after a bit ; 
 said he fancied nothing. Lost his taste 
 entirely. He pined away and died in a 
 galloping consumption before the third month 
 was due. Nobody ever saw him drinking, 
 but he was drunk every night, regular, like 
 the rest. Perhaps it's only coincidence. 
 Better luck Xo yoiL, Mr. Lucraft j " 
 
 This conversation did not reassure me, and 
 I determined to go over to Bucklersbury at 
 once and see my patron. I found the post 
 against which I was leaning when he accosted 
 me ; there was no doubt about that, for the 
 hares and the cauliflowers were still in the 
 shop-windows, only they looked disgusting to 
 me this morning. I found the street into 
 which he had led me, and then — then — it
 
 78 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 was the most extraordinary thing, I could 
 not find the door by which we entered. Not 
 only was there no door, but there seemed no 
 place where such a door as I remembered 
 could exist in this little winding narrow 
 street. I went up and down twice. I looked 
 at all the windows. I asked a policeman if 
 he had ever seen an old gentleman about the 
 street such as I described, or such a negro as 
 Boule-de-neige ; but he could give no infor- 
 mation. Only as I prowled slowly along the 
 pavement I heard distinctly — it gave me a 
 nervous shock that I could not account for — 
 the infernal " Cluck- cluck ! " of the negro with 
 the cold soft hands, the wrinkled skin, and 
 the fiery red eyes. ' He was clucking at me 
 from some hiding-place of his own, where he 
 was safe. He had done me no harm that I 
 knew of, but I hated him at that moment. 
 
 I was by this time not at all elated at my 
 good fortune. I even craved to have back 
 again what I had sold. I felt heavy at heart,
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 79 
 
 and had a presentiment of fresh trouble 
 before me. I thought of the fate of those 
 unknown and unfortunate predecessors, all 
 dead in consequence of drink, evil courses, 
 and D.T. Heavens ! was I too to die 
 miserably with delirium tremens, after I had 
 sold my taste, and could only tell brandy 
 from water, like the cask which might hold 
 either, by the smell ? 
 
 At half-past one — the luncheon time for 
 all who have appetites — the sense of being 
 gorged came upon me again, but this time 
 without the giddiness. I went to a tavern 
 in the Strand, and fell sound asleep. When 
 I awoke at six the oppression had passed 
 away. And now I began to realise some- 
 thing of the consequences of my act. I 
 say something, because worse, far worse, 
 remained behind. I was doomed, I saw 
 clearly, to be the victim of the old man's 
 gluttony. He would eat and I should suffer. 
 Already, as I guessed from the clerk's state-
 
 8o FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ments, he had killed four strong men before 
 me. I was to be the fifth. I went again 
 to Bucklersbury, and sought in every house 
 for something that might give me a. clue. I 
 loitered in the quiet city streets in the hope 
 of finding my tormentor, and forcing him to 
 give me back my bond. There was no clue, 
 and I did not meet him. But I felt him. He 
 began dinner, as nearly as I could feel, about 
 seven o'clock ; he took his meal with deliber- 
 ation, judging from the gradual nature of 
 my sensations ; but he took an amazing 
 quantity, and by eight o'clock the weight 
 upon me was so great that I could scarcely 
 breathe. How I cursed my folly ! How I 
 impotently- writhed under the burden I had 
 wantonly laid upon myself ! And then he 
 began to drink. The fiend, the scoundrel ! I 
 felt the fumes mount to my head ; there was 
 no exhilaration, no forgetfulness of misery ; 
 none of the pleasant gradations of excitement, 
 hope, and confidence, through which men are
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 8 1 
 
 accustomed to pass before ariving at the final 
 stage, the complete oblivion, of intoxication. 
 I felt myself getting gradually but hopelessly 
 drunk. I struggled against the feeling, but 
 in vain ; the houses went round and round 
 with me ; my speech, when I tried to speak, 
 became thick ; the flags of the pavement flew 
 up and struck me violently on the forehead, 
 and I became unconscious of what happened 
 afterwards. 
 
 VOL. I.
 
 82 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 In the morning I found myself lying on a 
 stone bench in a small white-washed room. 
 My brows were throbbing and my throat was 
 parched, and in my brain was ringing, I do 
 not know why, the infernal ." Cluck-cluck ! " of 
 the negro with derisive iteration. I had not 
 long to meditate ; the door opened, and a 
 constable appeared. 
 
 " Now then," he said roughly, " if you can 
 stand upright by this time, come along." 
 
 It was clear enouo^h to me now what had 
 happened : I was in custody, in a police-cell, 
 and I was going before a magistrate. 
 
 I dream of that ignominy still, though forty 
 years have passed since I was placed in the
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LU CRAFT. 8$ 
 
 dock and asked what I had to say for myself. 
 " Drunk and disorderly." 
 
 I was charged by the constable — there 
 were no police in 1823 — with being drunk 
 and disorderly. Twenty other poor wretches 
 were waiting their trial for the same offence ; 
 one or two for graver charges. My case 
 came first, and had the honour of being 
 reported in the papers. Here is the extract 
 cut out of the Morning Chronicle — 
 
 "A young man, who gave his name as 
 Henry Luke, and said he was an actor by 
 profession, was charged with being drunk 
 and disorderly in the streets. The constable 
 found him at ten o'clock lying on the pave- 
 ment of Bucklersbury, too drunk even to 
 speak, and quite unable therefore to give any 
 account of himself A cheque, signed by the 
 well-known firm of Crackett & Charges, for 
 ^30 was found on his person. The magis- 
 trate remarked that this was a suspicious 
 circumstance, and decided to remand the
 
 84 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 case till these gentlemen could be commu- 
 nicated with. One of the partners appeared 
 at twelve, and deposed that the prisoner's 
 real name was Luke Lucraft, that he had 
 been an actor, and that the cheque had been 
 given him by the firm, acting for a client who 
 wished to be anonymous, but whose motive 
 was pure benevolence. 
 
 " The magistrate, on hearing the facts of 
 the case, addressed the prisoner with a suitable 
 admonition. He bade him remember that 
 such an abuse of a good man's charity, as he 
 had been guilty of, was the worst form of 
 ingratitude. It appeared, that on the very 
 day of receiving a gift, which was evidently 
 intended to advance him in life, or to find him 
 the means of procuring suitable employment, 
 the prisoner deliberately made himself so 
 hopelessly drunk that he could neither speak 
 nor stand — where, it did not appear. The 
 magistrate could not but feel that this conduct 
 showed the gravest want of moral principle,
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 85 
 
 and he strongly advised Mr. Crackett to 
 cancel the cheque till further orders. As, 
 however, it was a first offence, and in con- 
 sideration of the prisoner's youth, the fine 
 inflicted would be a small one of ten shillings, 
 with costs." 
 
 That was the newspaper account of the 
 affair. On my way out of the court, Mr. 
 Crackett stopped me. 
 
 " Young man," he said, shaking his head, 
 " this is very dreadful. I warned my bene- 
 volent client against this act of generosity. 
 You are the fifth young man whom he has 
 assisted in this magnificent manner. The 
 former, all four, took to drink, and died in a 
 disgraceful manner. Take warning, and stop 
 while it is yet time." 
 
 I got away as fast as I could, and crept 
 back to my lodging after the necessary miser- 
 able breakfast. 
 
 I am not ashamed to say that I sat down 
 and cried. The tears wottld crowd into my
 
 S6 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 eyes. It was too dreadful. Here I was, 
 only twenty-four years of age, with my life 
 before me, doomed, through my own foil}', to 
 a miserable ending and a disgraceful reputa- 
 tion. What good would come of having 
 money under these dreadful conditions ? 
 Money, indeed ! What had become of the 
 fifty pounds given me only two days before ? 
 Gone. All gone but one single sovereign, 
 which served to pay my fine. Some one had 
 robbed me. Perhaps the constables. Perhaps 
 a street thief. It was gone. The sorry 
 reward of my consent to the unholy bargain 
 was clean swept away, and only the conse- 
 quences of the contract remained. 
 
 In the afternoon, as I hastened home along 
 the darkening streets, hoping to reach my 
 lodging before the daily gorge began, a 
 curious thing happened to me. On the other 
 side of the street, in a dark corner, standing 
 upright, and pointing to me with a finger of 
 derision, I saw Boule-de-neige, the negro
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 87 
 
 servant. I rushed at him, th'nd with rage. 
 When I got to the spot I found nobody there. 
 Was it a trick of a disordered brain ? I had 
 seen him, quite plainly, grinning at me with 
 his wrinkled features. And as I turned from 
 the place I heard his familiar " Cluck-cluck." 
 
 Twice more on the way this strange phan- 
 tom appeared to me ; each time accompanied 
 by the " cluck " of his voice. • It was a phan- 
 tom with which I was to become familiar 
 indeed, before I had finished with Boule-de- 
 neiofe and his master. 
 
 It was clear that the demon to whom I had 
 sold myself was incapable of the slightest 
 consideration towards me. He would eat 
 and drink as much as he felt disposed to 
 do, careless of any consequences that might 
 befall me. It was equally evident that he 
 intended to make the most of his bargain, to 
 eat enormously every day, and to drink him- 
 self drunk every night. And I was power- 
 less. Meantime it was becomins: evident
 
 88 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 that the consequences to me would be as 
 serious as if I were myself guilty of these 
 •excesses. One drop of comfort alone re- 
 mained : my appetite would fail, and my 
 tormentor would be punished where he would 
 feel it most. I lay down and waited till 
 luncheon time ; no sense of repletion came 
 over me ; it was certain, therefore, that he 
 was already suffering a vicarious punishment, 
 so to speak, for yesterday's debauch. 
 
 The next day, however, I really did meet 
 my negro. 
 
 It was about five in the afternoon — the 
 time when I was tolerably safe, because my 
 owner, who took a plentiful luncheon at one, 
 did not begin his nightly orgy much before 
 seven. I was loitering about Bucklersbury, 
 my favourite place of resort, in the hope of 
 meeting the old man, when my arm was 
 touched as I turned round. It was the negro. 
 " Massa Lucraft," he said, " you come along 
 o' me. Massa him berry glad to see you."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 89 
 
 I declare that although the moment before 
 I had been picturing such an encounter ; 
 although I had imagined myself with my 
 fingers at his throat, dragging him off, and 
 forcing him to tell me who and what he was, 
 I felt myself unable to speak. 
 
 " Come along o' me, Massa Lucraft," he 
 said ; " this way — way you know berry well. 
 Ho, ho!— Cluck." 
 
 He stopped before the door I remembered 
 but had never been able to find, opened it 
 with a little key, and led the way to the 
 octagonal room. 
 
 There was no one In it, but the table was 
 already laid for dinner. 
 
 " Massa come bymeby. You wait, young 
 gegleman." 
 
 Then he disappeared somehow. 
 
 As before, I could see no door. As before, 
 the first sensation which came over me was 
 of giddiness, from which I recovered imme- 
 diatel)-. I walked round and round the room,
 
 90 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 looking at the heavy furniture, the pictures, 
 which were all of fruit and game, and the 
 silver plate. Everything showed the presence 
 of great wealth, and, I supposed, though I 
 knew nothing about it, great taste. I was 
 kept waiting for nearly two hours. That I 
 did not mind, because every moment brought 
 me, I thought, nearer to the hour of my 
 deliverance, I was certain that I had only 
 to put the case to Mr. Grumbelow — I re- 
 membered his name the moment I was back 
 in that room — to appeal to his generosity, his 
 honour, his pity, in order to obtain my release- 
 Mr. Grumbelow — Ebenezer Grumbelow — he 
 was the charitable client of Messrs. Crackett 
 & Charges, was he ? Why, I might show him 
 up to popular derision and hatred. I might 
 tell the world who and what this great bene- 
 factor of young men really was. 
 
 Suddenly, as the clock struck seven, he 
 stood upon the carpet before me, while Boule- 
 de-neige stood at the table with a soup tureen
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. QI 
 
 in his hand, I declare that I did not sec at 
 any time any one enter the room or go out 
 of it. They appeared to be suddenly in it. 
 
 I do hope that the appearance of small 
 details like the above, at first incredible, will 
 not be taken as proof of want of veracity on 
 my own part. I wish that I could tell the 
 tale without these particulars, but I cannot. 
 I must relate the whole or none. 
 
 "You here?" said Mr. Grumbelow, looking 
 at me with an air of contempt. He seated 
 himself at the table and unfolded his napkin. 
 " Soup, Boule-de-neige." 
 
 " Massa hungry ? Dat young debbel there 
 he look berry pale already." 
 
 " Pretty well, Boule-de-neige, considering. 
 You, sir, come here, and let me look at you." 
 I obeyed. " Hold out your hand. It shakes. 
 Let me look at your eyes. They are yellow. 
 Do you know that your appetite seems to me 
 to be failing already — already — and it is only 
 the fourth day."
 
 92 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " It is not my fault," I said. 
 
 " Nonsense. Don't talk to me, sir, because 
 I will have none of your insolence. I say 
 that you do not walk enough. I order you 
 to walk twelve miles a day — even twenty, 
 after a heavy night — -do you hear ? " 
 
 " It is not in the contract," I replied 
 doggedly. 
 
 " It is in the contract. You are to use 
 every means in your power to keep your 
 faculties in vigour. What means have you 
 used ? " 
 
 He banged the spoon on the table and 
 glanced at me so fiercely that I had nothing 
 to say. 
 
 " Massa, soup get cold," said Boule-de- 
 neige. 
 
 He gobbled it up, every now and then 
 looking up at me with an angry grunt. 
 
 " Now then, you and your contract. This 
 is pretty ingratitude, this is. Here's a fellow, 
 Boule-de-neige, I pick up out of the gutter,
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 93 
 
 Starving ; whom I keep expensively ; wliom 
 I endow with an income ; whom I deprive of 
 the temptation to gluttony." 
 
 " Nebber see such a debbel in all my days," 
 said the negro ; " nebber hear such a ting told 
 nowhere." 
 
 " No, nor ever will. Listen to me, sir. 
 You will walk ten, twelve, or twenty miles 
 a day, according to the dinner I have had. 
 And, mark you, it will be the worse for you 
 if you do not. Remember, if I cannot eat I 
 can drink." 
 
 There was a fiendish orlare in his blood- 
 stained eyes as he spoke, and I trembled. 
 My spirit was so completely gone that I had 
 not even the pluck to appeal to his pity. 
 Perhaps a secret consciousness of the use- 
 lessness of such an appeal deterred me. 
 
 " You will now," he said, " watch me 
 making as large a dinner as your miserably 
 languid appetite will allow." 
 
 " I have been drunk for four nights," I 
 pleaded.
 
 94 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " Then you have no business to get drunk 
 so easily. Your head is contemptibly weak — 
 what did I take yesterday, Boule-de-neige ? " 
 
 " Big bottle champagne, big bottle port, 
 eight goes whisky grog." 
 
 " I did — and that was all. Why your 
 predecessor stood double the quantity." 
 
 " Beg pardon, massa. Last young gegle- 
 man poor trash — last but two — him mighty 
 strong head — head like bull — nebber get 
 drunk." 
 
 " Ah, we wasted him, Boule-de-neige ; we 
 fooled him away in one imprudent evening. 
 I told you at the time that ncyeau punch is 
 a very dangerous thing." 
 
 "Ho, ho ! " the diabolical negro laughed 
 till his teeth showed like the grinning jaws 
 of a death's head. " Ho, ho ! him so blind 
 drunk he tumble out of window — break him 
 neck. Ho, ho ! " 
 
 This was a pleasant conversation for me 
 to hear.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 95 
 
 Then Mr. Grumbelow resumed his dinner. 
 
 He ate a good deal in spite of his grum- 
 bhng, and then he began to drink port. I 
 observed that the wine had a peculiar effect 
 upon him. It made him redder in the face, 
 but not thicker in speech. He drank two 
 bottles, talking at me all the time. I began 
 to get drunk, he only got the more merrily 
 fiendish. 
 
 " This is really delightful," he said, as I 
 reeled and caught at a chair for support. 
 " I wonder I never thought of this before. 
 It is quite a new pleasure to watch the effects 
 of my own drink on another man's brain. I 
 shall write a book about you. I shall call it 
 ' The Young Christian deterred, or Leaves 
 from Luke Lucraft's Wicked Life.' Ho, ha ! 
 ha, ho ! I saw the account in the Morning 
 Post. Heigh, heigh ! " — he nearly choked 
 as he recalled the circumstance. " The 
 magistrate admonishing the wicked drunkard. 
 Ho, ho! It is like a farce. Stand up, sir,
 
 96 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Stand up. He can't stand up. Can you 
 sing ? Can you dance ? He could not even 
 dance a hornpipe. Do you feel a little 
 thickness in your speech ? Would you be 
 able to explain to the worthy magistrate the 
 circumstances quite beyond your own control, 
 which brought you into that painful position 
 in which you stood ? It is the best situation 
 that ever was put upon any stage. There's 
 nothing like it in fiction. Nothing. Walter 
 Scott never invented anything half so rich. 
 Ho, ho, ho ! he is really getting drunk 
 already. What a poor creature it is ! " 
 
 He paused for a moment and then went 
 on. 
 
 " Boule-de-neige, coffee ; brandy in it- 
 plenty of brandy, and a glass of curacoa after- 
 wards. A large glass, sir ! I'll have a night 
 of it. Your health, Luke Lucraft, in this 
 coffee ; and you had better take care of it, or 
 I'll pack you off with noyeau punch. Plea- 
 sant times you are having, eh ? Might have
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 97 
 
 been worse, you know. You might have been 
 starving — What ? Don't fall against the table 
 in that way. Take care of the furniture. 
 It cost a great deal more money than you 
 are worth. So, sit down on the floor while 
 I tell you about your predecessors, dead and 
 gone, poor fellows. 
 
 " Let me see. The first was William. 
 Saunders, a poor devil of a clerk of mine. 
 He disgraced himself in chapel one week- 
 day prayer-meeting, the very evening of 
 his signature ; then he ran away, but Boule- 
 de-neige found him out, and brought him 
 back. He took to praying and crying. 
 One day he died in Bartholomew Hospital 
 of delirium tremens. He lasted about six: 
 months. 
 
 "The next was Hans Hansen, a Dane. 
 He only lasted about three weeks, because 
 he became melancholy directly he found he 
 could no longer taste brandy. I was disap- 
 pointed with Hansen, and when he jumped 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 off London Bridge into the Thames one 
 night, his appetite having quite gone, I was 
 really very sorry on account of the temporary 
 inconvenience it put me to ; and I deter- 
 mined to be very careful in his successor. 
 I remember I had a good deal of trouble 
 to find one. 
 
 " However, at last I got a third man, a stout 
 Cumberland chap, son of a statesman. You 
 poor, puny, little strolling actor, I suppose 
 that you will hardly believe that I once took 
 four and twenty tumblers of Scotch whisky 
 and water without affecting that brave fellow's 
 appetite one bit. He used to take it out in 
 swearing ; and really he was almost too often 
 in trouble with the magistrates. He never 
 clearly understood that his safety lay In being 
 home early in the evening. Once he nearly 
 killed Mr. Crackett in his own office. Poor 
 Crackett! that eminent Christian lawyer ; 
 I should never have forgiven myself had 
 anything happened to the worthy Crackett.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 99 
 
 Well ! he went too ; at least, after a good 
 tough twelvemonth. It was my own fault, 
 and I ought not to grumble. That noyeau 
 punch was strong enough to kill the devil." 
 
 " Cluck," said Boule-de-neige. 
 
 " Then we came to Tom Kirby. None 
 of them looked so well or promised so much ; 
 none broke down so easily. A whining- 
 fellow too ; a crying, sobbing, appealing rogue, 
 who wanted to get off his bargain. How- 
 ever, de mortuis ■ Your health, Luke 
 
 Lucraft. Hallo ! hold up." 
 
 " I tell you what I mean to do after you 
 are worked off, Luke Lucraft. I mean to 
 have a brace of fellows. I shall Qfo down 
 to the London docks or else to the railway 
 stations, and find a couple of trusty young 
 porters. They are the sort of men to have. 
 Fine, strong, well-set-up rascals. Men with 
 muscles like rigging ropes — don't clutch at 
 the chairs, Lucraft — if you can't sit up you 
 may lie down — I shall make them come here
 
 lOO FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 • — give them a blow out of steak — I wasted 
 a splendid dinner on you — and then I shall 
 make them sign. 
 
 " The great thing, then, will be to have the 
 appetites of two men ; twice as much to eat 
 and twice as much to drink. I never thought 
 of that before. 
 
 " And then to bring both the rogues up 
 here of an evening and make them wait and 
 see me eat ; watch them gradually lolling 
 and reeling about till they tumble over each 
 other; go secretly and hear them curse me, 
 me their benefactor — Ho ! ho ! I think I 
 shall not be long over you, Luke Lucraft, 
 Hallo! keep your drunken legs away from the 
 table. Boule-de-neige, roll this intoxicated 
 log into the street."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 01 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 When I came to my senses it was of course 
 the next morning, and I was lying in my own 
 bed-room, whither I had been carried by two 
 strange men, the landlady afterwards -told 
 me, who said they were paid for the job. 
 I had a splitting headache. I was sick and 
 giddy ; my limbs trembled beneath me when 
 I tried to stand ; my hands shook. I looked 
 at myself in the glass. Swollen features and 
 bloodshot eyes greeted me. 
 
 Less than a week had wrought this ruin. 
 
 The ordinary drunkard refreshes himself in 
 the morning with tea. Nothing refreshed me 
 because I could taste nothing, and because 
 my suffering sprang from a different source,
 
 102 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 though they were the same in kind. I had 
 to bear them as best I mieht. 
 
 I remembered the command which Mr. — 
 Mr. — strange, I had forgotten his name 
 again — gave me, to walk twenty miles after a 
 " heavy night." I started to obey him. 
 
 Outside London, beyond Islington, where 
 •there are now rows of houses, but were then 
 fields, I saw a little modest cottage, standing 
 alone in its garden. It was a cottage with 
 four rooms only, covered over with creepers. 
 On a board, standing at the gate, Avas 
 an announcement that it was to let. A 
 thought struck me. Here could be seclusion,, 
 at any rate. Here I could shut myself up 
 every night, and await in comparative safety 
 the dreadful punishment — fast becoming 
 heavier than I could bear — which my 
 tormentor inflicted upon me. Why should 
 I not take the cottage, pay the rent in 
 advance every month — for how many months 
 should I have to pay it ? — and so wait in
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT, 10$ 
 
 patience and resignation the approach of 
 my inevitable fate ? 
 
 I made inquiries at once, and secured the 
 place at a merely nominal rent. Then I 
 moved in a little furniture, bought second- 
 hand in Islington High Street, and became 
 the occupant, a lonely hermit, of the house. 
 There were no houses within hearing in case 
 I should storm and rage in my drunken mad- 
 ness at night. The cottage stood removed 
 from the road, and no callers were likely to 
 trouble me. Within those walls I should be 
 secure from some dangers at least. Here, 
 night after night, I could await the attacks of 
 surfeit and intoxication, which regularly came ; 
 for my master knew no pity. 
 
