Ghosts by Gaslight - Jack Dann [52]
That very evening I contrived to sit beside Lady Margaret’s maid at our supper in the kitchen. It was far from difficult to steer our conversation toward the great dinner planned for The Day, all the extra work that would be involved, Lady Margaret’s ever more frequent shopping trips, and the visits of her dressmaker.
“There was the prettiest little book in Cobbler & Bowen’s,” the maid confided. “All white it was, and gold everywhere. She wanted it ever so much, only then she said what would the master say to paying so much for a little book and put it back.”
Thus I was able to tell my own master that a certain collection of the works of the celebrated poetess Elizabeth Browning, a volume in bleached calf with gilt edges, would make an eminently satisfactory gift. Together we journeyed to Windermere; it was still in the shop, and he purchased it forthwith.
He was in so fine a mood thereafter that I made bold to broach the matter of Miss Landon, asking whether she would be at Lady Margaret’s dinner. He pretended to know nothing of her; the pinchbeck falsity of his disclaimer shone like brass, and so it was that I ventured a statement of the same kidney, saying that it was alleged among the servants that he and Miss Landon were soon to wed.
“Oh,” said he, “you intended Miss Alice Landon? I had supposed you spoke of an older sister. I have met her, but as for intending her, there is little enough to recommend her to any man.”
“Then she will not be at the dinner, sir?”
“Well now,” he replied with a feigned indifference, “I’ve no way of knowing. The mater has seen the lady’s pater regarding some complaint or other, faintness from tight lacing if I were to guess; so the Landons may have been invited. I really wouldn’t know.”
Recollecting the ghost, I remarked that Miss Landon possessed good features, and he shrugged. “If you care for blotches, she’ll do well enough, I suppose. Yellow hair and blue eyes give her some charm from a distance. That much I’ll allow.”
I scratched my head.
“What puzzles you so, Brooks?”
I said, “Why, I had heard that you and she were to be united next summer, sir, and now I cannot imagine what gave rise to so absurd a report.”
“Nor can I. She’s a bit daft, they say, and hasn’t a farthing. Oh, I’ve spoken to her and danced, and all that. One must have a partner for the waltzes, and most of these country misses outweigh the white heifer.”
“She has no prospects then?”
He laughed. He had a most hearty and most engaging laugh, sir; I feel that I can hear it even as we speak. “From a medico?” he asked. “And there are four brothers.”
I ventured a few further questions, but learned little of substance. Needless to say, I awaited the dinner, and the dancing which was to follow it, styled by some a ball, with the highest interest. For reasons I cannot explain, I felt confident that Miss Landon’s ghost should not trouble me until I had seen Miss Landon in the flesh. In that, I was wholly mistaken, for I woke to find her bending over my bed.
“The time grows short,” she said. “I’ve tried to come to you before, Brooks, but was prevented.”
“N-n-not b-by me, I hope, madam,” I ventured, and at once discovered that my teeth chattered.
She gave my question no heed. “I must soon die, save you prevent it. Will you not save me?”
I nodded, though fumbling for the matches I had placed next to my lamp.
“You are not going to light that, I hope. I’d thought better of you.”
“I fear I dream. I wish to see if it be so.” Even as I spoke, I struck a match on the floorboard; she weakened and backed away from its flare of light and hellish smoke.
“And will you light the gas, beast?”
That was my purpose; rising from my bed, I turned the valve and applied the flame.
“Do you dream, or no?”
Though I could no longer see her, I had heard her voice. “I do not dream,” I conceded. “Where are you?”
“Not in hell, the place to which you would consign me if you could.” Her tone was despairing.
“I would consign no soul to hell,