Part 32 (1/2)

”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.