 On the first evening I sat down at half-past 
 six to prepare for what was coming. The 
 day was drawing in, and a cold twilight — the 
 month was March — covered the trees and 
 shrubs in my little garden, as I opened the 
 door and looked out.
 
 I04 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Before me stood the negro. 
 
 My spirit was quite broken, and I could 
 only groan. 
 
 " Do you want me to go with you again ? " 
 I asked, thinking of the last entertainment at 
 which I provided amusement for his master. 
 
 " Massa say him berry glad you come hyar. 
 You walk the twenty mile ebbery day, else 
 massa know the reason why. How you 
 feel, Massa Lucraft ? Heigh ! heigh ! cluck. 
 Dat most fortunate day for you when you 
 sign dat little paper." 
 
 He delivered his message and disappeared 
 in the darkness. I heard his footsteps crunch- 
 ing the gravel in the road, and I longed, only 
 now I had no courage or spirit left, to seize 
 him and tear him limb from limb. 
 
 Then I shut myself in, lit one candle, and 
 sat over the fire. I thought of the scenes by 
 which my extravagant fancy had been ex- 
 cited ; the garden full of lively girls — what 
 were girls to me now ? the country walks I
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. IO5 
 
 was to have with JuHet — where was my 
 passion for Juhet now ? The ease and happi- 
 ness, the lightness and innocence, of the Hfe 
 before me, drawn by that arch-deceiver, com- 
 pared with my present, my actual misery, 
 sitting alone, cut off from mankind, the slave 
 and victim of a secret -profligate and glutton, 
 doomed to die slowly, unless it should please 
 the murderer to kill me off quickly. 
 
 And then, because the first symptoms of 
 the attack were coming on, I went to bed and 
 stayed there. 
 
 So began my new life. A wretched life it 
 was. There was no occupation possible for 
 me — no amusement. I walked every day, in 
 fair weather or foul, a measured twenty miles. 
 
 This in some degree restored vitality to 
 my system. I never read. I took no interest 
 in any politics. I sat by myself, and brooded. 
 
 As for my meals, I bought them ready 
 prepared. They consisted almost wholly of 
 bread and cold mutton. You may judge of
 
 106 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 the absolutely tasteless conditipn to which I 
 was reduced, when I write calmly and truth- 
 fully that cold boiled mutton was as agreeable 
 to me as any other form of food. I found, 
 after repeated trials, that mutton forms the 
 best fuel — it is better than either beef or 
 pork — and keeps the human engine at work 
 ■ for the longest time. Sol had mutton. As I 
 discovered also that bulk was necessary, and 
 that only a certain amount of animal food 
 was wanted, I used to have cold potatoes 
 always ready. I stoked twice a day, at eleven 
 in the morning and about five in the after- 
 noon. Thus fortified, I got through the 
 miserable hours as best as I could. 
 
 I look back on that period as one of 
 unmitigated misery and despair. ' I was daily 
 growing more bloated, fatter, and flabbier in 
 the cheeks. My hands trembled in the 
 morning. I seemed losing the power of 
 connected thought. My very lips were 
 thickening.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. lOj 
 
 I hope I am making it clear what was the 
 effect of my bargain on myself — I mean with- 
 out reference to the sufferings inflicted on me 
 by my tyrant. People, however, never can 
 know, unless they happen to be like myself, 
 which is unlikely, how great a part eating and 
 drinking take in the conduct of life. Between 
 the rest of the world and me there w^as a 
 great gulf fixed. They could enjoy, I could 
 not ; they could celebrate every joyful event 
 with something additional to eat ; they could 
 make a little festival of every day ; they 
 could give to happiness an outward and 
 tangible form. Alas, not only was I debarred 
 from this, but I was cut off even from joy 
 itself! for, if you look at it steadily, you will 
 find that most of human joy or suffering is 
 connected with the senses. I had bartered 
 away a good half of mine, and the rest 
 seemed in mourning for the loss of their 
 fellows. As for my pale and colourless life, 
 it was as monotonous as the clock. If I
 
 I08 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 neglected to stoke, the usual feebleness would 
 follow. There was no gracious looking for- 
 ward to a pleasant dinner ; no trembling 
 anticipations in hope and fear of what might 
 be preparing ; no cheerful contemplation of 
 the joint while the carver sharpens his knife ; 
 no discussions of flavour and richness ; no 
 modestly hazarded conclusions as to more 
 currants ; no rolling of the wine-glass in the 
 fingers to the light and smacking of lips over 
 the first sip — all these things were lost to me. 
 Reader, if haply this memoir ever see a 
 posthumous light, think what would happen 
 to yourself if eating and drinking, those 
 perennial joys of humanity, which last from 
 the infantine pap to the senile Revalenta 
 Arabica, were taken away. 
 
 All things tasted alike, as I have said, and 
 cold mutton formed my staple dish. As I 
 could only distinguish between beer, wine, 
 coffee, and tea by the look, I drank water. If 
 I ventured, which was seldom, to take my
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. IO9 
 
 dinner at a cookshop, I would choose my 
 piece de resistance by the look, by some fancied 
 grace in the shape, but not by taste or smell. 
 The brown of roast beef might attract me 
 one day and repel me the next I was 
 pleased with the comeliness of a game-pie, 
 or tickled by some inexplicable external 
 charm of a beefsteak-pudding. But three 
 quarters of my life were gone, and with them 
 all my happiness. 
 
 If you have no appetite for eating, you can 
 enjoy nothing in the whole world. That is 
 an axiom, I could not taste, therefore my 
 e)'e ceased to feel delight in pleasant sights, 
 and my ear in pleasant sounds. It was not 
 with me as in the case of a blind man, that 
 an abnormal development of some other 
 sense ensued ; quite the contrary. In selling- 
 one, I seem to have sold them all. For, 
 as I discovered, man is one and inseparable; 
 }Ou cannot split him up ; and when my arch- 
 deceiver bought my appetite, he bought me
 
 no FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 out and out. A wine-merchant might as 
 well pretend to sell the bouquet of claret and 
 preserve the body ; or a painter the colour of 
 his picture and preserve the drawing ; or a 
 sculptor the grace of his group and keep the 
 marble. 
 
 As regards other losses, I found I had lost 
 the perception of beauty in form or colour. 
 Why this was so I cannot explain. I.: was 
 no longer, I suppose, in harmony with othier 
 men on any single point. Pretty women 
 passed me unheeded ; pictures had no charm 
 for me ; music was only irritating to my 
 nerves. 
 
 Then I found that I had lost the power 
 of sympathy. I had formerly been a soft- 
 hearted man. I remarked now that the si^ht 
 of suffering found me entirely callous. There 
 was a poor family living about half a mile 
 from me, whose acquaintance I made through 
 buying some of my supplies of them. They 
 were in distress for rent ; they applied to
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. I I T 
 
 me .... there, I cannot bear to think of 
 it. I had the money and I refused them. 
 They were sold up, and I sat at my door and 
 watched them on their way to London — the 
 mother, the two girls, the little boy, hand- 
 in-hand, homeless and penniless, without a 
 pang and without a single prompting of the 
 heart to help them. God knows what became 
 of them. May He forgive me for the hard- 
 hearted cruelty with which I regarded their 
 fate. 
 
 Had I, then, sold everything to this man ? 
 
 I had been pretty religious in a way — a 
 young man's way. Now I had lost all reli- 
 gious feeling whatever. I had once ambition 
 and hopes, these were gone ; I had once the 
 capacity of love, that was gone ; I had once 
 a generous heart, that was gone ; I once 
 loved things worth loving, I felt no emotion 
 now foj- anything. I was a machine which 
 could feel. I was a man with the humanity 
 taken out of him.
 
 112 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 This time lasted for about four months.^ 
 On the first of each month I went to receive 
 my pay — the wages of sin — from the clerk, 
 who surveyed me critically, but said nothing 
 till the morning of the fourth month. Then, 
 while he handed me my money, he whispered 
 confidentially across the table : 
 
 " Look here, old fellow, you know ; you're 
 going it, worse than poor Tom Kirby. Why 
 don't you stop it ? What is the good of a 
 feller's drinking himself to death ? The old 
 gentleman was here yesterday, asking me 
 how you looked and if you continued steady. 
 Pull up, old man, and knock it off." 
 
 I took the money in my trembling hands 
 and slunk away abashed. When I got home 
 again, I am not ashamed to say that I cried 
 like a child. 
 
 Delirium tremens ! That would begin soon, 
 and then the end would not be far off It 
 was too awful. Think of my position. I 
 was but four and twenty. Not only was I
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. II3 
 
 deprived of the pleasure — mind you, a very 
 real pleasure — of eating and drinking ; I was 
 the most temperate man in the world, though 
 that was no great credit to myself, consider- 
 ing ; and yet I bore in my face and my 
 appearance, and felt in my very brain, all 
 the marks and signs of confirmed drunken- 
 ness and the hopelessness of it. That 
 hardened old voluptuary, that demon of 
 gluttony, that secret murderer, would have 
 no pity. He must have felt by the falling- 
 off of the splendid appetite which he was 
 doing his utmost to ruin, that things were 
 getting worse, and he was resolved — I had 
 suspected this for some time — to kill me off 
 by drinking me to death. 
 
 I believe I should have been dead in 
 another week, but for a blessed respite, due, 
 I afterwards discovered, to my demon being* 
 laid up with so violent a sore throat that 
 he could not even swallow. What was my 
 joy at being able to go to bed sober, to 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 wake without a headache, to feel my bad 
 symptoms slowly disappearing, to recover 
 my nerves ! For a whole fortnight I was 
 happy — so happy that I even believed the 
 improvement would last and that the old 
 man was penitent. One day, after fourteen 
 days of a veritable earthly paradise, I was 
 walking along the Strand — for I was no 
 longer afraid of venturing out — and met my 
 old manager, Juliet's father. He greeted 
 me with a warmth that was quite touching 
 under all the circumstances. " My dear boy, 
 I have been longing to know your where- 
 abouts. Come and tell me all about it. 
 Have you dined ? Let us have some dinner 
 together." 
 
 I excused myself, and asked after Juliet. 
 
 " Juliet is but so-so. Ah, do you know, 
 Lucraft, sometimes I think that I did wrong 
 to part you. And yet, you know, you had 
 no money. Make some, my boy, and come 
 back to us."
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. I 1 5 
 
 This was hearty. I forgot my troubles 
 and my state of bondage and everything, 
 except Juliet. 
 
 " I — I — I have money," I said. " I have 
 ■come into a little money unexpectedly." 
 
 " Have you?" he replied, clasping me by 
 the hand. " Then come down and see Juliet. 
 Or — stay ; no. The day after to-morrow is 
 Juliet's ben. We are playing at Richmond. 
 We have one of your own parts — you shall 
 be Sir Harry Wildair. I will alter the bills. 
 You are sure to come ? " 
 
 '• Sure to come," I said with animation. 
 " Capital ! I know every line in the part. 
 Tell Juliet that an old friend will act with 
 her." 
 
 We made a few new arrangements and 
 parted. I bought a copy of the play at 
 Lacy's, and studied the part over again. 
 
 Next day I got over to Richmond in good 
 time. The day was fine, I remember; my 
 spirits were rapidly rising because it was now
 
 Il6 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 the fifteenth day since I had had one of my 
 usual attacks. I was in great hopes that 
 the old man was really going to change his 
 life and behave with consideration towards 
 me. With the birth of hope, there revived 
 in my heart some of my old feelings. I 
 had a real desire to see Juliet again, but 
 yet the old warmth seemed gone. It was 
 a desire to see one in whom I had once 
 been interested ; the desire to awake old 
 memories which, I think, principally actuated 
 me. 
 
 I found the dear girl waiting for me with 
 an impatience which ought to have touched 
 my heart, but which, somehow, only seemed 
 to remind me of old times. My heart was 
 gone — sold to my master with everything 
 else. Mechanically I took her hands in 
 mine, and kissed her on the lips as I used 
 to do. She threw both arms round my 
 neck, kissed me again and again, and burst 
 into tears of joy.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. ll*J 
 
 " Oh, Luke, Luke ! " she said, " I have so 
 longed to see you again. The time has been 
 weary, weary, without you." 
 
 We sat together for half an hour, she all 
 the time talking to me, and I, remembering 
 what I used to be with her, wondering where 
 the old feelings were gone, and trying to act 
 as I used to. 
 
 " Luke, you are not growing cold to me, 
 are you ? " she asked, as some little gesture 
 or word of hers passed me unnoticed. 
 
 " Cold, Juliet ? " I replied. " What should 
 make you think so ? " 
 
 " I will not think so," she said. " It is too 
 great happiness to meet again, is it not ? 
 And you are silent because you feel too 
 happy to speak. Ls not that so ? " 
 
 Presently it became time to go and dress. 
 
 " Let me look at you, Sir Henry Wildair," 
 she said. " Yes, we shall do it very well to- 
 night. You are not looking, somehow, quite 
 so well as you used, Luke dear. Is it that
 
 Il8 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 London does not agree with you ? Are you 
 working too hard ? Your face is swollen and 
 — fancy — Mrs. Mould says you look as if you 
 had been drinking." 
 
 Mrs. Mould was the dresser. 
 
 If Mrs. Mould had seen me a fortnight 
 before, she might well have said I had been 
 drinking. A fortnight, however, of rest had 
 done wonders for me. 
 
 I laughed, but felt a little uneasy. 
 
 We rang up at seven. 
 
 The house was quite full, because my Juliet 
 was popular at Richmond. 
 
 I began with all my former fire and vigour, 
 because I was acting again with her. The old 
 life came back to me ; I forgot my troubles ; 
 I was really happy, and I believe I acted 
 well. At all events, the house applauded. 
 Between the first and second act a sudden 
 terror seized me. I felt that the old man 
 was eating again. That passed off, because 
 he ate very little. But then he began to 
 drink, and to drink fast.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. II9 
 
 It was no use fighting against it. I believe 
 the villain must have been drinking raw 
 brandy, because I was drunk in five minutes. 
 I staggered and reeled about on the stage, I 
 laughed wildly and sang foolishly, and then I 
 tumbled down in a heap and could not get up 
 again. The last thing I remember is the 
 angry roar of poor old Kerrans, beside him- 
 self with passion, telling the carpenters to 
 carry that drunken beast away and throw 
 him into the road. I heard afterwards that 
 they were obliged to drop the curtain, and that 
 the eclat of poor Juliet's benefit was entirely 
 spoiled. As for myself, the carpenters carried 
 me out to the middle of Richmond-green, 
 where, they were going to leave me, only one 
 of them had compassion, and wheeled me to 
 his own house in a barrow. 
 
 In the . morning I returned hastily to 
 London, sought my cottage at Islington, and 
 shut myself in with an agony of shame and 
 humiliation.
 
 I20 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 I was quite crushed by this blow. For 
 the first time I felt tempted to commit suicide 
 and end it all. To be sure I ought to have 
 foreseen this, and all the other dreadful things. 
 Directly my master, my owner, got able to 
 swallow, though he could not eat, he could 
 drink, and ordered the most fiery liquor he 
 could procure, with a view to kill me off and 
 begin with another victim. 
 
 But Providence ruled otherwise. 
 
 Then began a week of cruel suffering. My 
 master sent me word by Boule-de-neige that 
 he intended to finish me off. My appetite, 
 he said, had been long failing, and was now 
 perfectly contemptible. He complained that 
 I had neglected my part of the contract, that 
 I must have been practising intemperance — 
 the horrible hypocrite — to have reduced so 
 fine an appetite to nothing in a short four 
 months. Therefore he felt obliged to tell me 
 that in a week or two I should probably find 
 the agreement ended. That was his ferocious
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 121 
 
 way of putting it. He meant that in a week 
 I should be dead. His words were prophetic, 
 but not in the sense in which he meant them. 
 
 He drank brandy now. He drank it morn- 
 ing, noon, and night. He drank it, not 
 because he Hked it, but in hopes of despatch- 
 ing me. I was no sooner partially recovered 
 from one drunken bout than I plunged into 
 another. 
 
 I lost all power of walking. I could not 
 move about. I lay the whole day sick and 
 feverish on my bed, or, if I got up at all, it 
 was only to change it for an easy chair. I 
 could eat nothing. 
 
 Then I began to have visions and to see 
 spectres in my loneliness and misery. 
 
 First I saw all over again the scenes of my 
 early life — my poor deserted mother ; the 
 tramp who took charge of me ; the sleep in 
 which I nearly perished ; the strolling actors 
 with whom I wandered ; the girl with whom 
 I fell in love. Only among them all there
 
 122 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 hovered perpetually the ugly face of Boule- 
 de-neige, spoiling the pleasant memories, 
 and corrupting the current of my thoughts 
 with his " cluck, cluck," and his demoniac 
 grin. 
 
 " How you do, Massa Lucraft ? How you 
 feel your stumjack this morning ? Ole massa 
 him berry fierce. Him gwine to make the 
 noyeau punch to-morrow. Dat finish um 
 off. Dat work um up. You wait till to- 
 morrow, Massa Lucraft." 
 
 I could only groan. 
 
 " You nice young gegleman," he went on 
 with a grin. " You berry grateful young 
 gegleman. Massa him gib you thirty pounds 
 a month, and you spend it all in 'temperate 
 courses. Bad ; berry bad ; dam bad. What 
 you say when you die — eh ? Ho ! ho ! " 
 
 The creature seemed always with me 
 during this time. If I opened my eyes I 
 had the feeling that he was hovering about 
 my bed. If it was dark I thought I saw his
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 23 
 
 eyes glaring at me from some corner. If I 
 was asleep he would waken me with his 
 "cluck." What he did in my cottage I never 
 knew. The room was filled with the visions 
 which passed through my brain, succeeding 
 each other again and again like the acts of 
 a play repeated incessantly. I saw the 
 octagonal room with the old gentleman eat- 
 ing and drinking. I saw myself at Rich- 
 mond, I saw myself before the magistrates ; 
 and I looked on as an outsider, as a spectator 
 of a tragedy which would end in death and 
 horror. 
 
 It was two days before the period allotted 
 to me by my master, at eight o'clock in the 
 evening, as I was sitting in my lonely cottage, 
 expectant of the usual drunken bout, when I 
 felt a curious agitation within mc, an internal 
 struggle, as if through all my veins a tem- 
 pestuous wave was surging and rushing. I 
 lay down. 
 
 " This is some new devilry of the old
 
 124 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 man," I said to myself. " Let him do his 
 worst ; at least, I must try to bear it with 
 resignation." I began to speculate on my 
 inevitable and approaching end, and to 
 wonder curiously what proportion of the sin 
 of all this drunkenness would be laid to my 
 charge. 
 
 To my astonishment nothing more fol- 
 lowed. The tumult of my system gradually 
 subsided, and I fell asleep. 
 
 In the morning I awoke late, and missed 
 the usual headache. I had therefore, I was 
 surprised to find, actually not been drunk the 
 night before. I rose with my customary 
 depression, and was astonished to discover 
 that my nerves were steadier and spirits 
 higher than I had known for a long time. 
 
 I mechanically went to the cupboard and 
 pulled out my cold mutton and potatoes. 
 Who can picture my joy when I found that 
 I could taste the meat again, and that it 
 was nasty ? I hardly believed my senses ; in
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 12$ 
 
 fact, I had lost them for so long, that it was 
 difficult to understand that they had come 
 back to me. I tried the potatoes. Heavens, 
 what a horrible thing to a well-regulated 
 palate is a cold boiled potato ! 
 
 At first, as I said, I could not believe that 
 I had recovered my taste ; then, as the truth 
 forced itself upon me, and I found that I 
 could not only taste, but was actually hungry, 
 I jumped and danced, and was beside myself 
 with joy. Think of a convict suddenly re- 
 leased, and declared guiltless of the charges 
 brought against him. Think of a prisoner 
 on the very ladder of the gallows-tree, with 
 the rope round his neck, reprieved and 
 pardoned. Think of one doomed to death 
 by his physician receiving the assurance that 
 it was all a mistake, and that he would gather 
 up long years of life as in a sheaf. And 
 think that such joy as these would feel, I felt 
 — and more ! 
 
 I went to the nearest coffee-shop and
 
 126 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ordered bacon, eggs, and tea, offering up a 
 short grace with every plate as it came. And, 
 then, because I felt sure that my old tor- 
 mentor must be dead, I repaired to my 
 lawyers, and saw the clerk. 
 
 " Ah," he said, '* the poor old man's gone 
 at last ! Went out like the snuff of a candle. 
 His illness was only twenty-four hours. Well, 
 he's gone to heaven if ever man did." 
 
 "What did he die of — too much eating and 
 drinking ? " 
 
 " Mr. Lucraft," said the clerk severely, 
 "this is not the tone (or yoti to adopt towards 
 that distinguished man, your benefactor. He 
 died, sir — being a man of moral, temperate, 
 and even abstemious life, though of full habit 
 — of apoplexy." 
 
 " O ! " I said, careless what the clerk said, 
 but glad to be quite sure that the diabolical 
 old villain was really dead. I suppose that 
 never was such joy over the repentance of 
 any sinner as mine over the death of that
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 27 
 
 murdering glutton, for whom no words of 
 hatred were too strong. 
 
 " I think you've got to see our senior 
 partner," said the clerk. " Step this way." 
 
 He led me to a room where I found a 
 grave and elderly gentleman sitting at a 
 table. 
 
 " Mr. Lucraft ? " he said. " I was expect- 
 ing you. I saw your late patron's negro this 
 morning. He told me that you would call." 
 I stared, but said nothing. 
 " I have a communication to make to you, 
 on the part of our departed friend, Mr. 
 Ebenezer Grumbelow. It is dated a few 
 weeks since, and is to the effect that a sum 
 of money which I hold was to be placed in 
 your hands in case of his death. This, it 
 appears, he anticipated, for some reason or 
 other." 
 
 " Ebenezer Grumbelow." That was the 
 name which had so long escaped my memory 
 — " Ebenezer Grumbelow."
 
 128 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 I said nothing, but stared with all my eyes. 
 
 "My poor friend," the lawyer went on, 
 " after remarking that unless you change your 
 unfortunate habits you will come to no good, 
 gave me this money himself — here is the 
 cheque — so that it will not appear in his last 
 will and testament." 
 
 I took it in silence. 
 
 " Well, sir " — he looked at me in some sur- 
 prise — " have you no observation to make, or 
 remark to offer, on this generosity ? " 
 
 " None," I said. 
 
 " I do not know," he continued ; " I do not 
 know — your signature here, if you please — 
 what reason Mr. Grumbelow had in taking 
 you up, or what claim you possessed upon his 
 consideration ; but I think, sir, I do think, 
 that some expression, some sense of regret, 
 is due." 
 
 I buttoned up the check in my pocket. 
 
 " Mr. Grumbelow was a philanthropist, I 
 believe, sir ? "
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 29 
 
 "He was. As a philanthropist, as a sup- 
 porter of charities, as a public donor of great 
 amounts, Mr. Grumbelow's name stands in 
 the front. So much we all know." 
 
 " A religious man, too ? " 
 
 " Surely, surely ; one of our most deeply 
 religious men. A man who was not ashamed 
 of his saintly profession." 
 
 " Cluck-cluck ! " 
 
 It was the familiar face of Boule-de-neige 
 at the door. 
 
