The Circular Staircase | Page 5

was taken
unexpectedly with a pain in his right side, much worse when I was
within hearing distance, and by afternoon he was started cityward. That
night the cook's sister had a baby--the cook, seeing indecision in my
face, made it twins on second thought-- and, to be short, by noon the
next day the household staff was down to Liddy and myself. And this
in a house with twenty-two rooms and five baths!
Liddy wanted to go back to the city at once, but the milk-boy said that
Thomas Johnson, the Armstrongs' colored butler, was working as a
waiter at the Greenwood Club, and might come back. I have the usual
scruples about coercing people's servants away, but few of us have any
conscience regarding institutions or corporations--witness the way we
beat railroads and street-car companies when we can--so I called up the
club, and about eight o'clock Thomas Johnson came to see me. Poor
Thomas!
Well, it ended by my engaging Thomas on the spot, at outrageous
wages, and with permission to sleep in the gardener's lodge, empty
since the house was rented. The old man--he was white- haired and a
little stooped, but with an immense idea of his personal dignity--gave
me his reasons hesitatingly.
"I ain't sayin' nothin', Mis' Innes," he said, with his hand on the

door-knob, "but there's been goin's-on here this las' few months as ain't
natchal. 'Tain't one thing an' 'tain't another-- it's jest a door squealin'
here, an' a winder closin' there, but when doors an' winders gets to
cuttin' up capers and there's nobody nigh 'em, it's time Thomas Johnson
sleeps somewhar's else."
Liddy, who seemed to be never more than ten feet away from me that
night, and was afraid of her shadow in that great barn of a place,
screamed a little, and turned a yellow-green. But I am not easily
alarmed.
It was entirely in vain; I represented to Thomas that we were alone, and
that he would have to stay in the house that night. He was politely firm,
but he would come over early the next morning, and if I gave him a key,
he would come in time to get some sort of breakfast. I stood on the
huge veranda and watched him shuffle along down the shadowy drive,
with mingled feelings--irritation at his cowardice and thankfulness at
getting him at all. I am not ashamed to say that I double-locked the hall
door when I went in.
"You can lock up the rest of the house and go to bed, Liddy," I said
severely. "You give me the creeps standing there. A woman of your age
ought to have better sense." It usually braces Liddy to mention her age:
she owns to forty--which is absurd. Her mother cooked for my
grandfather, and Liddy must be at least as old as I. But that night she
refused to brace.
"You're not going to ask me to lock up, Miss Rachel!" she quavered.
"Why, there's a dozen French windows in the drawing- room and the
billiard-room wing, and every one opens on a porch. And Mary Anne
said that last night there was a man standing by the stable when she
locked the kitchen door."
"Mary Anne was a fool," I said sternly. "If there had been a man there,
she would have had him in the kitchen and been feeding him what was
left from dinner, inside of an hour, from force of habit. Now don't be
ridiculous. Lock up the house and go to bed. I am going to read."

But Liddy set her lips tight and stood still.
"I'm not going to bed," she said. "I am going to pack up, and to-morrow
I am going to leave."
"You'll do nothing of the sort," I snapped. Liddy and I often desire to
part company, but never at the same time. "If you are afraid, I will go
with you, but for goodness' sake don't try to hide behind me."
The house was a typical summer residence on an extensive scale.
Wherever possible, on the first floor, the architect had done away with
partitions, using arches and columns instead. The effect was cool and
spacious, but scarcely cozy. As Liddy and I went from one window to
another, our voices echoed back at us uncomfortably. There was plenty
of light--the electric plant down in the village supplied us--but there
were long vistas of polished floor, and mirrors which reflected us from
unexpected corners, until I felt some of Liddy's foolishness
communicate itself to me.
The house was very long, a rectangle in general form, with the main
entrance in the center of the long side. The brick-paved entry opened
into a short hall to the right of which, separated only by a row of pillars,