Since the murder the Silent House had acquired a tenfold interest in the eyes of all.
The crime, added to its reputation for being haunted, invested it with horror; and its commonplace looks assumed to fanciful onlookers a grim and menacing aspect, in keeping with its blood-stained floor and ghostly rooms.
Disheartened by the late catastrophe, which had so greatly enhanced the already evil reputation of the house, the landlord did not attempt to relet it, as he knew very well that no tenant would be bold enough to take it, even at a nominal rent.
Mrs. Vrain had sold off the furniture of the two apartments which her unfortunate husband had inhabited, and now these were as bare and lonely as the rest of the rooms.
The landlord made no effort to furbish up or renovate the mansion, deeming that such expense would be useless; so No.
13, deserted by man, and cursed by God, remained vacant and avoided.
People came from far and near to look at it, but no one entered its doors lest some evil fate should befall them.
Yet, in strange contradiction to the horror it created in every breast, the houses on either side continued to be occupied.
Miss Greeb frequently took a peep across the way at the empty house, with its curtainless, dusty windows and smokeless chimneys.
She had theorised often on the murder of Vrain, and being unable to come to any reasonable conclusion, finally decided that a ghost—the ghost which haunted the mansion—had committed the crime.
In support of this fantastic opinion she related to Lucian at least a score of stories in which people foolishly sleeping in haunted rooms had been found dead in the morning.
"With black finger-marks on their throats," said Miss Greeb dramatically, "and looks of horror in their eyes, and everything locked up, just like it was in No. 13, to show that nothing but a ghost could have killed them."
"You forget, Miss Greeb," said Lucian flippantly, "poor Vrain was stabbed with a stiletto.
Ghosts don't use material weapons."
"How do you know the dagger was a real one?" replied Miss Greeb, sinking her voice to a horrified whisper. "Was it ever seen?
No!
Was it ever found?
No!
The ghost took it away.
Depend upon it, Mr. Denzil, it wasn't flesh and blood as made a spirit of that crazy Berwin."
"In that case, the ghostly criminal can't be hanged," said Denzil, with a laugh. "But it's all nonsense, Miss Greeb.
I am astonished that a woman of your sense should believe in such rubbish."
"Wiser people than I have faith in ghosts," retorted the landlady obstinately. "Haven't you heard of the haunted house in a West End square, where a man and a dog were found dead in the morning, with a valet as gibbered awful ever afterwards?"
"Pooh!
Pooh!
That's a story of Bulwer Lytton's."
"It is not, Mr. Denzil—it's a fact. You can see the very house in the square for yourself, and No. 13 is just such another."
"Nonsense!
Why, I'd sleep in No. 13 to-morrow night, just to prove that your ghostly fears are all moonshine."
Miss Greeb uttered a screech of alarm.
"Mr. Denzil!" she cried, with great energy, "sooner than you should do that, I'd—I'd—well, I don't know what I'd do!"
"Accuse me of stealing your silver spoons and have me locked up," said Lucian, laughing. "Make yourself easy, Miss Greeb.
I have no intention of tempting Providence.
All the same, I don't believe for one minute that No. 13 is haunted."
"Lights were seen flitting from room to room."
"No doubt. Poor Vrain showed me over the house before he died.
His candle explains the lights."
"They have been seen since his death," said Miss Greeb solemnly.
"Then, as a ghost, Vrain must be walking about with the old woman phantom who wears brocade and high-heeled shoes."
Miss Greeb, seeing that she had a sceptic to deal with, retreated with great dignity from the argument, but nevertheless to other people maintained her opinion, with many facts drawn from her imagination and from books on the supernatural compiled from the imagination—or, as the various writers called it—the experience of others.
Some agreed with her, others laughed at her; but one and all acknowledged that, however it came about, whether by ghostly or mortal means, the murder of Vrain was a riddle never likely to be solved; and, with other events of a like nature and mystery, it was relegated to the list of undiscovered crimes.
After several interviews with Link, the barrister was also inclined to take this view of the matter. He found the detective quite discouraged in his efforts to find the assassin.
"I have been to Bath," said Link dismally. "I have examined, so far as I was able, into the past life of Vrain, but I can find nothing likely to throw light on the subject.
He did not get on well with his wife, and left Bath ten months before the murder.
I tried to trace where he went to, but could not.
He vanished from Bath quite unexpectedly, and four months later turned up in Geneva Square, as we know, but who killed him, or why he was killed, I can't say.
I'm afraid I'll have to give it up as a bad job, Mr. Denzil."
"What! and lose a reward of five hundred pounds!" said Lucian.
"If it was five thousand, I must lose it," returned the dejected Link. "This case beats me.
I don't believe the murderer will ever be run down."