The Ghost and Mrs. Muir Read Online Free PDF

said Lucy. “But of course there aren’t any ghosts, really. They always turn out to be the wind in the chimney, or shadows on the wall, or branches tapping on the window——”
    “Or bats in the belfry,” said Martha. “Well, I’ll be off downstairs, mum, and get our supper.”
    “Can you manage,” asked Lucy, “or shall I come and help you?”
    “Manage!” Martha snorted. “Wot’s a couple of eggs and bacon to one that’s dished up a seven-course dinner for a dozen on ’er ’ead! Manage!” She went out, closing the door behind her.
    Lucy sat down in the armchair. She was more tired than she had realized, and as she sat there, her head leaning back against the cushion, looking up at the picture of the full-rigged schooner over the mantelpiece, her eyelids drooped and she was asleep and dreaming.
    She dreamed that Captain Daniel Gregg had come to life again and was in the room with her. A taller man than she had imagined from the painting, with broad shoulders and long legs, rolling a little in his gait as he walked up and down, as if he were pacing a quarter-deck in a heavy sea. He was not in uniform but wore a navy blue suit with a white shirt and a black tie, and he was smoking a pipe; she particularly noticed the hand that held the pipe, a brown well-shaped hand with a gold signet ring on the little finger, quite unlike the wooden claw clasping the telescope in the portrait downstairs, a firm hand full of life and power.The whole bearing of the man gave an impression of intense virility; there was nothing depressed about him nor neurotic, nothing that could in any way be associated with an unhappy nature, admitting the ultimate defeat of the spirit in self-imposed death. He came very close, in her dream, and stared down at her with a surprisingly kindly expression in his blue eyes.
    For a few seconds he stood there. Then he turned and, going to the window, opened it and resumed his steady pacing up and down, as if he were trying to walk out the solution to some problem in his mind. So real did he seem in her dream that when she awoke and opened her eyes to the empty room, she could scarcely believe he was not there, and gazed round in search of him. But of course it had been a dream, and she leaned back, shivering a little in her chair, the cold breeze from the open window blowing in her face.
    Funny, she thought, I was positive I shut that window before Martha and I started to make up the bed. I know I shut that window, she said to herself, starting out of the chair. The catch was stiff and I squeezed my finger. There was a red mark still on her forefinger to prove it. Who opened it? she thought, and a dark cloud seemed to fold itself down on her spirit. This is my house and my place, she said to herself, but how can I bring the children here to be frightened? She crossed to the window and banged it shut as if she thus could keep out her own forebodings, and she turned back into the room to unpack her suitcase and laid out her ivory toilet set on the chest of drawers, gaining what comfort she could from handling the smooth solidity of her own familiar things. A small, square mirror was propped on the top against the wall, and in it, as she combed back a lock of hair, she saw the reflection of the door; it was opening stealthily, slowly, without noise. She stood there, the comb poisedin her hand, as still as if she had been turned into an ivory image herself. Her relief from suspense was so great when Martha’s red face appeared in the opening, that she swayed forward, supporting herself with her arms on the furniture before her.
    “I crep’ up,” said Martha, “thinkin’ you might ’ave dropped off to sleep, and not wishin’ to disturb you, for wot’s an egg ’ere and there, and sleep’s sleep and I could fry you up another in a brace of shakes.”
    “I have been asleep for a few minutes,” said Lucy. But had she? Had that been a dream? And yet how could that substantial-looking figure in