 " You know, I suppose," said the lawyer, 
 " Mr. Grumbelow's body-servant, a truly 
 Christian negro ? " 
 
 " Was there," I asked, " any clause in Mr. 
 Grumbelow's letter — any conditions attached 
 to this gift ? " 
 
 " None whatever. It is a free gift. Stay, 
 there is a postscript which I ought to have 
 read to you. You will perhaps understand it. 
 In it Mr. Grumbelow says that as to the ser- 
 vices rendered by him to you, and by you 
 
 VOL. I. K.
 
 130 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 to him, it will be best for your own sake to 
 keep them secret." 
 
 I bowed. 
 
 The date of the cheque corresponded with 
 the first illness of the old man — his affection 
 of the throat. Probably he was afraid that I 
 should reveal his infamous story. 
 
 " I may now tell you, Mr. Lucraft, without 
 at all wishing to break any confidence that 
 may have existed between you and the de- 
 ceased, that a friend of Mr. Grumbelow's — no 
 other, indeed, than the Rev. Jabez Jumbles, a 
 pulpit name doubtless known to you — intends 
 to write the biography of this distinguished 
 and religious man, as an example to the 
 young. . Any help you can afford to so desir- 
 able an end will be gratefully received. Par- 
 ticularly, Mr. Lucraft, any communication on 
 the subject of his continual help given to 
 young men, who regularly disappointed him, 
 and all, except yourself, died of drink." 
 
 I bowed again and retired.
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. I3I 
 
 Did any one ever hear of such a wicked 
 old man ? 
 
 Outside the office I was joined by the 
 negro. 
 
 " What have you got to say to me, detest- 
 able wretch ? " I cried, shaking my fist in his 
 withered old face. 
 
 " Cluck-cluck ! Massa not angry with poor 
 old Boule-de-neige. How young massa ? 
 Young massa pretty well ? How de lubly 
 abbadide of de young gegleman ? How him 
 strong stumjack ? Cluck- cluck ! " 
 
 He kept at a safe distance from me. I 
 think I should have killed him if I had ever 
 clutched him by the throat. 
 
 " Ole massa him always ask, 'How dat 
 young debbel ? Go and see, Boule-de- 
 neige.' I go to young massa's cottage 
 daraway, and come back, * Him berry dam 
 bad, sir,' I say ; ' him going to de debbel 
 berry fast, just like dem oders. De folk all 
 say he drink too much for him berry fine con-
 
 132 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 stitution.' Cluck-cluck ! Ole massa he only 
 say say ebbery night, ' Brmg de brandy, 
 Boule-de-neige ; let's finish him.' Cluck- 
 cluck ! " 
 
 Here was a Christian negro for you ! 
 
 " Tell me, what did your master die 
 of?" 
 
 " Apple perplexity, massa." 
 
 " Ah ; what else ? Come, Boule-de-neige, 
 I know a good deal ; tell me more." 
 
 " Massa's time up," he whispered, coming 
 close to me. " Time quite up, and him berry 
 much 'fraid. Massa Lucraft want servant ? 
 Boule-de-neige berry good servant. Cook 
 lubly dinner ; make massa rich, like Massa 
 Grumbelow." 
 
 " I'd rather hire the devil ! " I exclaimed. 
 
 " Cluck-cluck-cluck ! " grinned the creature ; 
 and really he looked at the moment as much 
 like the devil as one could wish. " Cluck ! 
 dat massa can do if massa like." 
 
 I rushed away, too much excited by the
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 33 
 
 recovery of my freedom to regard what he 
 said. 
 
 I was free ! What next ? 
 
 First, the restoration of my shattered 
 nerves. 
 
 There was no permanent injury done to 
 my constitution, because, after all, the drink 
 had not actually gone down my throat, nor 
 was it I who had consumed the gallons of 
 turtle-soup, the tons of fish, the shiploads of 
 cattle with which he had punished me for 
 that woful signature of mine. 
 
 The contract, in some inexplicable manner, 
 affected me with the punishment of my 
 purchaser's excesses by a kind of sympathy. 
 I remained a strictly temperate man for a 
 month. I recovered gradually the tone of 
 my system ; my features lost their bloated 
 look. I became myself again. 
 
 And then I sought the injured Kerrans. 
 
 It was no use trying to tell him a story 
 which he never would have believed. I
 
 134 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 simply told him that I was taken suddenly 
 and hopelessly ill on that fatal night. I asked 
 him to remember, which is quite true, how I 
 began the piece with a fire and animation 
 quite impossible in a man who had been 
 drinking ; how I had certainly nothing be- 
 tween the scenes, during which intervals I 
 was talking with him, and how the thing 
 came upon me without any warning. If you 
 try, you know, you can make yourself quite 
 drunk with brandy in two minutes. This is 
 just what Mr. Grumbelow did to me. 
 
 Kerrans, good fellow, outraged in his 
 best^feelings, was difficult to smooth down. 
 
 He had asked me to act with Juliet in the 
 hope of restoring to the girl her lost good 
 spirits. I came ; the misfortune happened, 
 and she was worse than ever. But he for- 
 gave me at last, and allowed me another 
 chance. This time it was not Juliet who 
 threw her arms around me, it was I who 
 implored her forgiveness, and the renewal of
 
 THE CASE OF MR. LUCRAFT. 1 35 
 
 her love. I was cold no longer. I left off 
 remembering, and lived again in the present. 
 I was a lover, and my girl was trembling and 
 blushing, with her hand in mine. 
 
 It all happened more than fifty years ago. 
 The only records which remain of the events 
 I have described are on the tablet to the 
 memory of Ebenezer Grumbelow in St. 
 Rhadegunda's Church, City ; and the little 
 faded scrap from the Aforning Chro7iicle, 
 which I always carry in my pocket-book, 
 and which tells the tale of my shame. 
 
 Juliet never believed my story, and I left 
 off insisting on its truth. 
 
 She lies in Norwood Cemetery now, but we 
 kept our golden wedding ere she died ; and 
 children and grandchildren live to bless her 
 name.
 
 THE 
 
 MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 
 
 If everybody would take the trouble, once 
 for all, to set down his own personal expe- 
 riences, and no other's, among the world of 
 spirits, we might be spared a good deal of 
 controversy, and those unfortunates, now in 
 the minority, who, having nothing to commu- 
 nicate, do the scoffing, would see the necessity 
 of changing their note. I am in daily ex- 
 pectation of seeing this modification of the 
 enemy's front : I look for the day when they 
 will sing, like Scarron, " D6sormais il faut 
 filer doux." But in all ages men have scoffed 
 at the world of spirits — until their first ghost.
 
 138 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 To those who know and understand, it is 
 curious to mark the sudden chano^e from 
 scepticism — even open infideHty — to the rev- 
 erent awe produced by a single Appearance. 
 I know by my own experience that the tran- 
 sition is at first almost too great to be borne, 
 like the sudden passage from darkness into 
 dazzling light. It is not, however, my inten- 
 tion to defend or to attack the credibility of 
 the supernatural : I have only to set down in 
 plain terms, and for what it is worth, my own 
 single experience among the residents of the 
 other world. 
 
 One difficulty I may be allowed to mention. 
 Since so few ghosts are ever seen or. heard of, 
 what becomes of all the rest ? There are, at 
 present, about 900,000,000 men, women, and 
 children breathing these ujDper airs. Every 
 30 years a third of these have disappeared 
 and been replaced. Supposing the process 
 to have been going on for 3,000 years, which 
 is not an undue estimate, considering the
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 39 
 
 vestiges of ancient civilisation and a teeming 
 jDopulation which surround us on all sides, 
 we get for the number of souls which have 
 been born into the world during that period 
 the total of 900,000,000,000 — an army which, 
 allowing 2^ square feet for every one, would 
 occupy 81,000 square miles for mere standing 
 room, or a territory not quite 300 miles 
 square. Of all these 900,000,000,000 how 
 few there are who ever condescend to show 
 themselves to living man ! and yet how small 
 a space they occupy all together ! It seems 
 to me, speaking as one having but little 
 knowledge of the other world, that the few 
 visits we receive from our ancestors argues a 
 studied slight put upon living men by the 
 majority. After all, the living, and not the 
 dead, are the representatives of humanity. 
 
 I was engaged, five years ago, to the young 
 lady whom I have since married. The en- 
 gagement had little romance about it. We
 
 140 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 met, we saw, we conquered each other. 
 Eleanor's parents made fewer objections than 
 I feared, my fears being based upon the usual 
 ofrounds. I was o^iven to understand that the 
 duration of the engagement depended entirely 
 upon myself, and, as I was already perilously 
 near thirty, I hastened to bring matters to 
 a speedy termination. The remarkable hin- 
 drance to the realisation of my hopes, arising 
 out of circumstances entirely unlooked for 
 and beyond my control, forms the subject of 
 this paper. It was not a pleasant experience: 
 and yet it gives me a sense of pleasure to 
 recall it ; just as an old salt will delight in 
 dwelling on the dangers of the ocean. There 
 is nothing, strictly speaking, horrible about it. 
 At the same time, when I write it down in 
 cold blood, I am conscious of a tingling of the 
 nerves and a tendency to look over the left 
 shoulder. This, I suppose, will never leave 
 me. It is a distinction, I know — perhaps a 
 small one, like the Companionship of the
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. I4I 
 
 Bath, or that of the order of St. Michael 
 and St. George, or the queer Turkish decor- 
 ations with which old Crimean officers love 
 to decorate themselves — but still a distinction. 
 It is not everybody, even now, who can tell 
 of visits from the other world ; and the con- 
 stant companionship of a ghost seems to me 
 — naturally inclined to exaggerate on such a 
 subject — an adventure, perhaps, a little out of 
 the common. 
 
 I had taken and furnished, in readiness for 
 my wedding, a small detached villa, some 
 few miles out of London ; it was a new 
 house, with — though I did not think of that 
 — no possible memories of the past to 
 awaken disagreeable thoughts : a pretty little 
 house, standing between a lawn on the front 
 and a garden behind ; with stables on one 
 side and a " library " built out on the other. 
 There were the usual trees in the front — a 
 laburnum, a lilac, a laurestinus, a row of 
 limes, enough to shade the house from the
 
 142 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 road and give the appearance of privacy 
 such as every Londoner loves. But it was 
 not a gloomy house. It stood east and 
 west, so that the drawing-room, which ran 
 the whole depth of the house, was never 
 without sunshine whenever there might be 
 any going. The view from the back was 
 perfectly cheerful ; beyond the garden lay 
 green fields, and beyond these stretched a 
 noble park studded with elms : a bright, 
 cheerful, and comfortable house. On the 
 north, separated by several houses, and out 
 of sight, therefore out of mind, was a ceme- 
 tery, belonging to a great town parish, newly 
 laid out and, as yet, thinly populated. Had 
 I noticed it at all, I should have laughed 
 at the idea of spectres in connection with 
 so smiling a garden. Ghosts, I might have 
 said, prowl about grim old churchyards whose 
 falling tombstones are green with moss, on 
 whose slabs clings the yellow lichen, where 
 the ^rass grows tall and rank, and the
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 43 
 
 brambles stretch long, thorny arms across 
 the paths, whose worn stones once preserved 
 the names of the long-forgotten dead. They 
 love the old country God's-acre, piled eight 
 and ten feet high with human mould, where 
 every pinch of dust contains what is left of 
 a life once filled with hopes and fears. But 
 not a new cemetery : not a formal place 
 planted with roses, laid out in gravel walks, 
 and lying round two perky little chapels 
 which stand face to face, turning up spiteful 
 noses at each other, and breathing a post- 
 mortem defiance. Is there a Bogey-ridden 
 boy living who would fear to pass a night 
 in Finchley Cemetery, or dread to sit out a 
 few dark hours alone in Nunhead ? 
 
 I was mistaken. The truth is that the new- 
 ness of a cemetery is no proof of its tran- 
 quillity. Comparatively rare as are the visits 
 of ghosts, they may come from a cemetery 
 handselled only a week ago, a mere u^DStart 
 thing of yesterday, as well as from a grave-
 
 144 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 yard whose long annals are dark with the 
 secrets of a thousand unknown murders. 
 One is never safe, and the only way to insure 
 immunity from these generally unwelcome 
 visitors is, perhaps, to live as far as possible 
 from a churchyard of any kind. I have 
 been particular in describing my house, be- 
 cause I wish it clearly understood that there 
 was not, either about the place or its neigh- 
 bourhood, any predisposition to ghosts. Nor 
 was there about myself. I am not an ima- 
 ginative man : there are no poems, romances, 
 or novels with my name to them. I have 
 no patience with people who can forget their 
 own real troubles in reading of those which 
 never happened ; and, for the life of me, I 
 cannot have any interest in the loves of 
 anybody but ■ myself. I am not, therefore, 
 a man likely to be the prey of hallucinations. 
 I am no puling poet trembling at a shadow, 
 nor am I one of those poor spectre-smitten 
 imbeciles who turn a branch into a warn-
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 45 
 
 ing finger, and a snow-drift into a sheeted 
 wraith. This consideration makes my trifling 
 experience the more credible. 
 
 The situation is this. An unimaginative 
 man of thirty, whose days are spent in 
 business ; a new suburban villa ; a bright, 
 sunshiny country ; neighbours all round one ; 
 and a new cemetery a hundred yards' distance 
 from the house. 
 
 To this house and to this man the Ghost 
 came. 
 
 And in this wise. 
 
 It was in August, wheii the days begin to 
 close in early and it grows dark at eight. I 
 was sitting, after dinner, trying to get senti- 
 mental over my approaching happiness, and 
 picturing to myself Eleanor in the easy-chair 
 opposite me. It was a feeble attempt at 
 experiencing the pleasures of imagination, 
 because I could not picture any one at all. 
 Then I took a book and opened it with a 
 yawn. My back was to the window, which 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 overlooked the garden behind the house. 
 The light was fading, but as my eyes followed 
 the lines mechanically, and my thoughts were 
 elsewhere, that mattered little. Outside the. 
 house there was a stillness extraordinary — 
 no stirring of the leaves ; no breath in the 
 air ; no voices from my own kitchen ; no 
 sounds from the houses on either side, which 
 were locked up, their tenants being at the 
 seaside ; not even the distant bark of a dog, 
 or the distant roll of a carriage, to show that 
 there was another living person in the world 
 beside myself. Then a curious feeling came 
 over me : I suddenly realised the fact that 
 life may go on in invisible, intangible forms : 
 I looked round me with a shudder : I expected 
 something. The room became, without 
 warning, distinctly darker : the air grew chill : 
 I felt cold dews upon my forehead. Re- 
 member that up to this moment there was no" 
 reason at all — none whatever for alarm. Yet 
 I became unaccountably afraid. I turned to
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. I47 
 
 the window for relief, and there — there I saw 
 IT, for the first time. 
 
 It was standing outside the window, a 
 dark shadow, clearly outlined against the sky: 
 colourless, and yet its draperies were like 
 white graveclothes : shapeless, and yet, some- 
 how, human in appearance. And it had a 
 face. Deep-sunken and lustrous eyes, bright 
 with phosphoric splendour, showed me hollo>v 
 cheeks, lips that trembled as if with passion, 
 and a frowning forehead. When I turned he 
 raised his hand and shook it at me beneath 
 its linen folds, and then, with that singular 
 movement remarked by all who had con- 
 versed and are familiar with ghosts — a move- 
 ment in which the shape neither glides, nor 
 walks, but changes place — the spectre stood 
 Avithin the room, .facing me. I am not 
 ashamed to say that I was frightened. 
 
 " So," he said, with an angry glance, " I 
 have found you at last." 
 
 I made no reply. What was there to say ?
 
 148 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " I have found you at last, have I ? Now 
 I have you, what shall I do with you ? " 
 
 I could only look hopelessly. He pushed 
 one arm outside the cerements which covered 
 it — a long, lean arm, marked with a tattoo 
 representing a ship in full sail, surmounted by 
 a skull and cross-bones. He shook his fist 
 excitedly in my face. I noticed that the air 
 was not stirred by his movements. It was 
 odd, too, that I recovered my courage the 
 moment he began to threaten. 
 
 His gestures became more threatening. 
 He repeated twenty times running the ques- 
 tion with which he first accosted me : " Now 
 I have found you, what shall I do with you ? " 
 It seemed, indeed, as if he could say nothing 
 more. 
 
 " Come," I cried at last, " this is fooling. 
 What do you mean by coming to my house 
 like a burglar and carrying on like a mad- 
 man ? Leave off asking what you will do 
 with me. If you are a ghost out of his
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 49 
 
 senses, say so ; if not, vary the monotony 
 by saying- something else. Can't you swear, 
 man ? Can't you reheve nature in the usual 
 manner ? " 
 
 He ofroaned and wrunof his hands. 
 
 " I can't," he said. " It isn't allowed. I 
 wish I could. What shall I do with you ? 
 What shall I do with you ? " 
 
 " You have asked me that a hundred times 
 already. Bah ! you are a ghost. Ghosts can 
 do nothing. I used to believe that they did 
 not exist. Now I see that they do. But 
 look here." 
 
 I took the poker from the fireplace and 
 passed it through him. Then I cut him 
 down like a guardsman at Waterloo. Then I 
 sliced him in two like a soldier at an assault- 
 at-arms. At each pass of the weapon he 
 ducked, recoiled, and cried aloud. 
 
 " See, you cannot resist. I do what I like 
 with you. What can you do in return ? " 
 
 He raised his hand and struck at my
 
 150 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 face. It was as if a cold wind blew upon my 
 cheek. 
 
 " Is that all ? " I asked. " Do that as often 
 as you like." 
 
 " You are not afraid of me ? " he asked ; 
 as if such a thing as a man daring to stand 
 up to a ghost was unheard of " You are 
 positively not afraid of me ? " 
 
 " I certainly am not." 
 
 "He is not afraid of me ! Man ! I am 
 come from the churchyard. See my grave- 
 clothes. I am one from the tombs." 
 
 I could not repress a shudder. The old 
 shiver came across me. He saw it at once, 
 and sprang at my throat. To my surprise, 
 what was before as a breath of cold air 
 became tangible. I felt his cold grasp with 
 his long, bony fingers at my throat. His face, 
 close to mine, was filled with an eager longing 
 for revenge : his lurid eyes glared in mine : 
 his teeth glimmered in the twilight. It was 
 but for a moment that I was afraid. Then
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 151 
 
 I rallied my courage, sprang upright, and 
 looked my spectral enemy in the face. As I 
 looked the tangibility of his fingers weakened, 
 the tightness of his grasp relaxed, and his 
 look changed from one of triumph to that of 
 baffled rage. Then he fell back sullenly, and 
 threw himself into my easy-chair, glaring 
 round the room. 
 
 " I never allow any one but myself," I said, 
 "to occupy that chair.. It is mine. Please 
 take another." . 
 
 He changed chairs immediately. 
 
 "Will this do?" 
 
 It was one next to mine. I begged him 
 to take one on the other side of the fireplace, 
 which he did at once. Then I sat down, and 
 surveyed the situation. 
 
 I was alone, save an old woman, my tem- 
 porary factotum, in the kitchen. The peo^^Ie 
 in the houses round were now all away for 
 their holidays. I had a ghost, presumably 
 a lunatic of a dangerous kind, under my roof.
 
 152 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 It was Impossible to .get rid of him, unless 
 he chose to go. You cannot push, kick, or 
 throw a ghost out of a window or door ; you 
 cannot lock him in one room while you go to 
 sleep in another ; you cannot shut yourself 
 up in your bedroom and defy him ; above all, 
 you never know what tricks he may be at. 
 Thinking of these things, I became conscious 
 of another acch of terror— slighter this time. 
 My guest, however, perceived it, and in a 
 twinkling was on me again, with his skeleton 
 fingers round my throat. I shook him off; 
 that is, I regained my presence of mind, and 
 he cowered back to his seat, where he sat, his 
 head on his arm, and his long white clothes 
 clinging to his limbs, a sight never to be 
 forgotten. 
 
 " Pray tell me what It means," I said. 
 
 "It means that if you were afraid of me, I 
 would throttle you like a dog. It means that 
 I am sitting here waiting for the moment 
 when you will realise who and what I am ;
 
 THE T.IYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 53 
 
 the injuries you have done me, the wicked- 
 ness of your life, the loneHness of your 
 position, and your presence with another 
 world. Ha! ha! I see it coming! Your 
 nerves won't stand me another quarter of an 
 hour, and then I shall seize you by the wind- 
 pipe, and squeeze, squeeze, squeeze the life- 
 blood out of you ! " 
 
 " You forget," I replied, " one thing. If I 
 find my nerves giving way — which is not at 
 all likely — I shall get quietly up and go into 
 into town. It is only half an hour by train. 
 They don't admit ghosts into clubs." 
 
 He made no reply to this. Presently he 
 went on again : 
 
 '' You will have to go to bed soon. You 
 cannot sit up all night." 
 
 " How long can you stay here ? " 
 
 " As long as I please. Ho ! ho ! ho ! I 
 can be with you, now I have found you, 
 morning, noon, and night. When you are 
 quietly in your bed, I shall be sitting by the
 
 154 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 bedside, waiting for a moment's weakness. 
 When you are at your office in the city, I 
 shall be at your elbow, waiting to find you off 
 your guard. At dinner I shall be behind 
 you. You will not escape me. Sooner or 
 later you will be afraid, and then I shall have 
 you, although you are a bold man, as I know 
 of old." (This was curious, because I did 
 not remember to have seen him before, and 
 he had one of those very remarkable faces 
 which, once seen, are never forgotten.) " I 
 thought I might catch you napping when I 
 lit upon you here, all by yourself. Never 
 mind ! The time will come. I shall wait. 
 I shall wait." 
 
 " Pray explain," I said blandly. " You will 
 wait until I am afraid ? " 
 
 " Precisely. We ghosts cannot hurt people 
 who are not afraid of us. Our power is only 
 over the cowardly and superstitious — that is, 
 over nearly all mankind. Once the man has 
 the pluck to stand up to us, we are 
 powerless."
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAX. 1 55 
 
 "Thank you," I replied. "After that I 
 will take a pipe. Can I offer you one ? " 
 
 He shook his head. 
 
 •' A glass of brandy and water ? " 
 
 He frowned. 
 
 " Doubtless it will do you good to see me 
 take both. . . . Now, my friend, we will talk, 
 if you please. Do you not find it cold in that 
 light dress ? " 
 
 " I have no other." 
 
 " Shall I light a fire for you ? " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Would you like a blanket or a railway- 
 rug?" 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Can I do anything for you ? " 
 
 " No. . . Yes. . . Be afraid of me. Man ! 
 think of it ; I am a ghost ! I am a spectre ! 
 I am a spirit ! I am a walker up and down 
 the face of the earth. When the dogs see 
 me they wail and cry. When men see me 
 they drop upon their knees. These are 
 coffin clothes ! This arm is
 
 156 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " My good friend," I replied, " let us enjoy 
 each other's society without mutual confes- 
 sions. I grant all that you have said. It is 
 very curious and interesting. Not, perhaps, 
 quite so horrible as I might have expected, 
 
 had I known you were coming, but still 
 
 By the way, you — you hail from the cemetery 
 close by ? " 
 
 " I do. Ah, villain and traitor ! who put 
 me there ? I do ; and as I was taking an 
 evening invisible stroll, I happened to look 
 in at your window, and saw the man I had 
 expected and most hoped to see. Ha ! ha ! 
 I shall make it hot for that man ! . . . 
 So I will, too," he added, weakly, after a 
 pause. 
 
