J. S. Le Fanus Ghostly Tales, Volume 3 | Page 2

to save
a little, and perhaps he'll marry; and it is the more creditable, if, as they
say, he dislikes the place, and would prefer staying where he is."
And having spoken thus gently, Mr. Peers resumed his pipe cheerfully.
"No, he don't like the place; that is, I'm told he _didn't_," said the
innkeeper.
"He hates it," said the Doctor with another dark nod.
"And no wonder, if all's true I've heard," cried old Jack Amerald.
"Didn't he drown a woman and her child in the lake?"
"Hollo! my dear boy, don't let them hear you say that; you're all in the
clouds."
"By Jen!" exclaimed the landlord after an alarmed silence, with his
mouth and eyes open, and his pipe in his hand, "why, sir, I pay rent for
the house up there. I'm thankful--dear knows, I am thankful--we're all
to ourselves!"
Jack Amerald put his foot on the floor, leaving his wooden leg in its
horizontal position, and looked round a little curiously.
"Well, if it wasn't him, it was some one else. I'm sure it happened up at
Mardykes. I took the bearings on the water myself from Glads Scaur to
Mardykes Jetty, and from the George and Dragon sign down
here--down to the white house under Forrick Fells. I could fix a buoy
over the very spot. Some one here told me the bearings, I'd take my
oath, where the body was seen; and yet no boat could ever come up

with it; and that was queer, you know, so I clapt it down in my log."
"Ay, sir, there was some flummery like that, Captain," said Turnbull;
"for folk will be gabbin'. But 'twas his grandsire was talked o', not him;
and 'twould play the hangment wi' me doun here, if 'twas thought there
was stories like that passin' in the George and Dragon.'
"Well, his grandfather; 'twas all one to him, I take it."
"There never was no proof, Captain, no more than smoke; and the
family up at Mardykes wouldn't allow the king to talk o' them like that,
sir; for though they be lang deod that had most right to be angered in
the matter, there's none o' the name but would be half daft to think 'twas
still believed, and he full out as mich as any. Not that I need care more
than another, though they do say he's a bit frowsy and short-waisted;
for he can't shouther me out o' the George while I pay my rent, till nine
hundred and ninety-nine year be rin oot; and a man, be he ne'er sa het,
has time to cool before then. But there's no good quarrellin' wi' teathy
folk; and it may lie in his way to do the George mony an ill turn, and
mony a gude one; an' it's only fair to say it happened a long way before
he was born, and there's no good in vexin' him; and I lay ye a pound,
Captain, the Doctor hods wi' me."
The Doctor, whose business was also sensitive, nodded; and then he
said, "But for all that, the story's old, Dick Turnbull--older than you or I,
my jolly good friend."
"And best forgotten," interposed the host of the George.
"Ay, best forgotten; but that it's not like to be," said the Doctor,
plucking up courage. "Here's our friend the Captain has heard it; and
the mistake he has made shows there's one thing worse than its being
quite remembered, and that is, its being half remembered. We can't stop
people talking; and a story like that will see us all off the hooks, and be
in folks' mouths, still, as strong as ever."
"Ay; and now I think on it, 'twas Dick Harman that has the boat down
there--an old tar like myself--that told me that yarn. I was trying for

pike, and he pulled me over the place, and that's how I came to hear it. I
say, Tom, my hearty, serve us out another glass of brandy, will you?"
shouted the Captain's voice as the waiter crossed the room; and that
florid and grizzled naval hero clapped his leg again on the chair by its
wooden companion, which he was wont to call his jury-mast.
"Well, I do believe it will be spoke of longer than we are like to hear,"
said the host, "and I don't much matter the story, if it baint told o' the
wrong man." Here he touched his tumbler with the spoon, indicating by
that little ring that Tom, who had returned with the Captain's grog, was
to replenish it with punch. "And Sir Bale is like to be a friend to this
house. I don't see no reason why he shouldn't. The George and Dragon
has bin in our family ever