The Haunted Homestead Part 32

"Dead people."

"The Lord betune us and harm!"

"Hush, honey! Don't let on! We's gwine 'way; but de family don't want it should be known as dey leave for sich a cause."

"I unnerstans! The saints betune us an' sin!"

A few days after this conversation Mr. Ferguson's family left the Willow Cottage; and the excitement of the neighborhood upon the subject of the haunted homestead received a tremendous impetus. As it had been once visited from motives of incredulous curiosity, it was now avoided in the spirit of superst.i.tious dread. It was believed to be unlucky to the visitor. All the worst rumors about the former proprietors were revived and credited. It was said that a curse rested upon the house where marriage faith and friends.h.i.+p's trust and hospitality's laws had each in succession been basely betrayed--upon the house of three reputed murders!

Only Mrs. Hawkins stoutly stood up for the defense of the Willow Cottage.

"Three murders! nonsense! three stage plays! The doctor's young wife fretted herself into illness, and died of heart disease, poor thing. She was not, therefore, murdered. The old doctor himself lived to a good age and died in a fit. Was he murdered? I guess the coroner's jury knew! The unhappy young man Keats lost his life in a sinful revel--a warning to all youth. What guilt, then, rests upon the comfortable home and beautiful garden? Did they suggest wine-bibbing and brawling? Pshaw! I am ashamed of people's want of logic. Only wait until my term is up here, and then see if I do not move into the house, and stay in it, too!"

This decision of Mrs. Hawkins produced different effects upon each of her family. I for my own part had a natural turn for melodramatic heroism--admired Joan of Arc, Margaret of Norway, Philippa of Hainault, and all the lion-hearted, eagle-eyed, battle-ax heroines--and wished for the opportunity of imitating them. I had an aspiring, courageous spirit, but weak nerves; and so I stoutly seconded the move to move, though my heart quailed at the idea of our living alone in the haunted house.

Ally's trust in her grandmother was so perfect that she resigned herself in confidence to her decision.

The old negroes were possessed with the direst fore-bodings, but feeling that it would be vain to remonstrate, only shook their heads and muttered something to the effect that "old mist'ess'" confidence in herself would be sure to have a check some day.

Mrs. Hawkins was as good as her word. She began in her steady, energetic way to tie up parcels and pack boxes of such things as were not in daily use, in antic.i.p.ation of moving. There was no compet.i.tion for the possession of the deserted mansion. Mrs. Hawkins engaged it at a very moderate rate of rent.

And upon the 31st of October--the ghostly anniversary of Hallow E'en--a day ever to be remembered, we began our removal to the haunted house.

It was a dark, overcast day.

Mrs. Hawkins, who seldom stopped for weather, was anxious to get all her effects safely housed before the rain, or at least before night. So, very early in the morning, accompanied by Alice and attended by old Hector, she drove over to Willow Cottage to have fires lighted in the damp house, and to receive and dispose of the furniture as it should arrive.

Myself and Will Rackaway, who came to help me and old Ca.s.sy, remained in charge of the house to dispatch the furniture. It was a hard day's work, I a.s.sure you. And as the twilight hours pa.s.sed the sky grew darker, and the air damper and colder. A gloomier and more depressing day could scarcely be imagined.

It was nearly night when at length we dispatched the last cartload of effects, locked up the house, and got into the old carryall that had returned for us. Old Ca.s.sy sat with me on the back seat, and old Hector, who drove for us, sat beside Will Rackaway, in front. The rain was now falling in a fine, slow drizzle. Perhaps it was the dark and heavy atmosphere, fatigue, and the approach of night, that so oppressed my spirits, but I well remember the feeling of gloom and terror with which I crossed the highway and entered upon the gra.s.s-grown and shadowy road, through the thicket that led to Willow Cottage. It was a very dark and silent scene--no sight but the trees, that, like lower and heavier clouds, met and hung over our heads; no sound but the stealthy, m.u.f.fled turn of the wheels over the wet and fallen leaves.

"The road to the haunted house is a very ghostly one! I think, for my part, Mark Tapley would have found this a fine place to get jolly in,"

said Will, twisting his head around to look at me.

But he had quickly to recall his attention, for his first words had so upset the equanimity of our driver that he had allowed his horse to run full tilt into the trees. Will seized the reins from the shaking hands of old Hector and soon righted the carryall.

At last we emerged from the thicket, and saw dimly the great open area girdled with its pine forest, of which I have already spoken.

Only like a denser group of shadow was the old Willow Cottage, in the midst of its ancient trees, in the center of that open s.p.a.ce.

We followed the road through the broom sedge across the field until we drew up at the rusty iron gate of the cottage.

There we alighted, and, leaving old Hector to drive the carryall around to the stable door, we entered and went up the long gra.s.s-grown walk between the black oaks, until we reached the house.

The doors and window blinds were all closed, and the faint light within gleamed fitfully through the c.h.i.n.ks where the framework was warped.

The front door was not locked, and we entered at once into the hall that ran parallel with the front of the house, and formed, in fact, a sort of anteroom to the large parlor that lay behind it. From this hall, besides the central door before us that led into the parlor, there was a door on the right hand and one on the left, leading into the side bedchambers in the wings; and by the side of the right-hand door, nearer the front wall, was the staircase leading up to the large chamber in the gable end, that was lighted and ventilated by that fan-shaped window seen in the front of the house over the portico.

We pa.s.sed through the hall, and through the large, empty parlor behind it, and entered the long dining-room in the rear.