 I made no reply, but went on smoking as 
 if he had been an ordinary visitor. His face, 
 which was not without a certain rugged 
 beauty, was stern and lowering. He looked 
 up occasionally with an expression of baffled 
 rage which, now that I was accustomed to it,
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 57 
 
 rather amused me. His features — those of a 
 man under forty — were regular ; his eyes 
 were blue ; his chin was strong and square ; 
 his mouth, which was weak, marred the 
 Qfeneral effect. 
 
 " When I was in that country ship, trading 
 between Rangoon and Calcutta — there, what's 
 the use of raking up the old story ? " 
 
 " None," I replied, thinking that he cer- 
 tainly must be a lunatic ghost, and making 
 a mental note of the fact as one likely to 
 throw great light on the spirit world. " None 
 at all, unless you like." 
 
 " To think that you — ^you, of all men in 
 the world — never mind ! " 
 
 " Certainly not," I said. " I am sorry you 
 will take nothing. It is nearly my bed-time." 
 " When I saw you last, at Brighton, you 
 were walking with her." 
 
 That was a little uncomfortable to hear, 
 because I had been at Brighton a few months 
 before, when Eleanor was staying there.
 
 158 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " No use talking. What's the good of 
 talk? Come to that, I might remind you 
 what went on, you know, at Yokohama. Eh ? 
 What do you say to that ? " 
 
 " I have nothing to say to that." 
 
 " Lord ! Lord ! some men will brazen out 
 anything ! And what about the Hong Kong 
 business ? Who promised what — tell me 
 that — if some one walked the plank, and 
 something was thingumbobbed — eh ? " 
 
 Here was a very serious question. I only 
 shook my head. 
 
 " Thingumbobbed," he repeated. " Scut- ^ 
 tied, you villain ! and the coolies sent to 
 kingdom come ? And after that to round 
 upon a man ! Why did I take to drink ? 
 Why did I go off at thirty-six, with rum and 
 water enough to float King Solomon's fleet ? 
 Why ? why ? why ? " 
 
 •' Can't say, I am sure. Shall we say good- 
 niaht ? " 
 
 o 
 
 "If you are going to bed, I will go with
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 59 
 
 you. Man ! now I've caught you, do you 
 think I shall leave you ? " 
 
 This was pleasant. 
 
 I shut the windows, and went upstairs. 
 He went with me. I undressed and Qf-ot into 
 bed. Once there, I shut my eyes resolutely 
 and tried to go to sleep. That was impos- 
 sible. Every ten minutes or so I felt obliged 
 to open them. He was always standing by 
 the bedside, grave, stern, and resolute to do 
 me a mischief, if he could — if I grew afraid. 
 
 " You ■ are still here ? " I asked when the 
 clock struck two. 
 
 "Still here ? — I shall be always here !" 
 
 I thought of my approaching marriage. 
 It was awkward. A ghost for ever at my 
 bedside : a lunatic ghost thirsting for revenge; 
 angry at some imaginary wrong. Could he 
 be coaxed ? 
 
 I sat up and tried. 
 
 " Come, my friend," I said ; " let us make a 
 bargain."
 
 l60 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " No bargain," 
 
 " You shall come whenever you please to 
 my smoking-room, but not here. Man alive ! 
 be reasonable." 
 
 " I am not a man alive," he replied. " I 
 wish I was. And whose fault, I -ask you, 
 IS It : 
 
 " Come, my dear fellow, I put it to 3'ou — 
 is it reasonable to intrude into my bedroom 
 and keep me awake ? Do you think it looks 
 Jike good form to take advantage of 3^our — 
 of my inability to turn a spirit out of the 
 room ? " 
 
 " Do you think," he rejoined angrily — "' do 
 yo2c think it was good form to treat me as 
 you did ? Was it reasonable to send me to 
 the cemetery twenty years before my time ? 
 I shall stay here," he added, " so long as you 
 stay here. I shall be with you day and night. 
 You shall never cease to feel me with you. 
 I will make sleep impossible, and I will 
 trouble your business hours."
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. l6l 
 
 " Then," I interrupted, " you are the most 
 mahcious ghost that ever walked. I defy 
 you. You may go to the devil ! " 
 
 He shook his head sadly, and continued 
 that steady watch of his. Always his chin 
 upon one hand, while the white shroud flowed 
 round him, and his face turned to mine with 
 a remorseless gaze. 
 
 As I tossed in the bed, occasionally open- 
 ing ray eyes and seeing always that spectral 
 figure before me, a strange horror grew up in 
 my mind. It was not terror. I was per- 
 suaded that he would do me no harm, but 
 the sense of being watched, followed, and 
 haunted continually by this reproachful 
 spectre fell upon me. By some mysterious 
 power he felt it. 
 
 " Ha ! ha ! " he said. The laugh was not 
 a cheerful one. " Do you begin to realise 
 it now ? Do you feel what it will be 
 like ? " 
 
 There was little sleep for me that night. 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 1 62 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 When the day broke I dropped for half an 
 hour into a heavy unconsciousness, awaking 
 suddenly and with a horror upon me that at 
 first I did not understand. Between my eyes 
 and the window, through which the morning 
 sun was shining, stood a faint, almost an in- 
 visible shape. The sunlight streamed through 
 it, and it was as shadowless as Schemyl. 
 
 " I am here," it whispered. 
 
 I rose and dressed. It followed my move- 
 ments. I saw the spectre now only when it 
 came into the sunlight. Then it was dimly 
 visible, but only, I think, to myself. I break- 
 fasted and went into the city. It came with 
 me. It sat beside me in the train : it followed 
 me through the streets : it was with me in 
 my office : it came after me up the steps of 
 my club. 
 
 The thing grew maddening. If I forgot 
 it for a moment, I heard a whisper in my ear 
 — " I am here." If I managed to fix my 
 attention on the subject in hand, that accursed
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 63 
 
 voice began to remind me that I was neither 
 to sleep nor to work, nor to have any peace 
 for the rest of my natural life. 
 
 " What you have done, I shall do — and 
 worse. I shall dog you — I shall haunt you 
 — I shall make remorse and despair do for 
 you what you did to her and to me. I will 
 revenge myself — and her." 
 
 What had I done to him ? How was I to 
 get rid of this accursed lunatic ghost ? By 
 what spell and charm could I lay him for 
 ever in the Red Sea ? 
 
 The full misery of the thing was yet to 
 come. 
 
 The spectre, in the afternoon, seemed to 
 have left me. I even forgot its existence, 
 and dined comfortably. At eight I met my 
 Eleanor, and persuaded her, not thinking of 
 what might happen, to look at some new 
 furniture in what was going to be our joint 
 house. She came. Nothing happened until 
 we w:ent into the garden. As I led her up
 
 164 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 and down the walk, her hand in mine, she 
 suddenly stopped with a cry. 
 
 " Alfred ! who has been walking along the 
 sand " — there was an edging of red sand to 
 the gravel — " with bare feet ? " 
 
 I looked. There were footprints — great 
 gaunt footprints — parallel with my own. I 
 knew at once what was going to happen, 
 and I trembled. 
 
 " Nothing, Nelly ; nobody. Who should 
 walk in bare feet except a carpenter ? Let 
 us go in." 
 
 " Alfred ! " she cried, " see, they are falling 
 still — the foot prints — as we walk. Take me 
 in--— take me away ! " 
 
 It was pleasant ! The accursed ghost was 
 setting his long feet beside mine, keeping 
 step, so that at every footfall of mine there 
 was a new footprint of his. I bore my girl 
 half fainting into the house. 
 
 " What was it, Alfred ? what was it ? I 
 am afraid. And see — see ! — Oh ! Alfred — 
 Alfred!"
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 65 
 
 With a cry of fright, she fell fainting into 
 my arms. Between us and the window stood 
 revealed that awful figure in its long white 
 graveclothes, pointing its long bony fingers at 
 me, but saying no word. 
 
 I took Eleanor home. I implored her to 
 keep silence as to what she had seen. I 
 soothed and pacified her. I assured her that 
 it was fancy — that it was a trick of the imagi- 
 nation^ — that it was some schoolboy devilry — 
 anything to keep her quiet. And thus I left 
 her, and returned, miserable and maddened, 
 to battle with this demon who had fastened 
 himself upon me. 
 
 He was sittino: in mv chair, with his 
 abominable head, as usual, on his hand. 
 
 " I allowed you to go away with the girl,'' 
 he said, " because I do not wish to do her any 
 harm. But she shall never marry you — re- 
 member that. .Wretch ! " — he rose from the 
 chair and approached me with threatening 
 gestures — " wretch ! Was is not enough to
 
 1 66 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 interfere between me and her ? You try to 
 murder the happiness of another innocent 
 girl ! Can you ruthlessly " 
 
 " Good heavens ! " I cried, almost beside 
 myself with rage. " What madman is this, 
 who is allowed to revisit the earth in grave- 
 clothes and torture an unoffending man ? 
 What have I done to you, devil or lunatic, 
 that you should persecute me in this 
 way : 
 
 " He asks me what he has done ! Think 
 of Madagascar, villain of the deepest dye. 
 Think of San Fran, pirate and crimp. 
 Think of Liverpool Docks and Polly. Joe 
 Morgan — Joe Morgan, you were always as 
 brazen a liar as ever stepped, but I did not 
 think you would brazen it out to me." 
 
 A thought struck me. 
 
 "You call me Joe Morgan. I am not Joe 
 Morgan at all. I never heard of any Joe 
 Morgan. 
 
 He laughed.
 
 THE MYSTERY' OF JOE MORGAN. 1 67 
 
 " If you are not Joe Morgan," he said, " I 
 will eat my hat. I mean, of course " 
 
 " Come, this is trifling. I say that you 
 mistake me for some one else. What makes 
 you think me Joe Morgan. 
 
 " Because you -are." 
 
 " Nonsense. How long since you saw Joe 
 Morgan ? " . 
 
 " Ten years." 
 
 " What was he like when you left him ? " 
 
 " Much the same as you — sanctimonious 
 look, reddish hair, stumpy figure, fat cheeks, 
 just like yourself." 
 
 This was flattering. 
 
 " Only Joe Morgan did not wear a beard." 
 
 " Had this devil of a Joe Morgan any 
 marks ? " 
 
 " Tattoo marks like mine, on the right 
 arm. I did him — I mean Joe. He did me." 
 
 I drew up my shirt and showed him my 
 arms, white and free from any tattoo mark 
 at all.
 
 1 68 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 He was stupefied. 
 
 "Well — I'm — no — I'm dashed. And you 
 ain't Joe Morgan at all ? Lord ! Lord ! what 
 a fool you must have taken me for." 
 
 " I did." 
 
 " And me to go and let out all the little 
 secrets. Mate, you hold your tongue about 
 that Yokohama business." 
 
 " I never thought much of ghosts," I said, 
 " now I shall -think still less of them." 
 
 " Go on," he said, " go on ; let me have 
 it." 
 
 " Why couldn't you ask before you came 
 blundering into a house with your infernal 
 long white sheet ? Why couldn't you put the 
 question before you began ? " 
 
 " Why, indeed ? " he echoed. " Look here, 
 mate, I'm very sorry for this little mistake — 
 I am, indeed. And frightening the young 
 lady and all. I am the darndest drivelling 
 idiot of a ghost. What shall I do now to 
 make things square again ? "
 
 THE MYSTERY OF JOE MORGAN. 1 69 
 
 " Do ? What can you do, but go right 
 away i 
 
 " Shall I," he said, " shall I appear to the 
 young lady to-night after she goes to bed ? 
 I can easily do it, and then explain it all." 
 
 " Certainly not, on no account. You are 
 not to disturb her at all." 
 
 " Well, then, I suppose I had better go." 
 
 " Indeed, that is the only thing you can do. 
 Go at once, and have the goodness never to 
 return." 
 
 He began to disappear. I seemed to 
 breathe more freely. Then the shape, which 
 had almost disappeared, started into sight 
 again with a suddenness which brought back 
 the horror which first seized me. 
 
 " One word, sir," he said. " I'm afraid I 
 haven't come well out of this affair. Now 
 s'pose — I only say s'pose — I can put you on 
 to a good thing. It may be a wreck lying in 
 four or five fathom Turk's Islands way ; it 
 may be buried treasure ; it may be only a
 
 I 7b FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 pot of money ; it may be coins, or it may be 
 statues ; but if I shoidd hear of it, and was to 
 come and tell you, it might go some way to 
 getting into your good opinion again." 
 
 " No," I replied. " I want nothing, except 
 an assurance that I shall never see you 
 again." 
 
 He sighed. 
 
 "Well, sir, I feel that I can't go against 
 your wishes. I promise. No malice, eh ? 
 When we meet again, which we may, there 
 will be no malice, I hope." 
 
 Then he disappeared finally, and I have 
 seen no more of him. 
 
 I have often wondered who Mr. Joseph 
 Morgan is, wh^re" he lives, and what he has 
 done, and how he managed to offend my 
 ghost.
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY. 
 
 I HAVE always been of opinion that the 
 treatment of ghosts by those other ghosts 
 who yet walk about in flesh and blood, is 
 unworthy of our boasted civilization. We 
 regard with a terror perfectly ridiculous a race 
 of beings whose behaviour has always been 
 beyond reproach ; who have never had any 
 crimes to compass, nor any selfish ends to 
 serve ; whose appearances — singularly rare 
 at all times — have ever been enforced on 
 them by some strange necessity, or by the 
 desire to accomplish certain definite ends. 
 The spectre who wrings her hands by your
 
 172 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 bedside, dressed in her shroud — poor thing, 
 because she has nothing else to put on — does 
 not want to injure you. Why should she ? 
 And yet, at her first appearance, the 
 miserable man who sees her sticks his head 
 between his knees, stifles himself with the 
 bed-clothes, and remains in that position till 
 daylight dawns. There are some ghosts who 
 drag chains ; others who knock things about, 
 ring bells, and make strange noises. This 
 simply shows bad breeding, but does not 
 prove malice. One is not afraid of a man 
 who does not know what is due to social 
 etiquette : why, then, of a spirit ? Some 
 ofhosts are of a humorous turn. These come 
 round dark corners unexpectedly, and turn 
 up when least looked for behind trees and 
 in country lanes. But we have wags in the 
 flesh, and we are not afraid of them. What- 
 ever else they may do, there is no instance 
 on record of a ghost deliberately appearing 
 with a malignant or mischievous design.
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY. 173 
 
 They are a kindly, beneficent, well-conducted 
 race, and full of good-will to men. It is in 
 consequence of the singular ingratitude they 
 have experienced for all their kindness, that 
 they have retired, for very many years, into a 
 kind of seclusion. Wounded and hurt by 
 the suspicion, ill-will, and terror they have 
 caused, they returned long since to their own 
 haunts, and rarely put themselves in evi- 
 dence. It will be found that, of late years, 
 their appearances have been in almost all 
 cases entirely accidental, and when they were 
 taking the midnight air for a little exercise 
 and change. 
 
 Very early in life I formed the project of 
 vanquishing scruples which, I wa.s convinced, 
 stood in the way of much real — one can 
 hardly say tangible — enjoyment. I aspired 
 to the society of the supernatural. I longed 
 to converse with the men luho have been. 
 With this object, I began to read whatever 
 books I could find on the subject likely to-
 
 174 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 give me information. I could find none. 
 Cornelius Agrippa and Albertus Magnus 
 may have been adepts, but they have left no 
 clue to their secrets ; while the ghost stories 
 usually told me, as I know now, were either 
 gross exaggerations or stupid inventions. I 
 attended s(fances, only to discover that, if the 
 raps are made by spirits, they are illiterate 
 and vulgar spirits, evidently belonging to the 
 lowest social scale, and having nothing what- 
 ever to communicate. 
 
 I then tried haunted houses. I heard of 
 several, and actually went down personally, 
 offering. my services to sleep in the haunted 
 chamber, and question the ghosts themselves. 
 On the only occasion when I was not treated 
 as an intending burglar, and permitted to 
 sleep in the house, I saw and heard nothing. 
 
 Accident helped me. 
 
 The way of it was this. Six months ago, 
 my friend Philibert Jones deserted his old 
 friends, and created that vacuum which
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY. 175 
 
 nature abhors in our little whist-playing, 
 pipe-smoking circle by marrying. I have 
 nothing to say against his wife, who adds 
 to the many charms with which Providence 
 has endowed her, that special charm, which 
 so rarely accompanies married beauty, of 
 being civil to her husband's old friends. And 
 one of the first things which Mrs. Jones did, 
 after they were settled in their new house, 
 was to ask me to run down and spend an 
 evening with them. 
 
 They lived in an old-fashioned house, too 
 large for a young married couple, but adapted 
 for almost any number of interesting events, 
 in the neighbourhood of Weybridge. It 
 stood in its own old-fashioned garden, sur- 
 rounded by a high red-brick wall, and was 
 itself an ancient red-brick house, belonging 
 probably to the reign of Queen Anne. 
 
 " I got it," said Jones, showing me over 
 the place, " at a somewhat cheaper rate than 
 such a house would ordinarily be let at, in
 
 176 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 consequence of there being absurd stories 
 about It. The people round here have got 
 an idea that it is haunted." 
 
 " I'm sure we have seen nothing since we 
 came — have we, PhiHbert ? " 
 
 " Perhaps," said I, " it is haunted by the 
 ghosts of happy marriages." 
 
 Mrs. Jones smiled, and put her arm through 
 her husband's. I sometimes wish I was mar- 
 ried myself; but the fit wears off. Besides, 
 I am too ugly. 
 
 After dinner — what a cozy thing a dinner 
 of three is, when everybody means to be 
 pleasant ! — we took our claret into the garden, 
 and sat there through the long July evening, 
 while the soft twilight of summer lay upon 
 everything, and the sweet scent of the flowers 
 filled the air. And somehow we fell to 
 talking about ghosts. I found Mrs. Jones's 
 mind a mere blank upon this important sub- 
 ject ; and I spoke, from the experience gained 
 by ni)' own investigations, much to the same
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORV. 1 77 
 
 effect as I have written before, in those valu- 
 able iDreliminary remarks which my readers 
 are already digesting. 
 
 The evening passed along. Eleven o'clock 
 struck. 
 
 "Come," said Jones, "this won't do — we 
 have been long enough over ghosts ; let us 
 come back to flesh and blood — which, in my 
 own case, means a devilled bone. Lucy dear, 
 go in and get us a little supper." 
 
 We had our little supper — a devilled bone 
 — and then a glass of brandy and water and 
 a pipe, and then to bed. 
 
 It was about half-past twelve when Jones 
 took me to my room, 
 
 " You are our first guest," he told me. " I 
 hope you will be able to give a good account 
 of yourself in the morning." 
 
 He laughed, and wished me good-night. 
 
 Lookinq; round the room I Q-ot into bed. 
 It was not a remarkable room in any way ; 
 low — like all the rooms in the house — wains- 
 
 VOL. I, N
 
 178 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 coted, and consequently rather dark. It was 
 lighted by two windows, looking into the 
 garden. I could not help thinking, as I got 
 into bed, that here was a favourable oppor- 
 tunity for a ghost : an old house, which had 
 been empty for a good many years; a newly 
 married couple, who took it in spite of rumours 
 about it ; and a room in which no one had yet 
 slept. Sighing over the small chance that 
 any spirit would avail itself of the occasion, 
 I fell asleep. 
 
 I do not know how long I had been sleep- 
 ing — perhaps not more than half an hour or 
 so. I was awakened by feeling a cold, gentle 
 pressure of the right hand. I was lying on 
 my side, you see, with my right hand sticking 
 straight out of bed, as if to invite some such 
 confidence. Directly I felt the pressure, I 
 jumped to an immediate conclusion that it 
 was caused by some supernatural agency. 
 For a few moments, in the .first flush of 
 excitement, I did not venture, for fear of
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY. I 79 
 
 disappointment, to open my eyes. Suppose 
 it should be only the house dog, or even the 
 cat. But no : no dog, no cat could grasp 
 one's hand ! I lay motionless. The pres- 
 sure continued. I felt — oh, joy of joys ! — 
 the distinct grasp of fingers — long, cold, 
 and, if I may use the word of what was 
 unseen, shadowy. I opened my eyes, and 
 gazed, for the first time in my life, upon a 
 Spectre. 
 
 It was of the fair ' sex — a young lady, 
 apparently, of twenty-five. Long light hait- 
 — a wealth of it — floated in waves down her 
 back, and over her bare shoulders ; her face 
 was clouded with an anxious look ; her form 
 — not wholly, but partly transparent — was 
 draped in a white robe, not long enough to 
 hide her pretty feet, which were bare, as were 
 also her arms. The room had been perfectly 
 dark before her appearance ; but you require 
 no artificial light to see the supernatural, and 
 '- sort of dim and soft radiance seemed to fall
 
 l8o FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 from her upon me and the bed on which I 
 was lying, and the room itself. 
 
 I need not, I suppose, be ashamed to con- 
 fess that, for a few moments, I felt upon mc 
 that irrational terror which men generally 
 experience in the presence of visitors from 
 the other world. My first impulse- — which I 
 resisted — was to snatch my hand away, and 
 plunge my head beneath the bed-clothes. 
 My next — also resisted — was to start up 
 and stare at her. I may mention here that 
 it is quite reasonable to experience this first 
 feeling of terror, and that to be able to 
 converse with spirits, not only without fear, 
 but with positive pleasure, is a matter of long- 
 practice. Two ideas must be firmly seized 
 in order to accomplish this mastery over one's 
 self : first, that no spirit ever wants to do 
 you any harm ; secondly, that no spirit could 
 do you any harm if it wanted to. At least, 
 that is my experience. I lay thus, with half- 
 open eyes, pretending to be still asleep, but
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY. l8l 
 
 watching her. She pressed my hand again 
 and again, but I made no response. She 
 stamped her httle foot with vexation at her 
 ill-success, and, snatching her hand away, 
 began to walk up and down the room, I sat 
 up softly while her back was towards me, 
 and, at her next turn, our eyes met, and she 
 gave a little cry of delight. 
 
 " You are awake, then, at last," she said, in 
 a low, sweet voice. 
 
 Her voice was indeed the sweetest I ever 
 heard. 
 
 " I have been awake," I replied in a half- 
 whisper, " for some little time — ever since 
 you began squeezing my hand, which was so 
 pleasant a thing to feel, that I ventured to 
 trespass a little on your patience. ]\Iay I 
 ask who you are ? " 
 
 " May I tell you ? " she replied with 
 another question. 
 
 " Really," I said, getting bolder, " con- 
 sidering that )ou are here, that you have
 
 1 82 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 spoiled my night's rest, and that you can 
 hardly have come without some reason, your 
 question sounds rather absurd, does it not ? " 
 
 " True," she returned, smiling. *' What I 
 meant was, that you are really not afraid of 
 me?" 
 
 " Not in the least now. I was when I 
 first looked at you." 
 
