the mellow autumn months darkened and died slowly into winter. the wild winds that are born in the bitter north blew in stronger and fiercer gusts, and the majestic monotone of the sea grew louder and more triumphant as the huge tides broke in white-lipped wrath against the shuddering sands. there came tidings of fishing boats that never found their way back home, of great ships in the offing that made signals of distress, of dead bodies washed up here and there along the shore. the easterby lifeboat was ever ready to brave the fiercest seas; while miles away across the seething waters, at once a signal of warning and of hope, the ruddy beacon of easterby lighthouse shone clear and steady through the darkest night: it was like the eye of faith shining across the troubled waters of life.
at heron dyke, to all outward seeming, the winter months brought little or no change in the monotony of life within its four grey walls. and yet there were some changes; all of which, unimportant as they might seem if taken singly, had a distinct bearing on events to come. the two housemaids, martha and ann, to whom aaron stone had given warning in his anger at what he called their folly, were not forgiven. they left the hall at the expiration of the month's notice, giving place to two strong young women who came all the way from london; and who, never having been in the country before, were supposed to be superior to the ordinary run of superstitious fancies, which so powerfully affect the rural mind. aaron took care that martha and ann should be clear of the house before phemie and eliza arrived at it: there should be no collusion with the new-comers if he could prevent it.
all went well at first. phemie and eliza felt dull, but were sufficiently comfortable. they had plenty to eat, and little to do. not having been told that the hall was supposed to be haunted, to them the north wing was the same as any other part of the house, and they neither saw nor heard anything to frighten them. the deaf and stolid cook kept herself, as usual, to herself, and said nothing. indeed, it may be concluded that she had nothing to say. had a whole army of apparitions placed themselves in a row before her at the "witching hour o' night," it would not have affected her; she utterly despised them, and the belief that could put faith in them.
old aaron chuckled at the success of his new arrangements.
"we shall be bothered with no more cock-and-bull stories about grisly ghosts now," thought he.
but, though the new maids were safe enough from hearing gossip inside the house, they were not out of it. aaron, however good his will might be, could not keep them within for ever: they must go to church, they must go into the town; they claimed, although strangers in the place, a half-holiday now and then. and the first half-holiday that phemie had, something came of it.
the girl made the best of her way to nullington. small though the town was, it had its shops; and shops have a wonderful fascination for the female heart. into one and into another went phemie, making acquaintance with this vendor of wares and with that. mysterious things were talked of; and when she got back to the hall at night, she had a rare budget of strange news to tell eliza.
the hall was haunted. at least, the north wing of it was. a young woman. miss winter's maid, had mysteriously disappeared in it one night last winter, and had never been heard of since. the two previous housemaids had been nearly terrified out of their wits afterwards. they had heard doors clash after dark that were never shut by mortal hands; they had heard a voice that sobbed and sighed along the passages at midnight; and they had been once awakened by a strange tapping at their bedroom door, as if some one were seeking to come in. more dreadful than all, they had seen the deathlike face of the missing girl staring down at them over the balusters of the gallery in the great entrance-hall: and it was for being frightened at this, for speaking of it, they were turned away!--which was shamefully unjust. all this disquieting news, with the observations made on it, had mistress phemie contrived to pick up in the course of one afternoon's shopping, and to bring home to eliza.
the two servants had now plenty to talk about in the privacy of their own room, and talk they did; but they were wise enough at present to keep their own counsel, and to wait with a sort of dread expectancy for what time might bring forth. would they hear strange sobbings and sighings in the night? would a ghostly face stare suddenly out upon them from behind some dark corner when they least expected it? the dull depths of these girls' minds were stirred as they had never been stirred before. they half hoped and wholly dreaded the happening of something--they knew not what.
meanwhile they began to go timorously about the house, to shun the north wing most carefully after dark, and to keep together after candles were lighted. old aaron, silently watching, was not slow to mark these signs and tokens, though he took no outward notice. while his wife dorothy, watching also in her superstitious fear, drew in her mind the conclusion that the girls were being disturbed as the other two girls had been.
it fell out one afternoon, about three weeks after phemie had brought her strange tidings from nullington, that eliza was sent to the town on an errand by her mistress, mrs. stone: for, to all intents and purposes, dorothy stone acted as the women-servants' mistress, whether miss winter might be in the house, or whether she was out of it. eliza was later in starting than she ought to have been, and she was longer doing her errands--for she took the opportunity to make purchases on her own account--and it was dusk before she turned back to heron dyke. it was a pleasant evening, cold but dry, with the stars coming out one after another, as she went quickly along the quiet country road, thinking of her mother and sisters far away. she turned into the park by the lodge on the easterby road, stopping for a couple of minutes' gossip with mrs. tilney, the gardener's wife. how pleasant and homelike the little lodge looked, eliza thought, full of ruddy firelight, for hannah tilney would not light the lamp till her husband should arrive. the elder girl was making toast for her father's tea, the younger one was hushing her doll to sleep, while mrs. tilney herself was setting out the tea-cups, and the kettle was singing on the hob--all awaiting the return of the good husband and father.
