‘After the little rebuff you gave me t’other day, I shouldn’t have ventured to say nothing, sir; but when I see your family getting out of the fly this afternoon, I says to Mrs Browser, “If that don’t mean that they can’t stand Rushmere another night, I’m a pumpkin.” And I suppose, now, it did mean it, sir?’ ‘You are quite right, Mr Browser. The noises and voices about the house have become so intolerable, that it is quite impossible I can keep my family there. Still, I must tell you that, though I have been unable to account for the disturbances, I do not necessarily believe they are attributable to spirits. It is because I do not believe so that I wish to hear all you may be able to tell us, in order, if possible, to find a reason for what appears at present to be unreasonable.’ ‘Well, sir, you shall hear, as you say, all we have to tell you, and then you can believe what you like. But it ain’t I as can relate the story, sir. Mrs Browser knows a deal more than I do; and with your leave, and that of this good lady here, I’ll call her to give you the history of Rushmere.’ At this information, we displayed an amount of interest that resulted in a hasty summons for Mrs Browser. She was a fat, fair woman, of middle age, with ruddy cheeks, and a clear blue eye—not at all like a creature haunted by her own weak imagination, or who would be likely to mistake a shadow for a substance. Her appearance inspired me with confidence. I trusted that her relation might furnish me with some clue to the solution of the occurrences that had so confounded us. Safe out of the precincts of Rushmere, and with the lapse of twelve hours since the unaccountable swoon I had been seized with, my practical virtues were once more in the ascendant, and I was inclined to attribute our fright to anything but association with the marvellous. ‘Be I to tell the story from the beginning, Browser?’ was the first sentence that dropped from Mrs Browser’s lips. Her lord and master nodded an affirmative, whereupon she began:—