 " How delio^htful ! You are the first Man 
 I have met with not afraid to talk with me, 
 since I — since " 
 
 " I think I understand you. Shall we say, 
 to prevent the trouble of explanation, since 
 other days ? " 
 
 "Thank you — since other days. Even 
 then men seemed to be afraid of me for my 
 beatix yeux. Ridiculous, was it not ? " This 
 with a flash of the beaux yeux. 
 
 " Not at kll. I quite understand it. Was 
 it — ^^were the other days 9ng ago ? " 
 
 " You mean, I suppose, that I have grown 
 old, and lost my beauty. Men were not so
 
 AX OLD, OLD STORV. 1 8$ 
 
 outspoken formerly ; and it was not con- 
 sidered polite to tell a lady that it But 
 
 there — of course it doesn't matter what vou 
 say." 
 
 She looked so seriously offended that I 
 hastened to apologize. 
 
 " Pardon me, I meant to imply that it 
 could not have been long ago, for the 
 contrary reason." 
 
 She laughed, and made me as pretty a 
 curtsy as the scantiness of her dress would 
 allow. 
 
 " I thank you very much. But it was a 
 long time ago — more than a hundred and 
 fifty years. You would not think so, I am 
 sure." 
 
 " Indeed, no. Is it possible ^. A hundred 
 and fifty years ! Really ! " 
 
 It grew interesting. The little coquette sat 
 down in my easy chair, spreading out her 
 scanty white skirts, and leaning back with 
 an air of great enjoyment.
 
 184 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " I have not had a talk — with a Man, that 
 is, for among ourselves it doesn't count, of 
 course — all that time. I have made several 
 attempts, but the stupid creatures always 
 got frightened. Former tenants, you know. 
 However, now you are come, you will be 
 able to amuse me." 
 
 " Certainly, anything I can do. May I be 
 allowed to — to make some slight additions 
 to^ 
 
 " To your dress ? No, please don't, or else 
 I shall be made aware of the deficiencies of 
 my own, which really cannot immediately be 
 remedied. Pray stay where you are for the 
 present." 
 
 But I was too excited to sit still ; and, 
 draping myself with the counterpane as 
 gracefully as was possible under the circum- 
 stances — there is something, after all, of the 
 Roman toga about a counterpane, properly 
 thrown over the fig-ure — I o-ot out of bed. 
 And then, turning to the looking-glass, in
 
 AX OLD, OLD STORY. 185 
 
 hopes of being able to catch a glimpse of 
 my own appearance, I found, to my astonish- 
 ment, that my visitor — if I may call her so — 
 was not the only spiritual occupant of the 
 apartment ; for, sitting in a chair, dressed, 
 like her friend, in a single flowing robe, was 
 another young lady. For the moment my 
 senses reeled ; but I quickly recovered. 
 What helped me more than anything else 
 was a clear, ringing burst of laughter from 
 the first apparition. 
 
 " Oh dear !" she cried, wiping her eyes, ** I 
 haven't laughed this hundred and fifty years. 
 You do look so absurd. But you are a good 
 fellow not to be frightened. Let me intro- 
 duce you to Lady Bab Charteris, my very 
 particular friend, Bab, my dear, this gentle- 
 man has the extraordinary merit of not being 
 afraid of us." 
 
 As she spoke, the features of Lady Bab, 
 which had been indistinct and clouded be- 
 fore, became clear and briMit. She was a
 
 1 86 ' p-ROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 little younger and, if possible, even more 
 lovely than my first friend. Her hair did 
 not fall in ringlets and waves, but was piled 
 and artistically dressed after the fashion of 
 George the First's time, which I shall always 
 love for her sake. She dropped me a low 
 curtsy, smiled, and sat down again, 
 
 " Alicia dear, we are very fortunate. And 
 now, sir, I must introduce you, in my turn, to 
 her who had the courage to wake you up. 
 This is no other than the celebrated toast. 
 Lady Alicia Vernon." 
 
 I could not, stupidly enough, remember 
 anything about a celebrated toast of that 
 name ; but that was my ignorance. I suppose 
 my face expressed something of my hesita- 
 tion ; for Lady Alicia laughed, and said — 
 
 " I suppose you have never heard of me ? 
 Confess, now." 
 
 " I— I— am afraid " 
 
 " Oh ! impossible," said Lady Bab. " Of 
 course, I should not expect to be remem-
 
 AX OLD, OLD STORY. 1 8/ 
 
 bered so long " — this was said a little 
 anxiously. " Besides, a young woman who 
 dies at twenty-one, unmarried too, really 
 gets such a very short time to make a 
 reputation." 
 
 " We are both of us forgotten, Bab, my 
 dear," said Alicia, gaily — " of course, we are 
 forgotten. And if either of us were remem- 
 bered, it would be you, my poor, unfortunate, 
 dear little Bab " — kissing her as she spoke. 
 
 It was rather embarrassing,- all this. I was 
 standing on the floor, in the most ridiculous 
 manner possible — still with the toga of a 
 counterpane round me, and, as I was well 
 aware, my hair sticking out in all directions. 
 No man, not even the handsomest, can 
 afford to be seen by ladies with his hair in 
 that dishevelled state, like a Somauli Arab 
 at Aden, produced by the pillow. Why a 
 pillow docs it, when a sofa cushion doesn't, 
 I cannot tell. 
 
 This, however, has nothing to do with m)'
 
 1 88 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 history. I placed the easy chair for Lady 
 Ahcia, and invited her to sit down. 
 
 " Pray, do not stand yourself," said Lady 
 Bab ; " and if you feel yourself at all cold, get 
 into bed. On the whole, Alicia, my dear," 
 she added, looking at me thoughtfully, " I 
 think he would look better in bed ■ — we 
 should not see so much of him, perhaps ; 
 and then we could tell him what we want, 
 comfortably." 
 
 I made no objection, and once more re- 
 treated to the bed, where I propped myself 
 up with pillows, and wondered what was 
 coming next. It was all exceedingly novel 
 and interesting, though the ladies would 
 laugh whenever I tried to combine politeness 
 with a counterpane. But no one, with a 
 proper sense of what is due to the sex, can 
 object to being laughed at by a pretty 
 woman. 
 
 They both came and sat on the bed, one 
 on each side of me.
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORV. i8q- 
 
 Lady Alicia began to talk. 
 
 " What a real treat it is, Bab, to talk to a,' 
 man again ! Do you know, sir — what is }'our 
 name ? No, never mind your name — when 
 I touched your hand, I thought you would 
 probably turn out to be one of those wretched 
 creatures that always shriek and run away 
 when .they see us ? I am very glad you did 
 not?" 
 
 " So am I," said Lady Bab, softly. 
 
 " All the good fortune is on my side," I 
 said ; and they both smiled prettily. 
 
 " I used to come here years ago, and when 
 the memory of Lady Alicia was still alive, 
 with a special object. Shall I tell him, 
 Bab?" 
 
 " Why not ? " said her friend, sadly. " We 
 are both so clean forgotten now that it can- 
 not matter." 
 
 " True. Listen, then, to a very short story. 
 This room was my bridal chamber. It has 
 been left exactly as it was — never touched or
 
 IQO FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 repainted — on account of me and my ghost. 
 Over the mantelshelf was — for time has 
 effaced it — my portrait, painted by my hus- 
 band himself, Sir Arthur Vernon. He was a 
 good man, and I loved him ; but, like most 
 women, I had not married the man I loved 
 first, and perhaps best." She stopped and 
 sighed. " I knew, but my husband did not; 
 of the existence of a certain secret cupboard 
 in this very room. It is here still. This I 
 used as the depository of certain letters from 
 Charlie, which I did not wish my husband to 
 read, and could not bring myself to destroy. 
 I hid them away there. Then I died sud- 
 denly, and the thought of these letters tor- 
 mented me. I could not endure the idea 
 that my husband, or some one else, might 
 find them ; and for years I haunted this 
 chamber. Lady Bab generally came with 
 me, in hopes of finding some one who could 
 be safely trusted with a secret, and who 
 would not be afraid of us."
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORY. I9I 
 
 *' And you never found any one ? " 
 
 " Never, until we found you." 
 
 " Then," said I, " trust me. I am at least 
 a gentleman. Let me be your confidant. 
 Where is the cupboard ? " 
 
 She mounted a chair which stood in 
 • front of the fireplace ; then she pressed her 
 finger in a certain place, and drew back the 
 panel. 
 
 Behind it I saw two or three dark packets. 
 "These," she said, "are the letters." 
 
 " Will you allow me to take them out to- 
 morrow, and read them ? Will you trust me 
 with your secret ? " 
 
 But she shook her head. 
 
 " Well," she said, smiling, " it does not 
 much matter now. We are, as you have 
 told us, so utterly forgotten, that a few old 
 love letters make no difference. Besides, 
 even if they were found, there is nothing in 
 them to hurt my fair fame ; only they were 
 not from my husband. But you may take
 
 192 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL, 
 
 them if you please, and read them first, if you 
 promise to show them to no one, and to 
 destroy them afterwards." 
 
 " Do you ever see him now ? " I asked. 
 
 " My husband ? Oh ! you mean Charhe. 
 No. The fact is, that the poor fellow has 
 been going downhill a great many years, and 
 has become disreputable. However, there 
 3'ou have my story ; and it is rather a frumpy 
 old story, is it not ? But, my dear, tell him 
 yours." 
 
 " What have I to tell him ? It is all told 
 in a sentence. A year of London, and routs, 
 and dances, and cards ; a toast for a twelve- 
 month ; and then, before even I had time to 
 fall in love with any one, small-pox." 
 
 It did seem hard, and I said so. 
 
 " Yes," said Lady Alicia, " my case was 
 bad, but poor Bab's was a great deal worse. 
 And so, you see, we are a pair of ghosts ; 
 and have been any time this hundred and 
 fifty years."
 
 AN OLD, OLD STORV. 1 93 
 
 " Yes," said Lady Bab, with a yawn ; " and 
 terribly dull it is, too, at times," 
 
 " But you have society ? " 
 
 " Ye — yes. Oh, yes — there's society — of 
 its kind : exclusive society : none but county 
 families. The worst of it is, that one sees 
 the same people always." 
 
 "Indeed! I should have thought there 
 would have been a constant influx of new 
 blood — I mean, of new spirit." 
 
 " No," said Lady Alicia ; " not into certain 
 circles. We retain our prejudices, and we do 
 not like any modern importations. Conse- 
 quently, we are rather hipped at times for 
 want of amusement." 
 
 " Rather, dear ? " asked Lady Bab. 
 
 " Very much hipped, then. You see, we 
 tell each other our stories over and over 
 again." 
 
 " But some of the stories must be very 
 good." 
 
 " I dare say they are," said Lady Bab, 
 
 VOL. I. o
 
 194 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " when you first hear them. However, I 
 never did care to hear them. When a young 
 woman goes out of the world under such 
 melancholy circumstances as I did, poor thing 
 — and unmarried, too — she really has got 
 enough misfortunes of her own to cry over, 
 without shedding tears about other people. 
 But you can amuse us, if you like." 
 
 " How can I amuse you ? You have only 
 to tell me a way, and I will do anything — 
 everything I can." 
 
 " Tell us instantly," said Lady Alicia, " the 
 news of London." 
 
 '* With pleasure." 
 
 I reflected for a moment, and then began : — 
 
 " After the Irish Church was disestablished; 
 and the new Reform Bill passed, Mr. Glad- 
 stone found it advisable, in the interests of 
 the Liberal party " 
 
 " What on earth is the man talking 
 about ? " cried Lady Bab. " We want the 
 news of the town. Tell us who is the 
 reigning toast." •
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. 195 
 
 " Really, I don't know." 
 
 " Here's a state of things ! " said Lady 
 Alicia, with a sigh. " I thought everybody 
 would know such a simple thing as that. 
 Tell us the latest Court scandal." 
 
 I began to tell them all about the Tich- 
 borne case. Directly they found it had 
 nothing to do with fashion, they put their 
 fingers to their ears. 
 
 " It's very kind of you and all that," said 
 Lady Bab, yawning, " not to be frightened at 
 us ; but, really, if that is all you have to tell 
 us, I think we might as well go away at 
 once." 
 
 " Oh, nonsense," said her friend. " He 
 must have something more. Just at pre- 
 sent, of course, he is a little flurried by our 
 unexpected visit. But suppose we come 
 and see you again. Would you like to see 
 us ? " 
 
 " Indeed I should above all things in the 
 world."
 
 196 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " Then we will come here." 
 
 " No, not here. Come to my chambers in 
 the Temple." 
 
 " In the Temple ? Lady Alicia Vernon 
 in the Temple ? Dear me, this is very 
 irregular ! Well — if you don't mind, Bab, 
 dear." 
 
 " I think I should like it," replied the 
 beauty, " if he has anything amusing to 
 tell us." 
 
 " Then we will come. Expect us — to-day 
 is Saturday — next Saturday, at eleven o'clock 
 in the evening. You must be alone ; and, 
 if you please, dressed — in the fashion of a 
 gentleman. Keep the letters till then, and 
 we will be witnesses of their destruction. 
 And now, thank you very much for a pleasant 
 talk. We shall be with you punctually." 
 
 '* Stay one moment, dear," cried Lady Bab 
 — for her friend was already becoming indis- 
 tinct. "Do you" — this was to me — "faithfully 
 promise to be alone in your chambers ? "
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. \()J 
 
 " I do ! " 
 
 " No wild young barristers to destroy our 
 reputation or compromise us, mind." 
 
 " I will be quite alone." 
 
 " Do you know what happen to those who 
 break their word ? " 
 
 I trembled. What could it be ? 
 
 Lady Alicia interposed. 
 
 " We need not tell him, Bab, dear — 
 it would perhaps unhinge his mind. But, 
 my dear man, above all things, be faithful. 
 Indeed, I advise it for your own sake. We 
 have no power to save you if your break your 
 word." 
 
 " None," said Lady Bab. 
 
 " I will keep it," I promised. 
 
 *' Farewell, then," said Lady Alicia. She 
 stooped over me as I kissed that slender 
 hand which had no substance, and her long 
 curls fell upon my head in a profusion of 
 colour and softness. 
 
 And " Farewell " said Lady Bab, coldly
 
 1 98 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 extending her hand, which I also kissed. 
 " And, remember — keep your promised 
 
 They disappeared. 
 
 Lady Bab was, perhaps, the more regularly 
 beautiful of the two ; but Lady Alicia, with 
 her bright, smiling face and kindness of 
 manner, won my heart, and has it still. 
 
 "How did you sleep?" asked Mrs. Jones, 
 pouring out the tea in the morning. 
 
 " Never better," I replied — telling a tre- 
 mendous fib. 
 
 " My husband tossed about all night, and 
 had nightmares ; heard voices coming from 
 your room — no doubt, in consequence of that 
 little supper, which you might just as well 
 have dispensed with." 
 
 •55- -ss- -ss- % % 
 
 I had not slept one single wink. I lay 
 awake with excited nerves and a chilly 
 feeling, which I at first attributed to spiritual 
 influences, until I found that it disappeared 
 
 K
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. 1 99 
 
 on drawing up the blanket. In the quiet 
 night there were no sounds at all. In the 
 dark room there were no forms to be seen. 
 Could I have been dreaming ? 
 
 It was possible. Meantime, I could not 
 sleep. I recalled every syllable of the short, 
 too short, conversation, not one word of 
 which have I ever forgotten. I called myself 
 a thousand fools for letting my visitors go 
 before the morning. I remembered the 
 appointment for the following Saturday, and 
 I resolved to test the truth of my spectral 
 visitors by the simplest of all methods — a 
 search for the packet of letters. 
 
 I would not waste time by searching before 
 daylight. I watched the light grow in the 
 east from grey to red. I lay quietly till the 
 perfect day streamed through the windows, 
 and the July sun was pouring his early rays 
 across the waking world, and then, mad with 
 impatience, I sprang from the bed and began 
 my search.
 
 200 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 I knew the exact spot where her finger 
 lightly touched the panel, and I remembered 
 how she drew It back with the greatest ease. 
 The exact spot I pressed. There was 
 no result. Then I pressed harder still, but 
 there was no movement of the panel. 
 ' Perhaps I should succeed if I were to 
 ofet near the work. I moved the chest of 
 drawers as quietly as I could to the spot, 
 and, standing upon that, began my researches 
 again. The panel was a piece of wainscoting, 
 three feet long by two high, dark in colour, 
 like the rest of the old room. The place where 
 my lady's fingers had rested seemed to be 
 exactly like the rest of the panel. There was 
 no mark of secret spring, no knob, no button 
 or handle. I began to think that I had been 
 really deceived, and that my visitors were 
 only part of a disordered dream. 
 
 Then I pressed with all my force, and I 
 made a discovery. A small piece of the 
 panel, an inch square, was cut out of the rest.
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. 20I 
 
 and replaced with such dexterity, fitting so 
 exactly into its place, that the lines of juncture 
 could not be readily observed. It gave way 
 beneath my thumb with a low grating sound 
 as if of rusty metal, and as if the spring was 
 out of order : it did not when I removed the 
 pressure immediately return to its place. 
 
 This, then, was proof absolute. 
 
 My heart beat wildly. I expected the 
 panel to slide back of its own accord, but it 
 did not. 
 
 I pulled it, using the square aperture as a 
 point of support. It moved an inch or two 
 and then stuck. Whence then the apparent 
 ease with which my lady had moved it ? I 
 account for the noiseless and easy pushing 
 back of the panel in the following way : 
 There is a power common to spirits, and not 
 possessed, or even understood, by mortal 
 flesh. It is shown sometimes in the pheno- 
 mena known as levitations, sometimes in the 
 movement of heavy tables, sometimes in the
 
 202 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 banging about of chairs, sometimes in the 
 opening and shutting of doors. Vulgar ghosts 
 drag chains by the same curious power. 
 It should be called Spiritual Force, and, 
 perhaps, by a careful collection of. the in- 
 stances on record of its use, perhaps, too, by 
 the voluntary narrative of such experiences 
 as my own, we shall be able to tabulate and 
 classify its results, to estimate the power 
 expended, and to gauge the power possible. 
 Like electricity, it cannot be understood. 
 For that matter, what power can be under- 
 stood ? And, like all natural force, its power 
 is limited. 
 
 Lady Bab possessed force enough to move 
 lightly with her spirit hand a panel which 
 stuck fast ; as it was, I could not for a long- 
 time move it with all my strength. I suc- 
 ceeded at length, and saw before me the 
 packets I had seen In the night by the 
 luminous glow which emanated from the 
 forms of the ladles Bab and Alicia. I seized
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. 20^ 
 
 them ; looked hastily in the cupboard for 
 anything else which might be there, and 
 proceeded to shut up the panel again as I 
 had found it. 
 
 This was not easy, and when I had quite 
 brought it back, there still remained the 
 square inch of wood to which was affixed 
 the hidden spring. This would not be per- 
 suaded to return to its place and I was 
 obliged to leave it. 
 
 Afterwards, I heard, Mrs. Jones observed 
 the place, and by the aid of the steps, re- 
 discovered the secret cupboard. But this 
 time there was nothing in it. 
 
 As for the packet, I opened it and began 
 to read it at once. 
 
 Did you ever open a packet of letters, a 
 hundred years old and more — letters from a 
 young girt to her lover, and from a lover to 
 his sweetheart ? Nothino- sadder than to 
 
 o 
 
 think of the bright eyes closed for ever, the 
 hopes gratified or disappointed, the tender
 
 204 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 thoughts which seem, read in the faded ink 
 upon the yellow paper, wasted and thrown 
 away. We forget their influence upon the 
 lives of those who thought them first, and 
 those who read them. We forget how 
 maidenly trust and purity are strengthened, 
 how manly honour is braced, by the belief 
 that each has in the other. 
 
 Poor Lady Bab's letters were as sweet as 
 any that I have ever read, albeit dressed up 
 in quaint, old-fashioned garb, and talk of 
 nymphs and swains. She thought she loved 
 the man to whom she wrote. Very likely 
 she did love him, though she afterwards 
 married another, and learned to love her 
 husband more. I should like to publish the 
 story of that courtship of her's which came 
 to nothing. But I cannot. I am under 
 promise. I read the letters over and over 
 till I knew them all by heart, and I have 
 never forgotten them. If Lady Bab gave 
 me permission I would reproduce them faith-
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. 205 
 
 fully to-morrow, and then the world would be 
 the richer by^another pretty idyl, as sweet and 
 fresh as any that have found an echo in the 
 hearts of men. 
 
 I awaited the night of my strange trysting 
 with singular impatience. There was a 
 romance so unusual, so out of the common 
 run of things in the whole business — apart 
 from the natural desire one felt to converse 
 again with creatures so lovely and spirititelles 
 — that I could not even sit down till the time 
 came. 
 
 The leaden-footed hours crept along. I 
 had my rooms cleaned up for the occasion 
 by a supplementary female, to the displeasure 
 of my own laundress. I had got some 
 flowers from Co vent-garden ; and a small, 
 bright fire — for, though it was July, it was a 
 cold, rainy night — was burning in the grate. 
 I could think of nothing else that would 
 please my new acquaintance. Eating and 
 drinking, of course, were out of the question.
 
 206 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Pictures and photographs might amuse them, 
 and of them I had plenty. 
 
 The Temple was very quiet. Most of the 
 men were away for their holidays, and my 
 own staircase was entirely deserted, save by 
 a hard-working lawyer on the first floor, im- 
 mediately under me. In the silence I could 
 hear him clear his throat from time to time, 
 as he went through his papers. But there 
 was no other sound to be heard. 
 
 I sat still, waiting. No one came. I put 
 out the lights and sat in darkness, expecting 
 with a trembling heart, to see the two ladies 
 appear every moment. They came not. I 
 waited till the clock struck twelve. I waited 
 — with a dull, cold feeling of disappointment 
 — while it struck one, two, and three ; and 
 finally, when the daylight began to shine in 
 at the windows, I made a little heap of 
 the papers, placed them in the grate, and with 
 more sorrow than I can express, set fire to 
 them.
 
 THE OLD, OLD STORY. 207 
 
 One thing, however, I heard — a faint, 
 trembling music — and a woman's voice sing- 
 ine. And these were the words : — 
 
 '&• 
 
 " Shadowy dreams and fitful fancies 
 O'er the sleeper's pillow flit ; 
 Not a night but has its glances 
 O'er the bridge where others sit. 
 
 Still believe that ever round you 
 Spirits float, who watch and wait ; 
 
 Nor forget the twain who found you 
 Sleeping nigh the Golden Gate." 
 
 No one will accuse me of ever having 
 written a line of poetry. But was the song 
 a dream altogether ? Or did Lady Alicia 
 sing those touching lines as a farewell ? It 
 may be so — for / have never seen her since.
 
 LADY KITTY. 
 
 The curious experiences which follow took 
 place in the most prosaic place in the world, 
 and the least likely for such a thing to happen. 
 Ghosts haunt old places and lonely places, 
 like chambers in Gray's Inn and the Temple, 
 where I have frequently seen them flitting- 
 about at night. That is natural, and what 
 might be expected, so far as can be gathered 
 from the very limited knowledge we possess 
 as to the manners and customs of the spiritual 
 world. But no one would for a moment 
 expect the supernatural in the Liverpool 
 Road, Islington. 
 
