The Alleged Haunting of B---- House, - [best historical fiction books of all time TXT] 📗

As a matter of fact, we were sleeping on the other side of the house, and the rooms under the maids' rooms were empty.... In the evening, about six o'clock, we strolled down the avenue again, and Scamp, who never does bark except under strong excitement, again barked and growled at the copse.

The Hon. E. F——, a fellow-member of an S.P.R. committee, arrives to-night. Hospitality constrains us to put him in No. 4, which is "not haunted."

I asked after the success of the new kitchenmaid, a local importation, who arrived yesterday. I was told she had already gone. The cook told me "she talked all sorts of nonsense about the house, and the things that had happened in it, and had been seen in it, all day; and then at night refused to sleep here, and the butler had to walk home with her at eleven o'clock."

The Factor [anglicé: bailiff] came this morning, and I fancied a special intention in his manner. He was much annoyed about the kitchenmaid, said such talk was "all havers" [anglicé: "drivel"], begged me not to employ her again, and undertook to get another, lending me a girl in his own service meanwhile.

I went with him into the wing to get him to see to things there. We have been too busy in getting the rest of the house into order to look after it yet; but I find the pipes are out of order, the cisterns frozen, and the "set-basins" in the three bedrooms and bath-room out of working order. He promised attention, but discouraged the use of the wing. "Had we not room enough without?" and so on. I suggested that, any way, for the sake of the rest of the house it must be aired and thawed, and he insisted that the kitchen fire below did that sufficiently.

I cannot help remembering that this is the scene of the phenomena recorded by Miss "B——," as Duncan R——, the factor, is well aware. Also, he was persistent about "keeping out the natives," and their chatter, if I wanted to keep the servants, but did not specify the nature of the chatter, and I asked no questions.

February 6th, Saturday.—No phenomena last night. The house perfectly still.

During Colonel Taylor's tenancy a good many experiments of different kinds were made in hypnotism, crystal gazing, and automatic writing. These, however, belong to a class of matter quite different from that of spontaneous phenomena, and are therefore not referred to, with the exception of a single instance of crystal gazing, which, though relating to B——, was made elsewhere, and one or two occasions of automatic writing. This latter method of inquiry displayed all the weakness to which it is usually, and apparently, inherently liable, and is only mentioned here as explaining other matters. Its chief interest was that it supplied a name marked by a certain peculiarity which afterwards became familiar, and that it led to a hypothesis as to at least one of the personalities by whom certain phenomena were professedly caused.

In the afternoon an experiment was made with the apparatus known as a Ouija board, and this, as is very often the case, resolved itself, after a time, into automatic writing. There is in the library a portrait of a very handsome woman, to which no name is attached, but which shows the costume of the last century. Her name was asked, and the word Ishbel was given several times. It is not certain whether this word was meant as an answer to the question, or whether, as often happens in such cases, it was intended merely as an announcement of the name of the informant supposed to communicate.

The word, as given, possesses the following peculiarity. In the Gaelic language the vowels e and i have the effect of aspirating an s immediately preceding them, in the same way in which they effect the c in Italian, or the g in Spanish, so that, as in Italian ce and ci are pronounced chay and chee, so in Gaelic se and si are pronounced shay and shee. The name Isabel is written in Gaelic Iseabal, but the e is absorbed in its effect upon the s (like the i in the Italian cìo) and the first a is so slurred as to be almost inaudible, so that the word is pronounced "Ish-bel."

It was obvious, therefore, that the intelligence from which the writing proceeded (if such existed) could write in English, and was familiar with the colloquial Gaelic pronunciation of the name, but was unacquainted with the Gaelic orthography. On this occasion also the name "Margaret" was given in its Gaelic form of Marghearad (somewhat similarly misspelt as Marget), without any special connection either with the questions asked, or, so far as could be discovered, with anything in the mind of any present, none of whom had interested themselves at that time in the S—— ancestry.

In reply to questions as to what could be done that was of use or interest, the writers were told to go at dusk, and in silence, to the glen in the avenue, and this, rightly or wrongly, some of those present identified with what had been called Scamp's Copse. They were, however, perplexed by being told to go "up by the burn," for though Miss Freer and Miss Moore had twice explored the spot, they had not observed the presence of water. The journal continues—