The Four Pools Mystery | Page 8

it, the interior was somewhat slighted.
In any case we unearthed no ha'nt that night; and we finally gave up the
search and turned back to the house.
"I suspect," Radnor laughed, "that if the truth were known, old Aunt
Sukie's beckoning ha'nt would turn out to be nothing more alarming
than a white cow waving her tail."
"It's rather suggestive coming on top of the chicken episode," I
observed.
"Oh, this won't be the end! We'll have ha'nt served for breakfast, dinner
and supper during the rest of your stay. When the niggers begin to see
things they keep it up."
When I went upstairs that night, Rad followed close on my heels to see
that I had everything I needed. The room was a huge four windowed
affair, furnished with a canopied bed and a mahogany wardrobe as big
as a small house. The nights still being chilly, a roaring wood fire had
been built, adding a note of cheerfulness to an otherwise sombre
apartment.
"This was Nan's room," he said suddenly.
"Nan's room!" I echoed glancing about the shadowy interior. "Rather

heavy for a girl."
"It is a trifle severe," he agreed, "but I dare say it was different when
she was here. Her things are all packed away in the attic." He picked up
a candle and held it so that it lighted the face of a portrait over the
mantle. "That's Nan--painted when she was eighteen."
"Yes," I nodded. "I recognized her the moment I saw it. She was like
that when I knew her."
"It used to hang down stairs but after her marriage my father had it
brought up here. He kept the door locked until the news came that she
was dead, then he turned it into a guest room. He never comes in
himself; he won't look at the picture."
Radnor spoke shortly, but with an underlying note of bitterness. I could
see that he felt keenly on the subject. After a few desultory words, he
somewhat brusquely said good night, and left me to the memories of
the place.
Instead of going to bed I set about unpacking. I was tired but wide
awake. Aunt Sukie's convulsions and our torch light hunt for ghosts
were novel events in my experience, and they acted as anything but a
sedative. The unpacking finished, I settled myself in an easy chair
before the fire and fell to studying the portrait. It was a huge canvas in
the romantic fashion of Romney, with a landscape in the background.
The girl was dressed in flowing pink drapery, a garden hat filled with
roses swinging from her arm, a Scotch collie with great lustrous eyes
pressed against her side. The pose, the attributes, were artificial; but the
painter had caught the spirit. Nannie's face looked out of the frame as I
remembered it from long ago. Youth and gaiety and goodness trembled
on her lips and laughed in her eyes. The picture seemed a prophecy of
all the happiness the future was to bring. Nannie at eighteen with life
before her!
And three years later she was dying in a dreary little Western town,
separated from her girlhood friends, without a word of forgiveness
from her father. What had she done to deserve this fate? Merely set up

her will against his, and married the man she loved. Her husband was
poor, but from all I ever heard, a very decent chap. As I studied the
eager smiling face, I felt a hot wave of anger against her father. What a
power of vindictiveness the man must have, still to cherish rancour
against a daughter fifteen years in her grave! There was something too
poignantly sad about the unfulfilled hope of the picture. I blew out the
candles to rid my mind of poor little Nannie's smile.
I sat for some time my eyes fixed moodily on the glowing embers, till I
was roused by the deep boom of the hall clock as it slowly counted
twelve. I rose with a laugh and a yawn. The first of the doctor's orders
had been, "Early to bed!" I hastily made ready, but before turning in,
paused for a moment by the open window, enticed by the fresh country
smells of plowed land and sprouting green things, that blew in on the
damp breeze. It was a wild night with a young moon hanging low in the
sky. Shadows chased themselves over the lawn and the trees waved and
shifted in the wind. It had been a long time since I had looked out on
such a scene of peaceful tranquillity as this. New York with the hurry
and rush of its streets, with the horrors of Terry's morgue, seemed to lie
in another continent.
But suddenly I was recalled