The entrance was half hidden among rugged piled-up boulders dripping with moisture; and was not inviting.
I remembered chasing a rabbit into this cavern when I was a boy, and though it would have been an easy matter to follow him, I preferred to stay outside in the sunshine.
The spring-hole, then, was haunted.
This did not strike me as strange.
I rather wondered that it had not been from the first; it was a likely place for ghosts.
But the thing which did surprise me, was the fact that it was Mose who brought the news.
We were sitting on the portico after supper one night—it was almost dark and the glow from our cigars was the one visible point in the scenery—when Mose came bounding across the lawn with his peculiar loping run and fairly groveled at Radnor's feet, his teeth chattering with fear.
"I's seen de ha'nt, Marse Rad; de sho nuff ha'nt all dressed in black an' risin' outen de spring-hole."
"You fool!" Radnor cried. "Get on your feet and behave yourself."
"It was de debbil," Mose chattered. "His face was black an' his eyes was fire."
"You've been drinking, Mose," Radnor said sharply. "Get off to the quarters where you belong, and don't let me see you again until you are sober," and he shunted the fellow out of the way before he had time to say any more.
I myself was tolerably certain that Mose had not been drinking; that, at least, was not in the list of his peculiar vices.
He appeared to be thoroughly frightened—if not, he was a most consummate actor.
In the light of what I already knew, I was considerably puzzled by this fresh manifestation.
The Colonel fretted and fumed up and down the veranda, muttering something about these fool niggers all being alike.
He had bragged considerably about Mose's immunity in respect to ha'nts, and I think he was rather dashed at his favorite's falling-off.
I held my peace, and Radnor returned in a few minutes.
"Rad," said the Colonel, "this thing's going too far.
The whole place is infested with ghosts; they'll be invading the house next and we won't have a servant left on the place.
Can't you do something to stop it?"
Radnor shrugged his shoulders and said that it was a pretty tough job to lay a ghost when there were twenty niggers on the place, but that he would see what he could do; and he presently drifted off again.
That same night about ten o'clock I was reading before going to bed, when a knock sounded on the door, and Radnor appeared.
He was unusually restless and ill at ease.
He referred in a jesting fashion to the ha'nt, discussed some neighborhood gossip, and finally quite abruptly inquired:
"Arnold, can you lend me some money?"
"Yes," I said, "I think so; how much do you want?"
"A hundred dollars if you can spare it.
Fact is I'm a little hard up, and I've got a bill to meet.
I have some money invested but I can't put my hands on it just this minute.
I'll pay you in a week or so as soon as I get some cash—I wouldn't ask you, only my father is so blamed reluctant about paying my salary ahead of time."
I wrote out a check and handed it to him.
"Rad," I said, "you're perfectly welcome to the money; I'm glad to accommodate you, but if you'll excuse my mentioning it, I think you ought to pull up a bit on this poker business.
You don't earn so much that if you're thinking of getting married you can afford to throw any of it away.—I'm only speaking for your good; it's no affair of mine," I added as I saw his face flush.
He hesitated a moment with the check in his hand; I know that he wanted to give it back, but he was evidently too hard pressed.
"Oh, keep the money!" I said. "I don't want to pry into your private affairs, only," I laughed, "I do want to see you win out ahead of Mattison, and I'm afraid you're not going about it the right way."
"Thank you, Arnold," he returned, "I want to win a great deal more than you want me to—and if it's gambling you're afraid of, you can ease your mind, for I've sworn off.
It's not a poker debt I want this money for tonight; I wouldn't be so secretive about the business, only it concerns another person more than me."
"Radnor," I said, "I heard an ugly rumor the other day.
I heard that the ghost was a live woman who was living in the deserted cabins under your connivance.
I didn't believe it, but just the same it is not a story which you can afford to have even whispered."
Radnor raised his head sharply.
"Ah, I see!" His eyes wavered a moment and then fixed themselves miserably on my face. "Has—has Polly Mathers heard that?"
"Yes," I returned, "I fancy she has."
He struck the table with a quick flash of anger.
"It's a damned lie!
And it comes from Jim Mattison."
And now as to the events which followed during the night.
I've repeated them so many times to so many different persons that it is difficult for me to recall just what were my original sensations.
I went to bed but I didn't go to sleep; this ha'nt business was getting on my nerves almost as badly as the Patterson-Pratt case.
After a time I heard someone let himself softly out of the house; I knew well that it was Radnor and I didn't get up to look.