ce my father died from the cold he
caught drivin' the mare up from Portsville. Ther' was a time, in the
days when they talked of it bein' ha'nted, you'd hear folks call it
Eberdeen Manor; but not--no, and my father likely's been dead these
forty years now--never, Mr. Eberdeen's house!"

"'Mr. Eberdeen--there was such a person, then?'

"'There'll be a time, me boy, when they'll doubt yerself was a living
thing.' He straightened his bent body reprehensibly; he shook his head.
'Walk back to the next corner,' he muttered, 'and turn to yer left.
It'll be down there ber the cliffs, if nobody's stolen it. Somebody'll
sure 'nough be there ter point it out to yer.'

"'I'm a stranger,' I apologized; 'I really didn't know.'

"'_Know!_' he shouted. 'Who was it owned the land this 'ere street
runs over? Who built it? Who was it paid fer the church on the hill?
Who did fer the sick, and gave to the poor, and got nothin' hisself
fer the trouble but grief and loneliness and a broken heart? Wher'
did yer come from?'

"And he surveyed me, as if the mere fact of his seeing me for the first
time made him doubt my intentions. Still I stood there waiting.

"'What was he like? What did he do? Who was he?' I couldn't help
flinging out in my wonderment.

"'As good's'll ever come back from wher' yer've been, or 'll pray fer
the like of yer, I reckon. Judge not, I tell yer, that yer be not
yerself judged.'

"I tried to smile at the old man.

"'Good-day to yer,' he grumbled, and walked back in the direction from
which he had come. I watched until he was lost in the thickness."

Julia looked at Hastings in astonishment. Just another glimmer of
anxiety crossed her mind; but any foolish worry she might have had for
him was merged in her consciousness of something indeed more staggering.

"Do you think," she brooded, "that it can be true--that--that the house
is--_was_--haunted?"

"I had," Jack unresponsively continued--"I couldn't help it--on the
way a queer loathing of the little village. The gaunt house-fronts
obtruded themselves so obstinately, so self-satisfiedly, like anemic
country parsons, with their eyes close together, giving me a mean,
soulless stare. Every object testified to its lack of any temperamental
share in the joy of living. The emptiness of the streets seemed
pitiless; their narrowness was oppressive."

"I love every inch of it," said Julia, defiantly.

Hastings was silent. He looked at the dry, colorless walls, c