there isn't a genuine, blown-in-the-glass, dyed-in-the-wool family spook on the premises—well, all I can say is that the builder ought to be prosecuted for obtaining shudders under false pretenses."
"Obtaining shutters?" Hugh repeated, in a tone which showed his thoughts had been wandering from the other's light-hearted chatter.
"Wake up!" cried the indignant Ronnie. "Who said anything about shutters? I was talking about shudders—s-h-u-d-d-e-r-s—two 'd's,' and the 'h' is silent, as in 'pudding.'"
"I get you," laughed his friend. "What a lad you are for a joke, Ronnie! You really must take up your quarters here—the murmur of your baby prattle will be like a ray of sunshine in this gloomy old house."
"Anything to oblige, old bean," Ronnie smirked with the air of one acknowledging a well-deserved compliment. But the next moment his grin vanished as he laid his hand on the other man's shoulder. "But, seriously, Hugh, I hope you don't mind my silly nonsense," he went on in an altered voice. "You see, I have to be so preternaturally wise and solemn when I've got my bedside manner on, that it's quite a relief to blow the cork out now and again."
"Come and stay with me," invited Hugh Trehchard, "and you never need put the cork in at all."
Ronnie gave a laugh and smacked his lips with mock gusto.
"That sounds alluringly festive. I'll think it over."
Hugh had not been jesting when he
had described the house as a "gloomy old place," for it looked almost as eery in the bright sunshine as it had looked in the mist-dimmed moonlight when he had first seen it. It was a structure of tolerable antiquity, and had probably been built as a lodge for one of the Yeoman Rangers when Exmoor was one of the royal preserves. One had not to look very closely to detect the marks imprinted by the passing years. The tiles of the high-pitched roof were toned to a deep, mellow red; the oaken beams of the half-timbered walls were weathered to a grayish drab; the intersecting plaster was in places stained a sickly green by the drippings from the eaves, and its whole surface starred and cracked until it resembled the face of a wrinkled hag. There are some houses upon which the hand of Time seems to have been laid with benign touch—gray havens of peace and quietude, or stout old manor-houses whose wide hearths remind one of the crackling of Yule logs; whose cheerful, panelled walls still seem to retain a kindly echo of the songs and laughter of top-booted, red-faced squires; oak-roofed halls which still seem to ring with the merry strains of Sir Roger de Coverly; painted and gilded salons where one seems to catch the measured rhythm of viols and harpsichord, and the light tapping of red-heeled shoes in the stately minuet.
But there are others whose dusty chambers are shadowy, aloof, and mysterious—fit settings for whispered plots, cloaked and masked figures flitting like sinister shadows, or stealthy deeds which shunned the light of day. And of such was the house of which Hugh Trenchard had come to take possession.
The footsteps of Hugh and his companion echoed eerily as they passed along the passage on the ground floor, entering each room in turn and throwing back the curtains which shrouded the windows. Passing through the darkest part of the passage, Hugh's left-hand sleeve caught in something which projected from the