 ' VOL, I. p
 
 2IO . FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 It is only by the young lady's own per- 
 mission — she is actually reading what I am 
 writing at this moment — that I am enabled 
 to communicate to the public at large this 
 very interesting and valuable contribution to 
 our knowledge of the supernatural existence. 
 
 " Now, do not prose, but get on at once." 
 
 This is my Lady's own interruption. 
 
 I obey. I was a very poor man, and a 
 bachelor. Being a poor man, I was glad to 
 get a ' small house, exactly two years and 
 six months ago, in the Liverpool Road, where 
 rents do not run high. My house was a 
 semi-detached villa, as it called itself. It is 
 the smallest villa that ever had the impu- 
 dence to pretend to be anything but a cot- 
 tage ; but as the rent was low, and my own 
 stock of furniture small, it did well enough 
 for me. The ground floor boasted of one 
 room, with a kitchen at the back. Upstairs 
 were two bed-rooms. I engaged an aged 
 female to come every morning at eight, and.
 
 LADY KITTY. 2 I I 
 
 after performing the necessary sacrifices to 
 the Goddess of Cleanliness — very odd thing, 
 by the way, that there never was a Goddess 
 of Cleanliness in Lempriere ! — to go away 
 as soon as she could. Personally, I prefer 
 young and comely attendants about me ; but 
 the old and ugly come cheaper, and perhaps 
 are less likely to expose one to the breath of 
 calumny. 
 
 " Do not prose, I tell you," says the voice 
 at my shoulder, "but get on. We shall be 
 all night before you come to me." 
 
 Well, I sent up my half a dozen chairs, 
 two tables, bed, and bath, and the rest of 
 it, and got away from my office- — the place 
 where I was a slave to the tyrannical dictates 
 of a board of bank directors, without bowels, 
 appreciation, or generosity. A hundred and 
 twenty pounds a-year, if you please, for the 
 services of an imaginative mind like mine ! — • 
 for the discretionary use, between nine a.m. 
 and five p.m., of a pen which has written
 
 212 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 verses for the " Family Teapot." A poor 
 
 fortnight in the autumn, with the hohdays 
 
 of the Church, and the rest of the )^ear 
 
 on the treadmill, grinding out the figures 
 
 which add up to such a tremendous profit 
 
 at the end of the year; and forbidden, by' 
 
 a hollow mockery, to marry until my salary 
 
 should reach a hundred and fifty pounds 
 
 a -year ! 
 
 " Etouffe dans la foule, 
 Faute d'etre assez grand — " 
 
 Like many a greater poet before me, I bide 
 my time. 
 
 "If you do not get on with your story 
 and come to me, I will worry you and keep 
 you awake all night. Selfish creature ! 
 Always thinking about his own stupid mis- 
 fortunes ! As if anybody cared to hear about 
 
 That is just what I complain of No one 
 ever cared to hear about them. They would 
 not raise my salary ; they would not read my
 
 LADY KITTY. 213 
 
 verses — most beautiful things, some of them — 
 they would not appreciate me. 
 
 It was on the very first evening that I 
 went into my new house : one of those warm 
 evenings we had last year early in July. 
 I remember it was on Saturday, July 6th. 
 The thermometer had been standing at 
 84° all day ; and what with the heat, and 
 the hard work of putting up my bed, and 
 laying down the carpet -in my sitting-room, 
 with the aid of the Aged One — who mostly 
 sat upon a chair and gasped — I was regularly 
 beat ; and after smoking a pipe at my open 
 window, thought that I would draw myself 
 a single pint out of the cask which stood, 
 newly tapped, in my kitchen. I drew down 
 the blind, lit the lamp, and took it with me 
 into the kitchen. 
 
 This was not yet set to rights ; that is, the 
 old woman, on being told to put everything 
 in order, had contented herself by piling the 
 few pots and pans I possessed upon the table.
 
 214 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 and leaving- them there. On the floor, by 
 the cask, lay some sand, which had been left 
 there by the workmen when they repaired the 
 hearth : of course, the dear old lady had not 
 considered it part of her business to sweep 
 it up. I looked carelessly at the sand, and 
 then, setting down my lamp, drew my beer. 
 On taking up the lamp again, I observed, to 
 my great surprise, the prints of two bare feet 
 — a child's feet apparently — toes and all, upon 
 the sand. They were side by side, as if the 
 proprietor were actually standing there at 
 the moment. It was very odd. I could 
 swear they were not there when I first 
 looked at the sand. Odder still, while I 
 looked, another footstep, a third, was printed 
 before my eyes, just where the sand left off. 
 Few men, I flatter myself, would have pre- 
 served their courage better than I did at that 
 moment of terror. I dropped the beer be- 
 side the lamp — putting that out as it fell — 
 and, with a wild shriek, rushed out into the
 
 LADY KITTY. 215 
 
 little garden at the back. The wall checked 
 my flying feet, otherwise I might have been 
 running to this very day. Brought up short 
 by the bricks, I turned to face the foe, if 
 there were any. Even a worm will turn, 
 and a hare stand at bay, if there is no way 
 open for flight. How much more, then, I, the 
 poet, the man of highly strung feelings — 
 prohibited, too, from running further by a 
 six-foot wall. I stood with pale cheeks and 
 glaring eyes. Nobody ! Nothing ! There 
 was a seat — plank which did for a seat — 
 at the end of the little garden. I call it a 
 garden, because the landlord did. It had 
 but few pretensions to the name, as it 
 boasted of neither grass, nor flowers, nor 
 trees, nor was it more than six yards long. 
 No living thing grew in it, save moss and 
 mildew. As these are undoubtedly vege- 
 table productions, I suppose the landlord 
 was justified in calling the place a garden. 
 I sat on the seat and wiped my face. Two
 
 2l6 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 bare feet, toes and all — the feet of a child — 
 on the sand — one more presented before my 
 very eyes : what could this thing be ? 
 
 Robinson Crusoe's most fearful experience, 
 that of finding a single footprint — as if the 
 owner of the naked foot had been Jack the 
 Giant Killer or the hero of the Seven-league 
 Boots — was after all a mere flea-bite, so to 
 speak, to mine. Anybody could see, I re- 
 flected with trembling, a single footstep : I 
 would do it myself, with half an eye. But to 
 see a pair before me, and then a third actually 
 formed before my face ! Robinson, in his 
 most lonely moments, never succeeded in 
 getting further than a single footprint. What 
 could it mean ? 
 
 I suppose I sat on the bench, revolving 
 what to do, for half an hour. Escape was 
 impossible, except through the house itself. 
 This way was at least open to me ; but what 
 a dreadful way ! I might, it was true, get 
 over the wall and escape through my neigh-
 
 LADY KITTY. ' 21/ 
 
 bour's house, and so, probably, Incur the 
 charge of burglary. Even a ghost seemed 
 better than burglary. Then I began to 
 fortify myself with my own former experience. 
 Once, I reminded myself, I awoke, and saw 
 in the moonlight a female figure waving her 
 arms at me. After half an hour's suffocation 
 under the bed-clothes, I crept tremblingly out 
 of bed, and found that it was a feminine 
 garment — my aunt's — hung upon the wall. 
 Another time — but this was more fearful — I 
 was reading " The Spectre Smitten " in bed 
 on a summer's night. Suddenly the candle 
 went out, and simultaneously with the dark- 
 ness there came a tapping at the window 
 —slow, measured, and regular : on that 
 occasion my sufferings were even worse 
 than on the first. I pulled myself together 
 a little after an hour or two, of the tapping 
 — which was continuous — and found that it 
 was caused by a huge buck beetle. 
 
 But neither of these experiences seemed
 
 2l8 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 to meet the probabilities of the present 
 case. 
 
 The situation was very dreadful. Alone 
 in the house : no light, the lamp upset, the 
 lucifer matches heaven knew where, the 
 candles in the very room where the footprints 
 were — and the memory of those bare little 
 feet in the sand ! But the tooth had to be 
 drawn. I must face the danger. Summoning 
 all my pluck, I rose to my feet, and returned 
 — my nerves at the highest point of tension 
 —to the kitchen. I found the candles and 
 the matches, struck a light, picked up the 
 lamp, poured out more beer and drank it, and 
 then turned again to examine them. There 
 ■w&r&Jivc of them ! I stayed not to look any 
 longer, but hurried back with my candles 
 and the beer to my sitting-room in the front, 
 where I threw myself in an easy chair in an 
 ecstasy of terror. Just then, too, my dog, 
 which had been sleeping on the hearth-rug, 
 awoke suddenly, and retreated to a corner, 
 
 46^
 
 LADY KITTY. 219 
 
 where he crouched, whining and crying as 
 if in terror. 
 
 " Now, look here, you know "^ — it was a 
 girHsh voice that spoke, but in cheerful tones 
 — " I am not going to have any dogs about 
 the place. I don't like dogs. So if you and 
 I are going to get along together, turn him 
 out first. If you don't, I shall pretty soon 
 know the reason why." 
 
 " Pray," I stammered, " may I ask who 
 you are, and where you are ? " 
 
 " As for where I am, I am sitting on your 
 table.*' The dog was staring straight at the 
 table. "As for who I am, that's another 
 thing entirely ; and I am not at all inclined 
 to tell you." 
 
 " Might I ask to be favoured with a 
 personal interview — I mean a sight of my 
 mysterious visitor ? " 
 
 " You may certainly ask," she replied, 
 " and as certainly you will not get it." 
 
 " Are you a — a — particularly attached to
 
 220 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 this residence, Miss — may I ask your 
 name ? " 
 
 " If you mean, do I like living here, I can't 
 say I do ; but I'm obliged to live here ; and 
 my name is Kitty." . 
 
 "Why are you obliged to live here ? " 
 
 " The first lesson I was taught when I 
 went to school was not to ask questions. 
 When I disobeyed, I got my ears boxed — 
 like this." 
 
 Did you ever, swimming off the shore, 
 have a jelly-fish strike your cheek ? You 
 don't feel him, but you feel his sting, r That 
 was exactly my sensation at the moment. I 
 felt a distinct box on the ears, without any 
 justifiable cause or reason for it, because 
 nothing was to be seen. Curiously enough, 
 the physical discomfort caused by the blow 
 reassured my scattered nerves. A ghost 
 possesses terrors which are generally per- 
 fectly nameless. You do not know what he 
 or she may inflict upon you. Given the
 
 LADY KITTY. 221 
 
 worst, and you are • at least spared the 
 shuddering anxiety which attends the first 
 spiritual manifestations. My ghost was 
 young apparently, petulant, and somewhat 
 quick-tempered. She could box ears. Would 
 she also do anything else ? 
 
 " I must ask questions, you know. This 
 is altogether such a strange and inexplicable 
 circumstance." 
 
 " Not strange at all." 
 
 " Pardon me — it is strange to me." 
 
 " Then you are an owl. I am left here by 
 my stepmother, and I am going to stay for 
 three weeks more — locked up in this house 
 with you." 
 
 " Won't you show yourself to me, then ? " 
 
 "If we are to talk, we might as well talk 
 on an equal footing." 
 
 " Can't be on an equal footing. I've got 
 no things." 
 
 " Never mind about your things. Appear 
 as you are."
 
 2 22 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 " You most improper person, I've got 
 nothing at all on. My stepmother took 
 everything to prevent my going out. So 
 here I am. I don't care. Do something to 
 amuse me. I am going to sit on this mantel- 
 shelf and look at you." 
 
 I began to be provoked at her off-hand 
 manner. 
 
 "I'm glad you've come. I have had rather 
 a gloomy time lately — that is, for the last 
 fortnight, since I've been locked up. Now 
 you shall amuse me. Do something, I say — 
 sing, dance ! " 
 
 " Shall I read you my poetry ? " 
 
 " Stuff and nonsense — poetry, indeed ! 
 They used to read me Dr. Johnson's poetry, 
 and I always went to sleep. Sing." 
 
 I began to sing ; but, as always happens 
 when I exercise my light tenor, I was ordered 
 to stop at the third bar. 
 
 " Dance, now — dance a minuet with me." 
 
 In vain I assured her I could not. She
 
 LADY KITTY. 223 
 
 made me clear away the table, and kept 
 ordering- me about for three-quarters of an 
 hour. At the end of that time she was 
 good enough to call me the stupidest crea- 
 ture she had ever set eyes on. I wheeled 
 back the table and sat down. It was eleven 
 o'clock. 
 
 " May I smoke a pipe ? " I asked. 
 
 " No, certainly not ; no one ever smokes 
 before ladies. I don't like the smell. You 
 may take snuff if you like." 
 
 " I don't like," I returned gloomily. 
 
 "Well, I am sorry for you, then. But 
 nothing shall induce me ever to countenance 
 smoking ; and as I am going to be here for 
 three weeks, you had better go into the 
 garden to smoke, or it's very little sleep you'll 
 have, I can tell you. I like to make friends 
 with people if I can," she continued ; " but 
 I'm not going to be put upon or made un- 
 comfortable, although I am prevented from 
 showing myself by the harshness of a person
 
 224 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 whom I will never forgive when I grow up — 
 never." 
 
 " You are growing, then ? " 
 
 " Ridiculous creature ! Do you really 
 suppose that I am intended to be always a 
 child ? And don't Interrupt. I say that, 
 although I am necessarily invisible, I can 
 make myself felt, as you know already. 
 How should you like to be pinched all 
 night ? " 
 
 " I should hope, in the first place," I said 
 severely, " that you would not come into a 
 ofentleman's room." 
 
 " Should you ? Then you zvould be a fool. 
 A ghost may go anywhere, and through any- 
 thing, without any breach of the co7tve7iances. 
 But I am sure you would not drive me to 
 extremities, and I do hope that we shall be 
 good friends while I stay. Now, your busi- 
 ness is to amuse me. While you are away, I 
 shall amuse myself in the best way I can. 
 When you come home in the evening you
 
 LADY KITTY. 2 25 
 
 will read to me, talk to me, do anything but 
 sing to me. At eleven o'clock you may go 
 into the garden and smoke. It is eleven 
 now. Have your abominable tobacco, and 
 then creep quietly up the stairs to bed. Take 
 off your boots when you come in, and don't 
 make any noise, for I always go to sleep 
 directly I lie down. Good night — shake 
 hands." 
 
 She held out a hand, which I saw — a little 
 white hand, cold, thin, delicate. It terminated 
 at the wrist, and nothing else was visible. I 
 held it for a moment, and tried to extend my 
 fingers beyond the space where thin air began 
 and the arm should have gone on. I received 
 instantly a tremendous box on the ear, much 
 sharper than the first. 
 
 " You dare to do that ! " she cried. " An- 
 other such attempt, and we are enemies for 
 ever ! " 
 
 I humbly implored her pardon, and went 
 into the garden. Outside I found my dog. 
 
 VOL. I. CJ
 
 226 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 who peered curiously round me ; but finding 
 I was alone, jumped up to lick my hand. 
 Nothing, however, could induce him to enter 
 the house. 
 
 Next morning, nothing : no sound, no 
 indication of anything being in the house 
 except myself and the old woman. Only 
 the dog kept in the garden. I went off to 
 the city with curiously mingled feelings of 
 pleasure, fear, and curiosity. I was, however, 
 resolved on one thing. I would keep every- 
 thing to myself None of my fellow-clerks 
 should know of my singular fortune. 
 
 T,he day's drudgery — nine o'clock to five, 
 let me tell you, with half an hour extorted 
 for dinner is a good day's allowance — over, 
 I got back, walking as fast as I possibly 
 could, to the Liverpool Road. 
 
 Not a sound in the house — not a siofn to 
 indicate the presence of any one beside my- 
 self. I whistled to my dog. But, no- — he 
 peered wistfully in at the door, and shrank
 
 LADY KITTY. 22/ 
 
 away. Next I made my tea and drank it, 
 beginning to think that after all it was some 
 strange and disordered dream. 
 
 Seven o'clock struck. 
 
 "Well," said the voice I knew, with a 
 suddenness which nearly shook me off the 
 chair — " well, are you rested enough ? Have 
 you had plenty of tea ? You've been long 
 enough, but I would not disturb you before. 
 And now, put away the things and let us 
 talk." 
 
 That meant, let her talk. She went on 
 for four hours with a long and unceasing 
 prattle. She told me things that she had 
 seen ; what her own life had been ; q^nd, 
 though she was singularly reticent about her 
 present condition, she gave me to understand 
 that she was happy enough, and expected to 
 be happier when she was no longer in a state 
 of tutelage. 
 
 " I came over,' she said — it was a curious 
 phrase, as if she were an emigrant, but c^uite
 
 228 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 intelligible — " I came over about a hundred 
 years ago, or it may be a little more. I was 
 about ten years old then, so I am fifteen now, 
 at the rate of five per cent., which is all we 
 are allowed till we are twenty-one. After 
 that it does not matter, of course." 
 
 " Oh, of course," I replied. 
 
 " And why of course ? Pray don't expose 
 your ignorance. It's a great piece of con- 
 descension my talking to you at all, because 
 my father was a duke — the Duke of Reculver 
 — and I was Lady Kitty Reculver — you know 
 tJiat name at least, I suppose ? " 
 
 I bowed a mendacious assent," because I 
 did not know it at all. 
 
 "My father was a minister. He was not 
 a very wise one, I believe, from what I 
 have heard since. But perhaps he was as 
 ofood as most. I am inclined on the whole 
 to think, though, that he was not so wise as 
 the generality of people ; because, after ni}- 
 mother left us, he married my stepmother,
 
 LADY KITTY. 2 29 
 
 the second great-great-dowager-duchess, you 
 know. Any man who could do that iiuLst be 
 weak in the intellects." 
 
 " Pardon me," I said, " but does It not 
 become awkward, that kind of title — great- 
 great-great, for instance. How when you 
 get to the tenth or twelfth ? " 
 
 " Oh, we very seldom experience any 
 difficulty. In the case of houses like the 
 Montmorencies of France, they have adopted 
 an algebraical method. Instead of saying 
 great-great-great, for instance, they say great- 
 cubed. This saves a orreat deal of trouble. 
 Well, when I was ten, you see, the second 
 ofreat-gfreat-dowag^er and I came over to<jether 
 — typhus fever, or something disagreeable ; 
 it matters little now what we call it. I re- 
 member being a good deal annoyed at the 
 time. So you see, by the rules, I am under 
 her guardianship till I am grown up and can 
 do what I like. When I do anything wrong, 
 I get locked up in empty houses for so many
 
 230 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 weeks. That's my case now. A mere trifle, 
 too — not fit to make a fuss about. What she 
 called a breach of etiquette. Rubbish and 
 nonsense ! I haven't common patience with 
 it. But don't ask me. We are absolutely 
 forbidden to tell people on the other side 
 about our life, and I should catch it tre- 
 mendously if it were known that I have told 
 you as much as I have. Tell me about 
 yourself. Are you rich ? No, I see you are 
 not. Good family ? I suppose not. Not that 
 I care at all about it. There are not a dozen 
 good families in England, and a generation 
 or so is of very little importance to a 
 Reculver. We date beyond the Deluge, you 
 know, our ancestors having had the singular 
 good fortune to escape by getting to the top 
 of Snowdon. It isn't true, but that is what is 
 always said in our genealogy." 
 
 " I suppose I am not what you may call 
 of regularly good family," I replied — because 
 on this point I am a little touchy — " but my
 
 LADY KITTY. 23 I 
 
 father was the rector of Muddleborough, in 
 Norfolk ; and my uncle failed for forty- 
 thousand pounds as a " 
 
 " Parish pump and beadledom ! " she 
 replied, rudely. " My dear good sir, do you 
 think I should consider you of a bit more 
 importance if your venerable papa — he reads 
 prayers for us sometimes in his new position 
 — had been a bishop ? What fools men and 
 women are, to be sure ! Go on with your 
 story, however. It promises to be as inte- 
 resting as a novel. Oh, that you had one to 
 read to me now ! " 
 
 I told her all my story, which wasn't much 
 after all ; though, somehow, the subject 
 possesses the deepest possible interest to 
 myself. I had nearly finished, and was 
 dilating on the difficulties of living on a 
 hundred and twenty pounds a year, when 
 she broke in upon me, in her impatient 
 way — 
 
 " I really did not imagine that so ex-
 
 232 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 tremely stupid a story could have been made 
 so long. Why, man, don't you see that you 
 don't get on because you haven't got any 
 push ? What made the Reculver family ? 
 The man who pushed his way to the top of 
 Snowdon when the waters were rising ! I'm 
 only a young thing of fifteen, with no more 
 experience than a paltry hundred years or so 
 can give ; but I know this, that the waters 
 are always rising. And if you want to get 
 out of the mire, you had better make a fight 
 for it." 
 
 I shook my head. It was no use think- 
 inof of makinof a fiorht for it in the offices 
 of any bank in London. All very well to 
 talk. 
 
 " And haven't you had the spirit to fall in 
 love yet ? " 
 
 Now, it was very odd that in the story I 
 told her I had omitted all mention of my 
 Emily. That was, perhaps, because I thought 
 she wanted to hear about myself. Vanity !
 
 LADY KITTY. 233 
 
 Only the cases are very rare where ladies 
 Hke to hear about other ladies. 
 
 I told her about Emily. Engaged for 
 five years. Hopeless to think of marriage. 
 Best and most patient of girls : also the 
 prettiest. 
 
 " Prettiest ! " she said. " Rubbish and 
 nonsense ! You men are all alike ! You 
 think every girl an angel. Dowdy little 
 thing, I'm sure ! Can she do anything ? — 
 dance minuets, play the harpsichord, work 
 embroidery ? " 
 
 " N-no — I'm afraid not. But she can make 
 puddings." 
 
 " Ah ! very useful, no doubt, in your sphere 
 of life. You don't mean — you can't dare to 
 mean — that she is prettier than me ? " 
 
 I ventured, with respect, to explain that I 
 could not tell, because I had never seen her. 
 
 " Light the two candles, as well as the 
 lamp, and you shall see." 
 
 I did so ; although two candles a/id the
 
 234 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 lamp is an expensive job. I immediately 
 became aware of a presence — a face and 
 head, terminating where the dress should 
 begin — with two little hands, but not the 
 arms ; and below, on the footstool, two little, 
 tiny bare feet — the prettiest feet that ever 
 were seen. But ah ! such a face — such a 
 beautiful face ! — with its delicate little rose- 
 bud of a mouth, its dimpled chin, its* full, 
 deep-brown eyes, and its wealth of long, 
 dark-brown hair, that hung down behind in 
 waving curls, disappearing w^here the dress 
 would hide it ! A sweet child's face, or a 
 face of budding womanhood. She looked at 
 me, as Venus herself would have looked at 
 Paris, with a smile of conscious superiority, 
 of immeasurable superiority. I gasped. I 
 fell upon my knees. I begged and prayed 
 her to remain in my sight a little longer — 
 only a little longer. 
 
