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Page 37
"Here is a report that I have kept for my own satisfaction. I do
not feel that in showing it to you I am violating any trust reposed
in me by the Misses Quinlan. I never promised secrecy in the
matter."
I glanced at the paper, all eagerness. He smiled and pushed it
toward me. This is what I read:
First tenant, Mr. Hugh Dennison and family.
Night 1: Heard and saw nothing.
Night 2: The entire household wakened by a scream seemingly
coming from below. This was twice repeated before Mr. Dennison
could reach the hall; the last time in far distant and smothered
tones. Investigation revealed nothing. No person and no trace
of any persons, save themselves, could be found anywhere in the
house. Uncomfortable feelings, but no alarm as yet.
Night 3: No screams, but a sound of groaning in the library.
The tall clock standing near the drawing-room door stopped at
twelve, and a door was found open which Mr. Dennison is sure he
shut tight on retiring. A second unavailing search. One servant
left the next morning.
Night 4: Footfalls on the stairs. The library door, locked by Mr.
Dennison's own hand, is heard to unclose. The timepiece on the
library mantel-shelf strikes twelve; but it is slightly fast, and
Mr. and Mrs. Dennison, who have crept from their room to the
stair-head, listen breathlessly for the deep boom of the great
hall clock--the one which had stopped the night before. No light
is burning anywhere, and the hall below is a pit of darkness, when
suddenly Mrs. Dennison seizes her husband's arm and, gasping out,
"The clock, the clock!" falls fainting to the floor. He bends to
look and faintly, in the heart of the shadows, he catches in dim
outline the face of the clock, and reaching up to it a spectral
hand. Nothing else--and in another moment that, too, disappears;
but the silence is something awful--the great clock has stopped.
With a shout he stumbles downward, lights up the hall, lights up
the rooms, but finds nothing, and no one. Next morning the second
servant leaves, but her place is soon supplied by an applicant we
will call Bess.
Night 5: Mrs. Dennison sleeps at a hotel with the children. Mr.
Dennison, revolver in hand, keeps watch on the haunted stairway.
He has fastened up every door and shutter with his own hand, and
with equal care extinguished all lights. As the hour of twelve
approaches, he listens breathlessly. There is certainly a stir
somewhere, but he can not locate it, not quite satisfy himself
whether it is a footfall or a rustle that he hears. The clock
in the library strikes twelve, then the one in the hall gives one
great boom, and stops. Instantly he raises his revolver and
shoots directly at its face. No sound from human lips answers
the discharge of the weapon. In the flash which for a moment has
lighted up the whole place, he catches one glimpse of the broken
dial with its two hands pointing directly at twelve, but nothing
more. Then all is dark again, and he goes slowly back to his own
room.
The next day he threw up his lease.
Second tenant: Mrs. Crispin.
Stayed but one night. Would never tell us what she saw.
Third tenant: Mrs. Southwick. Hires Bess for maid-of-all-work, the
only girl she could get.
Night 1: Unearthly lights shining up through the house, waking
the family. Disappeared as one and all came creeping out into the
hall.
Night 2: The same, followed by deep groans. Children waked and
shrieked.
Night 3: Nothing.
Night 4: Lights, groans and strange shadows on the walls and
ceilings of the various hallways. Family give notice the next day,
but do not leave for a week, owing to sickness. No manifestations
while doctor and nurses are in the house.
House stands vacant for three months. Bess offers to remain in it
as caretaker, but her offer is refused.
Police investigate.
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