bidding the lodge goodnight, eliza went on her way. it was quite dark by this time, and although the hour was early she did not much like her lonely walk through the park. she was not used to the country, and the solitude frightened her a little; fancy whispering that a tramp might be lurking behind every tree. she pictured to herself the light and bustle of london streets, and was sorry she had left them. leaving the carriage-drive to the right when she got within two or three hundred yards of the hall, she turned into a shrubbery that led to the servants' entrance. it did seem very lonely here, and she hurried on, glancing timidly from right to left, her heart beating a little faster than ordinary.
suddenly a low scream burst from her lips. a dark figure, emerging from behind a clump of evergreens, stood full in her path, and placed its hand on her arm. eliza stood still; she had no other choice; and trembled as she had never trembled before. it was a woman: she could see that much now.
"won't you please let me speak with you?" cried a gentle voice, which somehow served to reassure eliza.
"my patience!" cried she, anger bubbling up in the reaction of feeling, "how came you to frighten me like that? i was thinking of--of--all kinds of startling things. what do you want?"
"you are one of the new maids at the hall," rejoined the figure, in low, beseeching accents, "and i have been trying for weeks to get to speak to you."
"who are you?--and what do you want with me?" demanded eliza.
"i am susan keen."
"susan keen," repeated the servant, not remembering at the moment why the name should seem familiar to her. "well, i don't know you, if you are."
"my sister lived at the hall, miss winter's maid, and she disappeared in her bedroom one night last winter," went on poor susan, with a kind of sob. "it was full of mystery. even mr. kettle says that."
"oh yes, to be sure," cordially replied eliza, her sympathies aroused now. "poor katherine keen! yes. what _did_ become of her?"
susan shook her head. it was a question no one could answer.
"i want you to help me to find out," she whispered.
the avowal struck eliza with a sort of alarm.
"good gracious!" she cried.
"i want you to help me to find some traces of her--my poor lost sister," continued susan--"some clue to the mystery of her fate----"
"but what could _i_ do, even if i were willing?" interrupted the housemaid.
"you are inside the house, i am outside," replied susan, with a sob. "your chances are greater than mine. oh, won't you help me? at any moment, when least expected, some link might show itself; the merest accident, as mother says, might put us on the right track. have you no pity for her?"
"i've a great deal of pity for her; i never heard so strange and pitiful a tale in all my life," was the reply. "phemie was told all about it when she went into nullington. but, you know, she may not be dead."
"she is dead," shivered susan. "oh, believe that. i am as sure of it as that we two are standing here. at first i didn't believe she was dead; i couldn't: but now that the months have gone on, and on, i feel that there's no hope. if she were alive she would not fail to let us know it to ease our sorrow--all this while! katherine was more loving and thoughtful than you can tell."
"it's said she had no sweetheart: or else----" eliza was beginning. but the other went on, never hearing.
"if she were not dead, she would not come to me so often in my dreams--and she's always dead in them. and, look here," added the girl, in awed tones, drawing a step nearer, and gently pressing against eliza's arm: "i wish some one could tell me why her hair is always wet when she appears. i can see water dripping from the ends of it."
eliza shuddered, and glanced involuntarily around.
"sometimes she calls me as if from a distance, and then i awake," resumed susan. "she wants me to find her--i know that; but i never can, though i am looking for her continually."
"this poor thing must be crazed," thought the bewildered woman-servant.
"and i've fancied that you might help me. i've come about here at night, wanting to see you, and ask you, for ever so long. you can watch, and look, and listen when you are going about your work in the house, and perhaps you will come upon her, or some trace of her."
"good mercy! you surely can't think she is _in_ the house!" exclaimed eliza.
"i am sure she's in it."
"what--dead?"
"she must be dead. she can't be alive--all these weary weeks and months."
"i never heard of such a belief," cried eliza. "what it is that's thought--leastways, as it has been told to me and my fellow-servant, phemie--is, that it is her spirit that is in the house, and haunts it."
"her spirit does haunt it," affirmed poor susan. "but she is there too."
eliza felt as if a rush of cold air were passing over her.
"something wrong was done to her; she was killed in some way; and i'd sooner think it was by a woman than a man," went on susan, dreamily. "it all happened in the north wing. and then they carried her away for concealment to one of the dark unused rooms in it, and left her there, shut up--perhaps for ever. that's how it must have been."
"dear me!" gasped eliza, hardly knowing, in her dismay, whether this was theory or fact.
"and so if you could watch, and come upon any clue, and would kindly bring it to us, me and mother, we'd be ever grateful. perhaps you know our inn--the 'leaning gate'--as you go from here to nullington."
"stay a moment," said eliza, a thought striking her: "does your mother think all this that you've been telling me?--does she want me to watch?"