 " Not so beautiful," I said — " by a thousand 
 times, Emily is not so beautiful as you ! Oh,
 
 LADY KITTY. 235 
 
 Lady Kitty ! tell me if all the ladies of your 
 time were so lovely as yourself ? " 
 
 " Not all ; but some. The Miss Gunnings, 
 for instance — pretty, but made-up, padded 
 things ! But, there, you wouldn't know if I 
 were to tell you. So, my pretty lover, you 
 are unfaithful already ! Your Chloe is not so 
 fair as Clarissa ! " 
 
 " Nay," I replied, " not so fair ; but yet 
 I love her. We mate only with our own 
 degree. I thank you always, madam, for 
 showing me — what else I might never have 
 known — what true beauty means. Would 
 that I could see you as you are — I mean, as 
 you might be — in a dress suitable to your 
 rank and beauty ! Oh, do not, do not fade ! " 
 
 There never was a girl so kind and 
 thoughtful. She remained in my sight for a 
 full hour. I am not an artist, or I would 
 have sketched her as she sat. But every 
 line in her face^f her face could be said to 
 have had lines — is deeply engraven on my
 
 2^6 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ■J 
 
 heart. I can never forget her if I would, and 
 I would not if I could. 
 
 . A whole hour ! And it was not the only- 
 time that she condescended to appear. Night 
 after night I was privileged to kiss her 
 beautiful hand, and to gaze upon her lovely- 
 face ; till the features of my poor, good little 
 Emily, down away in her Essex farmhouse, 
 seemed coarse and rough to my imagination. 
 Night after night, for three weeks — all too 
 short! — she sat in my little room, turning 
 solitude into Elysium and loneliness into 
 happiness. The debt of gratitude I owe to 
 her can never be repaid. But there was more 
 yet ; for one night she said suddenly to me, 
 without any kind of preamble — 
 
 " Roderick " — that is my absurd name : I 
 was only a few weeks old when they gave it 
 to me, and I remember I had not the courage 
 to protest before so many strangers ; nor, 
 indeed, at all, until it was much too late — 
 " Roderick, I have had my term of imprison-
 
 LADY KITTY 
 
 ment grreatl}^ lightened by your care and 
 trouble. I have been thinking how I might 
 be able to do something for you. The best 
 thing would be, I suppose, for you to marry 
 your Emily as soon as you can." 
 
 " I can't. I have only got a hundred and 
 twenty pounds a-year." 
 
 " So you've kept on saying nearly every 
 night, till I've really got almost tired of hear- 
 ing about it. Well, you know, if I were 
 older, or a scientific ghost, or a mining ghost,, 
 or an antiquarian ghost, or anything like 
 that, I dare say I could give you a lift, in a 
 practical sort of way, by telling you where 
 pots of gold are buried. As I'm only a 
 young girl, I don't know anything about pots 
 of gold, and don't want to. But I tell you 
 what I might do for you." 
 
 I listened with all my ears. Could it 
 possibly be that my Lady Kitty was really 
 going to do something for me ? 
 
 " We all take a particular delight in watch-
 
 238 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ing the fortunes of our own house. We do 
 this, if I may so explain myself, by influ- 
 encing the minds of our representatives. 
 Sometimes we do this injudiciously, because 
 we can't be any wiser than we are made, can 
 we now ? " 
 
 " Surely not," I said. " I know that 
 from my own sad experience ; and he who 
 hopes " 
 
 " But we may be foolisher," she returned, 
 sharply ; "so don't go on with what you 
 were going to say. You are really a good 
 fellow in your way ; and if your wife only 
 cures you of your propensity to prose and 
 make goody goody remarks, you may turn 
 out a useful sort of man, without ever having 
 had very much go. Now listen to me ? " 
 
 She was sitting opposite to me, in my easy 
 chair : that is, her head was visible in the 
 chair at the altitude at which a head might be 
 usually found when a young lady is sitting 
 there. I had got so used by this time to
 
 LADY KITTY. 239 
 
 seeing the head by itself, that I thought 
 nothing at all of it, and only occasionally 
 noticed the curious gap beneath it, which 
 revealed the chair behind. I should have 
 said that no mistiness or cloud interposed to 
 hide the chair, but that it was exactly as if 
 nothing at all was there. Custom, you see, 
 makes one accustomed to everything ; and 
 my imagination even filled in the flowing 
 robes, for want of which the poor dear girl 
 could not show herself before me. Her dear 
 little fingers were interlaced in such a position 
 as to lead me to suppose that she was resting 
 her elbows on the arms of the chair. I may 
 add that, after the first night, she made no 
 scruple of letting me see her feet, as well as 
 her face and hands. 
 
 " Listen to me, now. When any one of 
 our house does anything very good or very 
 bad, they say it is hereditary influence in the 
 old blood breaking out. Very well ; now I 
 am going to show to you exactly what here-
 
 240 FRO-M THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ditary influence means. You only read the 
 columns of the Times advertisement sheet 
 for the next fortnight, and when you see an 
 advertisement from the Duke of Reculver, 
 take care to answer it at once. The young 
 Duke has. just left college. He is full of 
 ideas about improving the estates and his 
 people. He imagines himself to be an old 
 feudal lord, with the interests of everybody 
 depending on himself. Now, he cannot 
 manage everything, and he will want a 
 private secretary' — that is, you ; a man of 
 business habits — you ; accustomed to writing 
 letters — you again ; ready to give up all his 
 time to business — you, you see ; about thirty 
 years of age — you, once more. Need I say 
 more ? Yes, one thing more. You had 
 better, in the meantime, study what I dis- 
 cover you are painfully ignorant about- — the 
 genealogy and histor}' of the great Reculver 
 house. And now, my dear friend — for we 
 are in reality friends — we must part. My
 
 LADY KITTY. • 24 1 
 
 captivity is over, and I return to my own 
 people. Forgive my little tempers and tan- 
 trums : I know I have them. When you go 
 to the Duke's presence, I will try to be there 
 and prompt you, if you want any prompting. 
 Farewell." 
 
 She rose — that is, the head rose — and the 
 hands parted. She held them out to me. I 
 took them in mine, and kissed them — the 
 prettiest hands that ever were seen. She 
 smiled a farewell, and then, with the sweetest 
 grace that ever gentle lady showed, she said 
 to me — 
 
 " In my time, men saluted a lady on the 
 lips. You may, if you would like to." 
 
 This condescension — so much greater than 
 I had any reason to expect — overwhelmed 
 me. I leaned forward, and with as much 
 deference as I could put into my manner — it 
 was not much, but as much as you could 
 expect for a hundred and twen — I mean 
 from a city clerk, and a good deal more than 
 
 VOL, I. R
 
 242 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 you could get from most of our fellows — I 
 kissed her on the forehead and on the lips. 
 Then I looked round the room, in a sort of 
 bewilderment, and was roused by my dog's 
 scratching at the door. He came in, for the 
 first time since my guest had been with me. 
 and sat down as unconcernedly as if there 
 had never been anybody there. 
 
 I bought the " Peerage " — a second-hand 
 copy — cost me eight shillings and sixpence — 
 and studied the famous history of the Recul- 
 ver house. Then I read the whole of the 
 advertisements in the Times every day for a 
 fortnight without success. At the end of a 
 fortnight — that is, on August the loth — I 
 saw the following advertisement : — 
 
 " A nobleman is desirous of finding a pri- 
 vate secretary. He must be of business 
 habits, not more than thirty years of age, 
 accustomed to correspondence, and ready to 
 devote his whole time to his business, which
 
 LADY KITTY. 243 
 
 will be partly that of a steward. — Apply to 
 K., etc. etc. etc." 
 
 Now, anybody who doubts my story may 
 just look up the Times for that date himself. 
 If he does not find the advertisement pre- 
 cisely as I have quoted it, let him write me 
 down fibster, fiction writer, inventor, teller of 
 tarradiddles. But it is there ! I • answered 
 the advertisement instantly, setting forth my 
 own qualities, and referring to my directors 
 for references. 
 
 On Monday afternoon a reply came — 
 
 " The Duke of Reculver will be glad to 
 see Mr. Roderick Leigh on Tuesday morn- 
 ing, at eleven o'clock, at his private resi- 
 dence." 
 
 I got leave of my manager. I went to 
 the Duke's private residence — a magnificent 
 mansion behind St. James's Palace. In
 
 24/] FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 trembling and trepidation, I was ushered 
 into the room. The Duke looked at me — 
 he was a young man of three and twenty — 
 with curiosity for a moment, and then 
 motioned me to a chair. 
 
 " You are acquainted with the House of 
 Reculver, Mr. Leigh ? " 
 
 " I believe, your Grace, I could even pass 
 an examination in the genealogy of your 
 family." 
 
 "That is very ' curious. You are fond of 
 genealogical studies ? " 
 
 I bowed. 
 
 "Well, now, a simple question." 
 
 When he first spoke, I saw the fair face 
 of my own dear Lady Kitty smiling at me 
 behind him ; but this time I saw her whole 
 form, wrapt in some wondrous silk that 
 swept behind her, as she whispered in his 
 ear — and he, as if speaking at her dictation, 
 asked me — 
 
 " Can you tell me who was Lady Kitty 
 Reculver ? "
 
 LADY KITTY. 245 
 
 "She was your Grace's great-great-aunt. 
 She died, about the year 1772, of typhus 
 fever, at the same time as the Duke's second 
 wife. Lady Kitty was only ten years old at 
 the time of her lamented death, but already 
 gave extraordinary promise of wit and viva- 
 city ; and was, besides, like most of the 
 ladies of your Grace's family, of singular 
 beauty." 
 
 " Very good," said the Duke, smiling ; 
 while Lady Kitty, behind him, nodded and 
 smiled and clapped her hands. 
 
 He asked me a few more questions, and 
 then dismissed me. As I bowed on departure 
 the dear girl behind kissed her hand to me, 
 nodded, laughed, and jumped for joy. As I 
 was leaving the room, he called me back, 
 
 " Mr. Leigh, one moment. I am about to 
 make inquiries of your directors about you. 
 See this pile. It is a pile of 635 letters, all 
 answers to my advertisement, from men in 
 every position and of every age. They will
 
 246 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 all go into the waste-paper basket if my 
 inquiries prove satisfactory." 
 
 I am now secretary and steward to the 
 Duke. I know every scrap of his family 
 history, and everything about his estates. I 
 have been married two years. I am the 
 father of a little girl. She Is not like her 
 ' mother at all, who has blue eyes, because her 
 eyes are brown as well as her hair. I have 
 called her, with his Grace's permission, Kitty. 
 The Duke is the kindest and best man that 
 ever lived. I am as happy as I can hope to 
 be, but for one thing — I have never once 
 seen my Lady Kitty again, though she some- 
 times condescends to pay me a flying visit, 
 and speaks to me at odd times, when I am 
 alone, and Emily out of hearing. I dare not 
 tell the Duke, my employer, or Emily, my 
 lord and — I mean, my obedient wife — a word 
 of the matter. Oh, lovely Lady Kitty! It 
 is not, I hope, infidelity to an excellent wife,.
 
 LADY KITTY. 247 
 
 to acknowledge that, while I regard her as 
 some divinity too fair and good, as well as 
 too ethereal, to be loved by a humble mortal 
 like myself, her image dwells in my heart, 
 and will never leave it.
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 
 
 On the east coast there are two or three 
 fashionable Avatering-places and about fifty 
 unfashionable. To one of these last, carefully- 
 selected as being one of the most unfashion- 
 able — only two lodging-houses and a country 
 inn — I betook myself last August, with the 
 intention of remaining there a month. 
 
 I was no more jaded than a man ought to 
 be after a year of not too hard work, and no 
 great amount of dissipation and society. My 
 nerves were not out of order, nor was my 
 brain giving way under that pressure which 
 sets in with such violence about the end of
 
 250 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 the season, and of which we hear so much 
 between the end of term and the beginning of 
 October. And I was not contemplating an 
 epic, or a novel, or a five-act play. I simply 
 went down to enjoy myself in a solitary way 
 — to sail, bathe, fish, stroll about, read novels^ 
 and smoke pipes. 
 
 It was about two o'clock in the afternoon 
 when I got down there. The last eight miles 
 of the journey were done in an omnibus, 
 which they called a coach. One family was 
 at my watering-place, and only one. I ascer- 
 tained from my driver that I might choose 
 between the other lodging-house and the inn. 
 There were, it appeared further, no German 
 bands and no barrel organs ; there was no 
 circulating library and no assembly rooms. 
 In fact, civilization, with its march, that we 
 hear so much about, had not come this way ; 
 though its tramp was distinctly audible not 
 many miles away. 
 
 The inn was that pretty kind of inn which
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 25 1 
 
 they represent on the stage — a low, two 
 storeyed house, with a porch, and creepers 
 cHnging all over the front. On the right was 
 a little " parlour," as they called it, which was 
 at my service ; on the left was the bar, 
 furnished with the usual display of pewter. 
 There was a fragrant smell of thyme or of 
 lavender in the bed-room ; there was a garden 
 behind the house, all dreamy with the hum of 
 bees and the scents of old-fashioned flowers 
 — stocks, wall-flowers, hollyhocks, London 
 pride, and the like ; and about a quarter of 
 a mile away was the sea-shore, with a long 
 murmur of waves. 
 
 The landlord, regretting the absence of his 
 good woman, brought me a little dinner of 
 some fish and a chicken at five. The ale was 
 excellent ; and after dinner I sat in the 
 garden and smoked, in great content, watch- 
 ing the glitter of the light in the leaves till 
 the sun went down, when I returned to my 
 parlour and got some tea. In the twilight,
 
 252 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 I went out for a stroll by the shore. It was 
 very quiet. The family in the lodging-house 
 were apparently all gone to bed. There was 
 not even a coast-guard to be seen. I un- 
 dressed and took a hasty dip, and then went 
 back to the inn. Here I drank a single 
 glass of brandy and water, and went to bed. 
 You will observe that the day had not been 
 exciting. 
 
 There were two beds in the room — which 
 was much larger than one generally finds 
 in a country inn, and extended along the 
 whole front of the house. One of these, 
 which I had not noticed in the afternoon, was 
 a grim, dismantled, old Four-poster, occupying 
 a good half of the room. My own was a 
 little iron, bachelor's bed — one of the pretty 
 little French things — but the other was a 
 sort of ancestral state bed. That is, it had 
 been. Now its cumbrous rigging was all 
 pulled down ; the curtains, rings, and hang- 
 ings had been taken away and carried off;
 
 THE OLD FOUR-rOSTER. 253 
 
 the mattresses and valance removed ; and 
 only the four bare posts, with the sacking 
 of the bed, remained. The posts seemed 
 to preserve something of their ancient 
 dignity ; and it was not without pride — the 
 last possession of a ruined gentleman- — that 
 the old skeleton towered in its fallen state. 
 
 I was glad to look at the contrast of the 
 little French bed, gaudily painted in green 
 and gold ; neat and tidy ; open and low — 
 suggestive of quiet slumber and peaceful 
 dreams, with a waking, early in the morning, 
 to find the early sun streaming in at the 
 window, and the twitter of birds inviting one 
 to be up and away, plunging in the cool 
 waves. 
 
 At present, however, the full moon was 
 shining, clear and bright, into the room. 
 I opened the window and looked out. I 
 could see its long silver light upon the water, 
 and hear the roll of the sea on the beach. 
 There was no other sound — not even the
 
 254 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 barking of a dog ; and, with a murmur of 
 congratulation at having found a place so 
 quiet and so pleasant, I turned into bed, 
 and fell asleep. 
 
 The bark of a dog — a door slamming — the 
 sound of many voices — the tread of steps 
 on the stairs. What is it ? I am a fool 
 to waken so suddenly, and a greater fool 
 for not going off to sleep again at once. 
 I address myself again steadily to slumber ; 
 think only of soothing things ; shut my eyes 
 hard ; lie in the most comfortable posture. 
 But all of no use. My feet are wakeful and 
 restless : they kick of their own accord. 
 Something tickles my nose. Something 
 startles me just as I feel myself dropping off. 
 This evidently will not do. It has just 
 struck twelve, and there are yet three hours 
 before the dawn. I remember the advice of 
 Franklin. He recommends you to get up, 
 shake the pillows together, lay the sheets
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 255 
 
 Straight, walk about the room for five minutes, 
 and then try again. I get up, shake pillows, 
 and smooth sheets, walk about a little, and 
 open the window. The moon is throwing 
 her light full upon the gloomy old Four- 
 poster. 
 
 Broad daylight. A delicious cool breeze 
 comes in at the open window, and awakens 
 me. I sit up and look round, trying to 
 remember things. Then, suddenly, I become 
 aware of a most singular circumstance. I 
 am lying on the bare sacking of the Four- 
 poster. 
 
 A cold shudder ran through me as I vainly 
 tried to remember how I got there. I could 
 not remember anything beyond looking from 
 the window, and noticing the moon on the 
 old bed, and my own shadow on its sacking. 
 A sort of terror came upon me, and I pre- 
 cipitately got up and retreated to my own
 
 256 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 bed. Then I gradually got warm, and 
 reasoned myself into the belief that I had 
 been sleep-walking, or had lain there for 
 coolness. As for the troubled feeling, the 
 sense of something terrible which had 
 happened and been forgotten, I put it away 
 from me — it was the effect of a strange bed 
 and too many pipes. I got up, bathed, and 
 came back refreshed and jolly. It was the 
 loveliest day — a day on which a wanderer's 
 conscience would be soothed and quiet — a 
 day when London is hot and heavy, and 
 the Downs are cool and bright — a day for 
 a long walk to clear out the cobwebs of the 
 brain, to forget regrets for wasted oppor- 
 tunities, and to build anew gorgeous dreams 
 of things that might yet be. I used the day 
 well. I walked along the low, breezy cliff, 
 by the sea-shore, where I met no one but a 
 man who, I have reason to believe, was a 
 poacher ; at least, the ears of a hare were 
 sticking out of his pocket. But he was not
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 257 
 
 a noxious animal, and answered me in a 
 sufficiently civil, if not friendly, manner. 
 
 After some six or eio;ht miles of walkino" 
 I came upon an old ruined abbey, with a 
 small church of modern construction in its 
 precincts, and a very old churchyard. Be- 
 yond the abbey stood a few houses of a 
 village. The ruins were not much to look 
 at. Three walls remained and the places 
 where once were the windows ; but of these 
 the very tracing was gone. Ivy clung over 
 all the walls and seemed to keep them up ; 
 but the abbey was long since roofless and 
 desolate. I was reminded of my old Four- 
 poster, and made out my fanciful resem- 
 blance ; thinking how a mantle of ivy would 
 improve the appearance of that venerable 
 relic of antiquity. 
 
 Then I turned into the churchyard and 
 tried to read the epitaphs, but I found 
 nothinor remarkable. In a corner of this 
 God's-acre was a comparatively new monu- 
 
 VOL. I. S
 
 258 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 ment. It was a tall and rather graceful 
 cross of white marble. In the centre of the 
 marble I read the inscriptions. They were 
 to the memory of Charles Arthur Clynton, 
 drowned accidentally, August i6th, 1838, 
 aged twenty-eight ; also of Lady Alice 
 Clynton, his mother, died in December of 
 the same year ; and of Clara Helen Swin- 
 ford, died about six years afterwards, aged 
 twenty-five. 
 
 I sat down and thought of the mother's 
 grief : died, too, four months after her son 
 — probably broken-hearted. 
 
 And who was Clara Swinford ? Perhaps 
 his wife that was to be ; and she, too, only 
 survived him six years ! Then I surprised 
 myself with a big tear which fell copiously — 
 if I may so express myself of a single tear 
 • — into my beard and lay there like a pearl. 
 I am not generally given to cry over other 
 people's misfortunes, being quite of the 
 opinion that a gentleman can find plenty
 
 THE OLD FOUR-rOSTER. 259 
 
 to cry about in considering his own. So, 
 for fear of another, I rose and addressed 
 my steps homeward, still thinking of the 
 terrible tragedy commemorated by that 
 marble cross. 
 
 In due course I got through the day. 
 jMaking acquaintance with a seafaring man 
 — not unconnected, as one may say, with 
 the fishing interests — I accepted an invita- 
 tion to go trawling, or dragging, or some- 
 thing else, with a boUt and a net. I dined 
 at five, had another stroll by moonlight, and 
 went to bed at ten o'clock well tired. The 
 first thing that caught my eye was the con- 
 founded skeleton of a bedstead, and I got 
 into bed with words on my lips that should 
 have been, but were not, a part of an 
 evening prayer. And then I fell asleep 
 without more ado. 
 
 What is it ? I am awakened, not naturally,
 
 26o FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 but suddenly and rudely, as if I had been 
 shaken into consciousness — thoroughly, how- 
 ever ; and I sit up in bed, startled, confused, 
 and terrified. The church clock is striking 
 twelve. The moon is shining full on the 
 sacking of that preposterous great bed exactly 
 as it did last night. And then the remem- 
 brance of last night comes upon me, and I 
 begin to shiver and tremble. It is too 
 absurd. I lie back, and try to get to sleep 
 again ; but it is of no use. Curiously, too, 
 the words on the tombstones are rinorino- in 
 my ears : " Charles Arthur Clynton, aged 
 twenty-eight ; Lady Alice, his mother ; and 
 Clara Helen Swinford." Poor Clara ; Poor 
 dear Cla — a — There's a yawn. I am 
 positively getting sleepy again. "Also, to 
 the memory of his mother, Lady Alice." 
 Hang Lady Alice ! 
 
 There are footsteps in the road : a noise 
 as of men talking in whispers : footsteps in 
 the garden, footsteps in the house. I cannot
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 26 1 
 
 remain in bed. I leap out, open the window, 
 and breathe the cold night air. There is a 
 confused and shuffled tramp up the stairs ; 
 then along the passage. They stop at my 
 door. The door, Avhich I had bolted, swings 
 open. What is it that makes my heart 
 freeze, and my eyes glaze, and my limbs 
 stiffen with a momentary horror ? What is 
 this nameless dread that comes over me ? 
 Why do I stand in this helpless way, staring 
 at the open door ? For I cannot move — I 
 can only watch and wait. This kind of 
 paralysed horror is momentary. It passes 
 from me and I can again lift my eyes and 
 turn them round the room. 
 
 It is all changed. The great bed is hung 
 round with curtains, and tassels, and fringes. 
 Clothes are hanging about. There is an old- 
 fashioned toilet table, covered with brushes, 
 jewellery, and rings. The chairs are littered 
 with riding-whips, gloves, and spurs. The 
 table is loaded with books. Liefhted candles
 
 262 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Stand upon the dressing table, and the moon 
 seems to have disappeared altogether. All 
 this I saw at a glance, and then turned to the 
 door. 
 
 In the passage were half a dozen men, 
 adjusting a burden. Presently, they all came 
 in, bearing — something ! What was it ? Five 
 of them were rough, fisher-looking men, in 
 sea-going dress. Before them came an old 
 man, in some sort of livery, weeping. But 
 they all had heavy, mournful faces ; and all 
 bore their burden In a reverent, careful way. 
 They put it on the bed, and lifted the cloth. 
 O God ! it was a dead body ! — the body of 
 a young man — his eyes open and staring — 
 his cheek pale and ghastly — his jaw sunken 
 — his long, fair hair dripping with water, and 
 matted over his forehead : a week ago, a tall, 
 strong, handsome man. They put up his 
 fallen jaw, and closed his eyes, and laid a 
 handkerchief over his face. And then one 
 of them spoke, in a hushed voice, as in the 
 presence of Death's handiwork.
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 26 
 
 O 
 
 " I found him," he said, " off the Clewin 
 Rocks. He was beatin' about in the waves, 
 and his poor arm was nigh crushed to pieces. 
 See here ! " 
 
 He Hfted the coverlet from the arm, and 
 I saw — oh, the piteous sight! — ^the deHcate, 
 shapely hand bent over and crushed into the 
 arm which, bruised and broken, lay upon the 
 bed. 
 
