search a room she was willing to have me enter?
No, and yet any knowledge which could be obtained in regard to this
house might be of use to me or to Mr. Gryce. I decided to embrace her
offer, after first testing her with one other question.

"Would you prefer to have me steal down these corridors at night and
dare their dusky recesses at a time when spectres are supposed to walk
the halls they once flitted through in happy consciousness?"

"Hardly." She made the greatest effort to sustain the jest, but her
concern and dread were manifest. "I think I had better give you the keys
now, than subject you to the drafts and chilling discomforts of this old
place at midnight."

I rose with a semblance of eager anticipation.

"I will take you at your word," said I. "The keys, my dear. I am going
to visit a haunted room for the first time in my life."

I do not think she was deceived by this feigned ebullition. Perhaps it
was too much out of keeping with my ordinary manner, but she gave no
sign of surprise and rose in her turn with an air suggestive of relief.

"Excuse me, if I precede you," she begged. "I will meet you at the head
of the corridor with the keys."

I was in hopes she would be long enough in obtaining them to allow me to
stroll along the front hall to the opening into the corridor I was so
anxious to enter. But the spryness I showed, seemed to have a
corresponding effect upon her, for she almost flew down the passageway
before me and was back at my side before I could take a step in the
coveted direction.

"These will take you into any room on the first floor," said she. "You
will meet with dust and Lucetta's abhorrence, spiders, but for these I
shall make no apologies. Girls who cannot provide comforts for the few
rooms they utilize, cannot be expected to keep in order the large and
disused apartments of a former generation."

"I hate dirt and despise spiders," was my dry retort, "but I am willing
to brave both for the pleasure of satisfying my love for the antique."
At which she handed me the keys, with a calm smile which was not without
its element of sadness.

"I will be here on your return," she said, leaning over the banisters to
speak to me as I took my first steps down. "I shall want to hear whether
you are repaid for your trouble."

I thanked her and proceeded on my way, somewhat doubtful whether by so
doing I was making the best possible use of my opportunities.

XVII

THE FLOWER PA