"mother does not know i've come to you, or that i've ever had thought of coming, else she might have stopped me," answered the girl candidly, for poor susan keen was truth itself. "but she knows katherine must be in the house, dead or alive; she says that. good-evening, and thank you, and i'm sorry i startled you."
she walked away at a swift pace. eliza looked after her for a moment, and then ran home shivering, not daring to glance to the right or to the left.
when the last fine days of autumn were over and the cold weather was fairly set in, squire denison had ceased to drive out in his brougham, and was seen no more beyond the suite of rooms that were set apart for his personal use. early in november, his lawyer, mr. daventry, was sent for, and received certain final instructions respecting his will.
about the same time a fresh inmate came to heron dyke, and took up her abode there for the time being. the person in question was a certain mrs. dexter, a professional nurse, who had been sent for from london by dr. jago's express desire. she was a plain-looking middle-aged woman, whose manners and address were superior to her station in life. a woman of few words, she seldom spoke except when some one put a question to her. she went quietly and deftly about her duties, and employed all her spare time in reading. a sitting-room was allotted her next mr. denison's, and she never mixed with the servants. no one at the hall, unless it was hubert stone, knew that mrs. dexter was an elder sister of dr. jago's wife. it might be that the treatment pursued by that undoubtedly clever practitioner, and which at present seemed to succeed, was of too hazardous a nature to be entrusted to, or witnessed by, an ordinary nurse.
then came another movement. within a few days of mrs. dexter's arrival at the hall, the carpenter, shalders, was sent for from nullington. receiving his orders, he proceeded to put up two doors covered with green baize, one in each of the corridors leading to mr. denison's rooms. the household wondered much; the neighbourhood talked; for shalders had a tongue, and did not keep the measure a secret. it was to ensure himself more quiet that the squire had had it done, said shalders. day and night these doors were kept locked. four people only, each of whom had a pass-key, were allowed to penetrate beyond them: dr. jago, mrs. dexter, aaron stone, and hubert. anything that took place on the other side of those mysterious doors was as little known to the rest of the inmates of the hall as if they had been a hundred miles away. in nullington, people could not cease wondering about these baize-covered doors, and were generally of opinion that squire denison was growing more crazy every day.
ella never failed to write to her uncle once a week, and once a week the squire dictated to hubert a few lines of reply. in these notes he always told her his health was improving; that he grew better and stronger. for weeks after he had ceased to leave his own rooms, he wrote to ella--in his unselfishness, let us suppose--about his drives out, and how the fresh crisp winter air seemed to give him strength. ella expressed a strong desire to be back at home by new year's day; but the squire's answer to her request, while kind, was yet so peremptory in tone that she was afraid to mention the subject again. he told her she was not to make herself uneasy about him, and that, now she was abroad, she had better enjoy herself, and see everything that was worth seeing: when he wanted her back at the hall he would not fail to send for her, but till that time she had better continue on her travels. if the body of the letter seemed hard to ella, there was no lack of loving messages at its end.
"you are always in my thoughts," he wrote. "i see your face in the firelight; i hear the rustle of your dress behind my chair; half a dozen times a day i could swear that i heard you singing in the next room. when you come back to me in spring, my darling, i will never let you go away again."
to ella his letters would read almost like a contradiction. he could write thus, evidently pining for her, and yet would not allow her to return. she comforted herself with the reassurance that he must be better. not the faintest hint was given to her in any one of the letters that mrs. dexter, a sick-nurse, had taken up her abode at heron dyke.
hubert stone received several private notes from ella, asking for full and special information respecting the state of her uncle's health. the writer of them little thought how they were treasured up and covered with kisses. to each of them hubert wrote a few guarded lines of reply, confirming the general tenour of mr. denison's own letters. miss winter, he said, had no cause for uneasiness: mr. denison was certainly stronger than he had been for two years past. a few old friends of the squire called at the hall occasionally and inquired respecting his health. now and again he would see one or other of them for a few minutes, and talk away as if nothing were the matter with him.
but after the middle of december no visitors of any kind were admitted. they were told that the squire was much as usual, but that his medical man, dr. jago, enjoined perfect quiet as indispensable to him. when dr. spreckley heard this, he differed completely.
"i always told mr. denison that he ought to see more company than he did," said spreckley. "he wanted rousing more out of himself. the sight of a fresh face and a little lively conversation never failed to do him good."
it was a marvel to dr. spreckley that the squire still lived. he wondered much what treatment was being pursued, not believing that any treatment known to him could keep him in life; he marvelled at other things.
"hang it all!" cried the doctor one day to himself. "i can't see daylight in it. shut up in his rooms from people's sight; green-baize doors put up to keep out the household! what does it mean? are they treating him to a course of slow poisons? upon my word, if it were not that the object is to keep the squire in life, i should think there was a conspiracy to send him out of it, and that they don't want to be watched at their work. but it is a strange thing that he yet lives."
that was, to dr. spreckley, the strangest thing of all. morning after morning, as he arose, did he expect to hear the news of the squire's death; but winter wore on, and the old year died out, and still the tidings came not. dr. spreckley marvelled more and more; but he said nothing to anybody.