There we found Mrs. Hawkins and Alice awaiting us among the piled-up furniture.

"You look tired and out of spirits, Madeleine. You must have worked harder than we did."

"How have you got on?" I inquired.

"Why, we have arranged the bedchambers and the kitchen--that is all. We have left the dining-room and parlor and hall to be put to rights to-morrow. But Hector has got the supper ready, and set the table in the kitchen; let us go in there; it is warmer. Come, girls--come, Will."

As I before mentioned, the kitchen, pantry, laundry and servants' rooms were in a building behind the dwelling-house, not joined to it, but standing back to back with it at a distance of three feet. So we had to go out of doors to enter the kitchen.

I remember even now the sense of comfort I experienced on entering that cozy room. It was a stone room, with a great fireplace, in which blazed a fine fire, a wide, high dresser, upon which shone, tier upon tier, rows of bright metal and clean crockeryware; in the middle of the floor was an inviting table, upon which smoked an abundant supper.

"Ah!" said Will, with an appreciating glance at the board; "thus fortified, we can meet the enemy!"

"Can you spend the night with us, Will?" inquired Mrs. Hawkins.

"Oh, no! must return; mother doesn't know I'm out!" replied the youth.

Accordingly, after supper Will prepared to take his leave of us.

"Before you go, Will, I wish you to take Hector and the lantern and go over every foot of the grounds, and all along the walks, to see that everything is safe here," said our grandmother.

"Of course, of course, n.o.ble lady! Order the seneschal and the luminary, and I will reconnoitre the state of the fortifications!" said Will, as he b.u.t.toned up his coat.

By the time he had drawn on his gloves Hector appeared at the door with the lantern, and they sallied forth. I looked through an end window, and found strange amus.e.m.e.nt in watching the progress of that lantern up one shadowy walk and down another, and along the hedged wall, until at last it approached the house. Will entered, speaking gayly.

"Well, Lady Hawkins, I have reconnoitred the defenses, and found them in an excellent condition! The wall is strong, the hedge on the inside is high, and that upon the outerside sharp. The enemy could not attempt to scale without such damage to cuticle from the one, and bone from the others, as no enemy endowed with 'the better part of valor' would risk.

All is quiet within the garrison; and if you will send the warden to lock the gate after me, I think the castle will be impregnable for the night."

Hector once more received orders to attend the young master, who now bade us good-night and left the house.

Meanwhile, Ca.s.sy had washed up the supper service and restored the kitchen to order. So that when old Hector returned from his errand, bearing the key of the gate, nothing remained for us to do but examine and close the house, offer up our evening wors.h.i.+p, and go to bed, which, as it was very late and we were very tired, we prepared to do at once.

After every room was visited, and every door and window firmly secured, we went to the dining-room for family prayer, and then let Ca.s.sy and Hector out, and gave them the key to lock the door on the outside, so that they might be able to let themselves in in the morning to light the fires without disturbing us. After having thus dismissed them, closed the door, and heard it locked, we turned to seek our rest.

"I do not consider these lower bedrooms quite dry and safe just at present, girls; so I have had two beds made up in the room overhead, which is large and well ventilated. Alice can sleep with me in the large bed, and you, Madeleine, can occupy the other," said our grandmother, as she led the way upstairs.

I did not quite like the arrangement, but could not resist Mrs. Hawkins.

The upper room, notwithstanding the fact of its being in the roof, was amply high and large enough for a healthful, double-bedded chamber. Our beds stood parallel, but sufficiently far apart, with their heads against the north, or back wall, and their feet toward the front gable, lighted by the fan-shaped window aforesaid. As it was very damp and chill, and we were very much exhausted, we did not linger long over our final preparations, but went speedily to bed.

Our grandmother and Alice seemed scarcely to have settled themselves under their blankets and given me a drowsy good-night when they slid off into the land of dreams.

I could not sleep! I seldom can the first night in a strange house, and this was--such a house! I felt quite alone--as much alone as if the heavy sleepers in the next bed were a thousand miles away, for farther still in spirit were they. I thought of the isolated situation of the house we were in; of the crimes, real or reputed, that had stained its hearthstone; of the superst.i.tious terror attaching to the haunted place; of the hard facts that three several families, not reputed less wise or brave than their neighbors, had been driven from the spot by supernatural disturbance as yet unexplained; of the coincidence that this dreary night was the ghostly Hallow E'en; then of the superst.i.tion that spirits, when they wish to appear to only one in a room, have the power of casting all others into a profound sleep, from which the haunted one cannot awake them; and of isolating their victim from all the natural world--even from the very bedfellow by their side. The room was very dark and still--solid blackness and dead silence. It oppressed me like a nightmare. At last, when my senses grew accustomed to the scenes by straining my eyes, I could dimly perceive beyond the foot of the bed the segment of a circle formed by the fan-light window, that now only seemed a thinner darkness; and, by straining my ears, I could faintly hear the stealthy fall of the drizzling rain. It was almost worse than the first total silence and darkness; for it kept my nerves on a strange _qui vive_ of attention. Presently this was over, too. The m.u.f.fled sound of the drizzling ceased. Yet darker clouds must have lowered over the earth, for the faint outline of the fan-light window was no longer visible. All was once more black darkness and intense silence, and again I felt oppressed almost to suffocation. Welcome now would have been the faint fall of the fine rain or the dim outline of the window. I strained my senses in vain; no sight or sound responded. I felt the silence and the darkness settling like the clods of the ground upon my breast.

Hoo-oo-o!--went something.

Hark! what was that? I thought, starting.