 " I picked him up, but couldn't get him 
 into the boat, till John Coss here, he come 
 alongside, and helped me. D'rectly we got 
 ashore, we sent up to the Hall." 
 
 I don't think I was afraid any more. The 
 fear had passed away very quickly ; and left 
 curiosity, with a sense of something wild and 
 strange. I waited to see what would happen 
 next. Nor had I to wait long. Presently, 
 there was the sound of horses' feet and 
 carriage wheels, which stopped at the house. 
 Then light footsteps on the stair. And 
 once more the door flew open. Two ladies,
 
 264 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 dressed in black, came in. Their eyes were 
 red and swollen ; but they had no tears, and 
 no words of sorrow. They stepped quietly 
 to the bedside, the rest silently parting to 
 make room for them. Then the elderly lady 
 spoke : — 
 
 " Take the cloth from his face. Let me 
 see my boy." 
 
 The old man interposed. 
 
 " Don't ye, my lady — don't ye now ! " 
 
 The poor old man. He dropped on his 
 knees, with his face in his hands, and his 
 whole frame shakina- with sobs. I do not 
 know which was the most pitiful sight, the 
 grief-^stricken old servant, or the wan-cheeked 
 women. 
 
 But they took the cloth off ; and the elder 
 lady gazed long and sadly upon the features 
 she was to see no more. The girl clung 
 to her arm and, after a single look, hid her 
 face. 
 
 At last she replaced the handkerchief.
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 265 
 
 One of the men, with a rough grace, took 
 a pair of scissors from the table, and cut off 
 two locks of his fair, silken hair, giving one 
 to each. 
 
 "It hardly needs," said the mother. 
 
 But the girl hid hers in her bosom, with a 
 convulsive sob. 
 
 " Come, Clara — come, my daughter," said 
 the mother, and led her to the door. 
 
 As they disappeared in the dark passage, 
 I heard the girl sob out, heart-broken — 
 
 " Oh, Charlie ! Charlie ! " 
 
 The bitter, hopeless sadness of the scene 
 came upon me like a flood ; and, unable to 
 restrain myself, I wept aloud. 
 
 Then it seemed to me as if the faces of 
 the men turned to me curiously and in- 
 quiringly ; and then all of them slowly faded 
 away and disappeared. I was standing in 
 an empty room. The door was shut. The 
 cold night air blew upon me from the open 
 window, and my shadow lay, in the moon-
 
 266 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 light, on the sacking of the dismantled old 
 bed. 
 
 Then I felt my heart grow cold and sink 
 within me ; and I remember nothing more. 
 
 Again I awoke, as the morning sun came 
 in at the open window ; and again I found 
 myself, cold and shivering, lying on the bare 
 sacking of the bed. This time I had no 
 difficulty in remembering everything ; and j 
 got up, dressed, and took a bath and a walk 
 to recover my nerves. 
 
 When I came back to breakfast, I found 
 that the landlady had returned. She saluted 
 me curiously, and inquired how I had slept. 
 I thought she meant more than mere cour- 
 tesy, and replied by a tremendous fib — 
 
 " Pretty well ; but there was a good deal 
 of disturbance in the niofht." 
 
 •' There was, sir," she said, gravely. " And 
 if I'd been at home before you went to bed 
 — which I wasn't — not for fifty pounds should
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 267 
 
 you have slept in that room — last night, of 
 all nights in the year." 
 
 " And why not last night ? " 
 
 " Last night is the night when we hear the 
 same noises, year after year. And they do 
 say that it's the men. carrying poor Master 
 Charles — him as was drowned six-and-thirty 
 years ago — up to the bed-room where he 
 slept the night before he was drowned." 
 
 " And have you heard the noises ? " 
 
 " I have, sir," she said gravely. " And I 
 heard them last night." 
 
 " And did you ever — ever see anything ? " 
 
 " No," she said ; " I have never seen any- 
 thing ; and I don't think there is anything 
 to be seen. And yoit didn't see anything, 
 sir : 
 
 I thought it would be very absurd for me 
 to spread about a nev/ ghost story, so I told 
 another tarradiddle — a pious one this time — 
 and said I had seen nothing. 
 
 Then she told me the story.
 
 205 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 A pretty little idyl with a tragical ending. 
 A penniless ward, a fond mother, a handsome 
 son, a country-house. Put these simple ele- 
 ments into the kaleidoscope of Fortune and 
 shake them up. Shake them how you will, 
 but one thing always comes — love. Either 
 the boy loves the girl, or the girl loves the 
 boy, or both love each other. Either the 
 mother approves or she disapproves. The 
 end is marriage, or it is separation and un- 
 happiness. Our novelists are right in making 
 their tales turn all upon love, because there 
 is nothing else in life worth fighting for or 
 having. 
 
 This time the story was very simple. The 
 young man went soldiering for a few years, 
 as all young men of birth and fortune should. 
 He left at home his widowed mother and the 
 girl, her ward, who lived with her — a sweet 
 child of affectionate nature, who loved him 
 like an elder brother. From time to time he 
 got home on leave. The girl growing from
 
 THE OLD FOUR-rOSTER. 269 
 
 childhood into maidenhood the while. Then 
 his regiment went to India, he with it. The 
 ladies lived at home, and occupied them- 
 selves with their poor, with their books, 
 with such little society as the neighbour- 
 hood offered. Mostly they talked about their 
 loved one in India. 
 
 The day came when the regiment came 
 back aeain. Then Charles sold out and re- 
 turned to his paternal acres, having had 
 enough of military life. He came home 
 handsomer than ever, and kinder to the 
 mother whose prayers had followed him for 
 so long. 
 
 He returned in June, when the summer 
 was beginning. It was only a week after he 
 came home that he made a discovery. You 
 may guess what it was. He found out for 
 the first time that Clara Swinford was not 
 his sister, and he informed her that they had 
 been having a great make-believe all these 
 years, because he was not her brother.
 
 270 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 She replied that she knew It very well 
 — but that she always loved him like a 
 brother. 
 
 He asked her how, having no brothers, 
 she could pretend to understand what sisterly 
 affection meant. 
 
 She said she guessed. 
 
 Then he began to ask her what kind of 
 affection she had for him. Did she think a 
 good deal about him ? 
 
 She said yes. 
 
 It appeared here, on close examination of 
 the narrator, that this duologue had ■ been 
 overheard by the narrator's father, the old 
 serving-man whose apparition I had seen. 
 He was so delighted to find that Master 
 Charles and Miss Clara were cominsf to an 
 understandinq- that he listened for more. 
 
 Did she further think about herself in 
 connection with him ? The question was 
 difficult to answer, and required explanation. 
 Did she, then, act, dress, and speak in some
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 2"]! 
 
 measure according to what she thought he 
 would approve ? 
 
 Then she blushed, and said she certainly 
 did. 
 
 Did she ever think about his getting 
 married to some other person ? 
 
 She blushed again, and said she could not 
 bear to think of it. 
 
 Then, her questioner went on, did she not 
 see that sisters do not regard brothers in that 
 way, and that she was nothing better than a 
 little goose ? ♦ 
 
 She laughed at this and inquired why she 
 was a little goose ? Master Charles, in 
 answer to this, took her in both his arms and 
 whispered in her ears for two minutes. 
 Then he kissed her on both cheeks and on 
 the lips ; then she tried to get away from 
 him, but he held her hands and would not let 
 her go till she kissed him in return. And 
 then, while she cried and blushed and laughed, 
 he kissed both her hands and she ran away.
 
 272 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 This was in the garden. 
 
 The sole witness of this interview held 
 his peace, but he was not surprised to hear 
 a day or two afterwards, from Lady Alice, 
 that Master Charles and Miss Clara were 
 engaged. 
 
 The marriage was to take place in August. 
 
 Why go on with the pitiful story ? 
 
 He was fond of fishing and sailing. He 
 came to this inn, the nearest place where he 
 could keep a boat and find a man to take 
 care of it. Sometimes he slept in the place 
 for a night when he was going out in the 
 early morning. 
 
 It was a week before the wedding that he 
 came for the last time. 
 
 At four, when the day was breaking, he 
 sailed out of the little port, he and his boat- 
 maii. 
 
 They brought him back as I saw. 
 
 His mother went home and sat looking 
 into space with a shattered mind and a
 
 THE OLD FOUR-POSTER. 273 
 
 broken heart for a few months. Then she 
 died. Her religion was gone. How could 
 Heaven kill so good a son, so good a man ? 
 Her hope was utterly gone. Even her 
 sympathy was gone — for she could not feel 
 for the bereavement of Clara Swinford. 
 
 So she died, and Clara Swinford was left 
 alone. She never put off her black silk ; she 
 never laughed, and never smiled. Her face 
 which had been so rosy, so bright, so 
 wreathed with smiles, so sunny with happi- 
 ness, was set pale and grave. She was kind 
 to every one, as she always had been ; she 
 was ready as ever to sympathize with every 
 one's sorrow. But she lived alone. And, 
 in solitude and sorrow, her life slowly wasted 
 away. What a sad ending to a morning so 
 bright and sunlit ! In that dark street of 
 tombs, where rest the young who should have 
 lived to be old, where lie the early dead 
 who by their death killed joy and bright- 
 ness out of the lives of those who loved 
 
 VOL. I. T
 
 2 74 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 them, what more sorrowful tomb is there 
 than the marble cross by the ruined abbey, 
 beneath which lie the coffins of Charles and 
 Clara ?
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 
 
 The following experience occurred to me 
 some years ago, when I was an under- 
 graduate at Oxford. The college to which 
 I belonged was of great antiquity and of the 
 highest respectability. It had a creditable 
 habit of turning out good men : it also 
 enjoyed a considerable celebrity for good 
 dinners, good whist, a geometrical bridge, a 
 curious sun-dial, and an admirable collection 
 of books. 
 
 There was one object in one of the up- 
 stair rooms of the library that, from my 
 earliest acquaintance with it, had fascinated
 
 276 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 me. And so great was its influence over me, 
 that whenever I was in that room alone I 
 could not hunt about from one dusty worm- 
 eaten oak bookshelf to another for the 
 volume I was in search of, but I must always 
 go and set myself opposite that object. 
 
 An old case, five feet nine inches high, 
 not counting the pedestal it stood upon ; 
 rather clumsily made by some rough carpen- 
 ter of elm wood, a wood supposed in country- 
 side lore to have peculiar preservative 
 properties. The sides and back of this case 
 were very much worm-eaten ; it might be 
 two hundred years old — it might be thre€. 
 The front was closed by a door hanging on 
 stout brass hinges, with a glass panel its 
 whole length. This door enclosed a skeleton. 
 
 The skeleton — to speak by the card — of 
 one who had been a woman. 
 
 In earlier days the college had boasted 
 some celebrity in medicine, and had sup- 
 plied the University with more than one
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 277 
 
 Regius professor of physic. I had not the 
 least doubt in my own mind, arguing from 
 the known dates of our Regius professors 
 teaching in the Schools, and the apparent 
 date of the case and its unpleasant en- 
 closure, that the bones were articulated at 
 the cost either of the college or of one of 
 these gentlemen for the purposes of illus- 
 trating anatomical lectures. 
 
 Tradition in the college, however, chose 
 to assign a different origin to the deposit of 
 the case in the library. 
 
 The generally received story ran that, 
 nobody knew how many years before, a 
 murder had been done within the walls of 
 the college, which had stirred the Oxford 
 of the day to the marrow. 
 
 It was a crime of the foulest and most 
 unnatural kind it is possible to conceive : 
 the murder of an undergraduate by a bed- 
 maker. 
 
 Now, if the undergraduate had put his
 
 278 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 bed-maker out of the way an excuse might 
 possibly have been proved for the act ; but 
 this was kilHng the goose that laid the golden 
 eggs with a vengeance. Bed-makers as a 
 race have grown wiser since the time of 
 Mrs. Oyston, for the legend went so far as 
 to assign the name of Oyston to the per- 
 petrator of the deed. The name of the 
 undergraduate is not mentioned in this 
 history, neither was any adequate motive 
 suggested for the crime, but a particular set 
 of rooms was pointed out as having been 
 the scene of the tragedy, and it was added 
 that the deed was done as he was sleeping 
 in his chair one evening just as the supper 
 bell was rino-insf nine. 
 
 The story was told to every freshman 
 on his first appearance in that particular 
 apartment of the library. There were of 
 course many little variations in the narrative, 
 but substantially the bare facts of the story 
 were as I have stated them.
 
 MY 0\VN EXPERIENCE. 279 
 
 The library was opened for the purpose 
 of taking out and returning books on two 
 days in the week, and on these days our 
 mediaeval bed-maker's remains held quite a 
 levee. Everybody who went into Dr. Smith's 
 room, as the long gallery was called where 
 the skeleton hung, opened the glass door 
 of the case, and gave the wires from which 
 the skull was suspended a playful shake. 
 Impressionable young men made some allu- 
 sion to the ghastly details of the tragedy, 
 budding divines probably moralized on the 
 uncertainty of life, the student of Shake- 
 speare touched the worn skull, put his fingers 
 to his nose, and said " Pah ! " Medical stu- 
 dents took the opportunity of displaying a 
 little college learning. 
 
 Now, this sort of thing had been going 
 in term time, two days a week, for between 
 sixty and ninety generations of undergradu- 
 ates, and must have been perfectly intoler- 
 able to the skeleton whose bones had fairly
 
 28o FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 earned repose even if they had slaughtered 
 a don. 
 
 I came to quite sympathize with the skele- 
 ton ; and in the librarian I found a man of 
 the same way of thinking as myself. 
 
 I must describe him. He was nicknamed 
 the "Tame Elephant." His build was ex- 
 traordinarily short, stout, and square ; his 
 muscular strength, as those who had seen 
 him throw the hammer or put the weight 
 knew, was enormous. But with this Atlas- 
 like frame was found a very amiable and 
 docile character. To this union of qualities 
 he owed his sobriquet. His habits were 
 unpleasant, for he did not love his tub, and 
 was for ever changing his religion. He 
 inclines to Buddhism now, I believe, after 
 running the whole round of creeds. He 
 was at the time of which I am writing a 
 great walker, a great tippler of beer, and a 
 very great smoker. If you were out for a 
 walk, and a huge figure swung suddenly
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 28 1 
 
 round a corner, book in hand, and nearly- 
 knocked you down ; if you were startled 
 by somebody bursting through a hedge, or 
 fell over something lying reading in your 
 path, it was always the Tame Elephant. 
 If a light was burning at three in the morn- 
 ing in a room adjoining the library, it was 
 the Elephant still at his studies. And his 
 reading was of two sorts. He devoured 
 fiction in English, in German, in French : 
 his memory was prodigious, and he could 
 spout forth pages of Scott or Goethe or 
 Rabelais without a verbal mistake. But this 
 was his recreation. His work was poring 
 over the pages of every book on the Super- 
 natural he could lay his large dirty hands 
 on. His knowledge of the University books 
 had obtained for him the post of librarian, to 
 which a scholarship of some sixty or seventy 
 pounds a year was attached. 
 
 A common purpose made us friends. He 
 had determined to penetrate the mystery of
 
 282 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 the case in his charge. For Wottenham 
 averred that at dead of night, as he lay in 
 his bedroom, he could distinctly hear foot- 
 steps in the library adjoining. 
 
 Whose footsteps ? 
 
 Presumably those of the ghost of the 
 skeleton in case. 
 
 We determined to discover for ourselves. 
 It was November, and a wild night; the 
 wind blew — as it usually does in the intro- 
 duction to ghostly narratives — in frightful 
 gusts. The inise en scene was perfectly 
 appropriate. We were alone, I and the 
 Elephant, in his keeping-room. He had 
 drunk his usual after-dinner draughts of beer 
 and had smoked several pipes from a huge 
 meerschaum, the bowl of which was fashioned 
 into a death's head, with superimposed cross- 
 bones. We were in the oldest part of the 
 oldest quadrangle of the college, where on 
 the Smoothly shaven grass plot ghosts might 
 be expected to run about like rabbits under 
 proper elementary conditions.
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 283 
 
 Our minds were duly prepared for manifes- 
 tations by having previously — that is, between 
 dinner and half-past eight o'clock — held an 
 amateur sdance in the Elephant's rooms, at 
 which the manifestations had been remark- 
 able. We are both firm believers in the 
 supernatural. The key was in the door that 
 communicated with the library to which we 
 were about to turn our steps, and we were 
 impatiently waiting for the supper bell to 
 ring nine. 
 
 " Two minutes," said Wottenham, pulling 
 out his watch, and puffing the last and 
 sweetest cloud from his pipe. 
 
 " Only two," I replied. 
 
 Two minutes of silence. The steps of 
 the old porter crossing the quadrangle to the 
 bell tower in the screens. 
 
 Tweak, tweak, tweak. Then the bell rang 
 out loud and long as it had rung out for 
 several centuries at the same time, the only 
 remnant now of a once, doubtless, substantial 
 supper.
 
 284 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 With the first sounds we rose and ad- 
 vanced to the Hbrarian's door, as the oak 
 planks that shut us out from Dr. Smith's 
 room were called. 
 
 The key turned with difficulty, being 
 seldom used. 
 
 Wottenham struggled with it, I followed 
 and held a candle. His huge wrist and 
 sinewy fingers soon turned the key in the 
 wards ; he put his foot against the door, and 
 it opened with a bang. Rather, perhaps, 
 with a dull, hollow, resonant boom ; the 
 sound the drop makes when it falls under 
 a man's feet at Newgate. I, who am 
 nervous and excitable, started at the unex- 
 pected noise. 
 
 Wottenham, whose nerves were iron, ad- 
 vanced with his usual rolling gait three or 
 four paces into the dark room, through whose 
 blindless, ivy-shaded windows only a faint 
 glimmer from the quadrangle lamp pene- 
 trated on a dark night. Suddenly he turned
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 285 
 
 round, quickly for him, and raither irritably 
 snatched the candle from my hand. He 
 flung it from him, sending it literally spin- 
 ning into the room we had just left. The 
 candle fell on his bed, the stick into his water- 
 jug. I had time to reflect that the Elephant 
 was not a person of nice tastes, and to 
 wonder if, being athirst in the night, he 
 would take a swig, as usual, from his jug — 
 of water and tallow. * Better without a 
 light ! ' he growled, sotto voce, in his stomach- 
 bass. 
 
 " You're not afraid ? " 
 
 Gold would not in my then ^Cate of mind 
 have tempted me a step further by myself. 
 But I had for company a modern Atlas, and 
 therefore managed to reply with some show 
 of spirit — 
 
 "All that man d^re." 
 
 " All right ; come on ! " He turned round, 
 and I could see the white of his face, and 
 his ijiot too clean shirt.
 
 286 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 I supposed I lagged. We had half the 
 length of the long gallery to walk ; and our 
 footfalls on the oaken planks sounded un- 
 earthly in the solitude and more than half 
 darkness of Dr. Smith's library. 
 
 Wottenham, leaning towards me and 
 groping, said — 
 
 " Give me your hand," and took my long 
 thin fingers in his stout grasp. 
 
 There is great courage in a strong grip. 
 
 We advanced towards the case ; and the 
 only light from the quadrangle lamp fell full 
 on it. 
 
 We were both looking at it, into it, through 
 it, of course. 
 
 I seized his huge hand convulsively. 
 
 The wires were trembling, the bones 
 shaking, the jaws grinning. 
 
 "We are shaking the old floor," said the 
 librarian coolly. " The bones rattle ! " 
 
 "No — not — through — us!" I said in a 
 whisper.
 
 ., MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 287 
 
 The bell had just ceased ringing. 
 
 " Wait ! " said Wottenham. 
 
 " Hark ! " we both said together. 
 
 The steps, beginning by the master's lodge, 
 came nearer and nearer, louder and louder. 
 
 They were close to us. 
 
 The bones in the case danced a mad and 
 unearthly dance in their prison. 
 
 Our eyes, accustomed to the light, saw 
 clearly. And the steps — the ghostly foot- 
 steps — walked round and round the case — 
 round and round us ! 
 
 Believer as I was, and prepared to find 
 myself face to face with the supernatural, I 
 trembled in every limb. 
 
 " Spirit," said Wottenham, "you are here \" 
 
 We paused for a reply. None came ; but 
 the footfalls ceased. A low whistling noise 
 more awful took their place. 
 
 " We will wait." 
 
 " If you can ease your condition by speak- 
 ing — speak." 
 
 Dead silence.
 
 288 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL.^ 
 
 Then the footfalls again round arid round 
 the case. 
 
 The skeleton preparing a terrible dance — 
 Macabre. 
 
 " Can you make yourself intelligible ? " 
 
 A knock which shook the dust from the 
 elm wood. 
 
 " You can. If we wait you will speak ? " 
 
 Another knock, 
 
 I had abandoned my grasp of Wottenham's 
 hand. I held him tightly round his huge 
 body, and stared with all my eyes at the 
 vibrating bones, and listened with all my ears 
 for what should come. 
 
 "Is your name Oyston ? " asked Wotten- 
 ham.. 
 
 "Patience Clark," replied the Invisible. 
 
 " Is this your skeleton ? " 
 
 " It is." 
 
 " You are condemned to walk this room at 
 night on account of the crime that is con- 
 nected with your name of Oyston ? "
 
 MY OWN EXPERIENCE. 289 
 
 " Nothing of the kind." 
 
 "Did you commit a murder .-* " 
 
 " No." 
 
 " Then there is no truth in the report ? " 
 
 " Not a word. In the flesh I was as 
 peaceable a woman as ever lived, and the 
 mother of eleven children, all alive when I 
 left them." 
 
 " Why do you walk here ? " 
 
 " For two hundred and forty years, good 
 gentlemen, I have been waiting for the 
 opportunity of speaking for myself and clear- 
 ing my character. Now I shall not trouble 
 the college, in which I hope I did my duty, 
 again. I wish you good-night." The bones 
 ceased to vibrate as she spoke. The steps, 
 much softer this time, we heard running off 
 in the direction of the Master's lodge. They 
 went through the thick wall and have never 
 been heard since. Wottenham and I did our 
 duty. We did our best to clear Patience 
 Clark's character, but we never told the 
 
 VOL. I. u
 
 290 FROM THE SUPERNATURAL. 
 
 Story of her interview with us, for the simple 
 reason that unbehef was rampant in Oxford 
 in our time. 
 
 So much of my own experience, as yet 
 my only experience, of being in actual com- 
 munication with the world of spirits. 
 
 The Elephant — who is now a country 
 parson — and I have been bosom friends ever 
 since. But this is the only supernatural tale 
 we have to tell. 
 
 END OF VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET 
 AND CHARING CROSS.
 
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