The Haunted House Part 3

In the morning the doctor called as he had promised, and was much surprised to see Esther up and dressed, helping Olive to wash the dishes. She told him that she felt all right again, only she was so nervous that any sudden noise made her jump. Having occasion to go down into the cellar with a pan of milk, she came running up, out of breath, exclaiming that there was some one down in the cellar, for a piece of plank had been thrown at her. The doctor went down to see for himself, Esther remaining in the dining room; for it must be borne in mind that the cellar door opens into the dining room. In a moment he came up again remarking that there was n.o.body down there to throw a piece of plank, nor anything else.

"Esther, come down with me," said he. So down they both went, when, to their great surprise, several potatoes came flying at their heads. That was enough. They both beat a hasty retreat. The doctor left the house, and called again in the evening, with several very powerful sedatives, morphia being one, which he administered to Esther about ten o'clock as she lay in bed. She still complained of her nervousness, and said she felt as if electricity was pa.s.sing all through her body. He had given her the medicine, and had just remarked that she would have a good night's rest when the loud sounds commenced, only they were much louder and in more rapid succession than on the previous nights. Presently the sounds left the room and were heard on the roof of the house. The doctor instantly left the house and went out into the street, hearing the sounds while in the open air. He returned to the house more nonplussed than ever, and told the family that from the street it seemed as if some person was on the roof with a heavy sledge hammer pounding away to try and break through the s.h.i.+ngles. Being a moonlight night he could see distinctly that there was not any one out on the roof. He remained until twelve. Everything becoming quiet again, he then departed, saying he would call the next day. When he had got as far as the gate, the sounds on the roof commenced again with great violence, and continued until he had gone about two hundred yards from the cottage, at which distance he could still hear them distinctly.

The next week it became known throughout Amherst that strange things were going on at Dan Teed's cottage. The mysterious sounds had been heard by people in the street as they pa.s.sed the house, and the poundings now commenced in the morning and were to be heard all day long. Esther always felt relieved when the sounds were produced by the unknown power.

Dr. Caritte called every night, and sometimes during the day, but could not afford her the slightest relief. One night, about three weeks after the doctor's first visit, as he and the family were standing around her bed listening to the loud knockings, Esther suddenly threw her arms up towards the head of the bed, and seemed to be seized with a spasm, for she became cold and perfectly rigid. While in this state she commenced to talk, and told all that had occurred between herself and Bob McNeal on the night of the fatal ride. This was the first anybody knew of the affair, for she had never told of it, and Bob had never been seen in the locality after that night. When she came to her senses again, they told her what had been said by herself during the strange state from which she had just emerged. Upon hearing this she commenced to cry, and told them that it was all true; that he had threatened her with his revolver, but becoming frightened by the sound of wheels in the distance, had driven her home without offering her any further show of violence.

"There!" exclaimed Olive, "Didn't I tell you that I felt it in my bones, that harm would come to you through that young man, and now you see he really is at the bottom of all this. Ah, it is Bob, who makes all these strange sounds about the house; I know he is the cause." Instantly three distinct reports were heard, shaking the whole house with their violence.

"Do you know doctor," said Jane, "that I believe that whatever agency makes these noises, it can hear and understand what we are talking about, and perhaps see us." The moment she had finished the sentence, three distinct reports were heard as loud as before.

"Ask if it can hear us doctor?" said Dan. "Can you, whatever you are, hear what we say?" asked Dr. Caritte.

Again three reports were heard, which shook the entire house.

"Why, that is very singular," remarked the doctor. "I believe Jane was right, it can hear."

"Well, let us try again," said Dan. "If you can see and hear, tell us how many persons are in this room?" Esther did not know how many were present, for she was lying in the bed, with her face buried in the pillow trembling with fear. As Dan did not receive an answer, he asked again.

"How many persons are in the room? Give us a knock on the floor for each one." Five distinct knocks were made by the strange force on the floor, and there were just five persons in the room, as follows:--Dr. Caritte, Dan, Olive, Esther and Jane, William c.o.x and John Teed having left the room after Esther had burried her face in the pillow. "Well, it certainly is strange remarked the doctor, but I must go, it is getting late." So he departed after saying he would call the next evening.

The next evening the Doctor called and remained for about an hour, but as nothing occurred he departed feeling rather disappointed. For the next three weeks no one could tell when the manifestations would take place. Sometimes they would commence in the morning and continue all day, and at other times they would only take place after Esther had retired. It had now become a settled fact that Esther must be in the house or there would be no manifestations of any kind. They never occurred during her absence.

About one month after the commencement of the manifestations, Dr. Edwin Clay, the well known Baptist clergyman, called at the house to behold the wonders with his own eyes. He had read some little account of them in the newspapers, but was desirious of seeing and hearing for himself, not taking much stock, as the saying is, in what other people told him about the affair. However, he was fortunate enough to have his desire fully gratified. He heard the loudest kind of knocks, in answer to his various questions, saw the mysterious writing on the wall, and left the house fully satisfied that Esther did not produce any of the manifestations herself, and that the family did not a.s.sist her as some people believed. He, however, was of the opinion that through the shock her system had received the night she went riding, she had become in some mysterious manner an electric battery. His theory being, that invisible flashes of lightening left her person, and that the knocks which every body could hear distinctly, were simply minute claps of thunder. He lectured on his theory, and drew large audiences as he always does, no matter what the subject is. Perfectly satisfied that the manifestations are genuine, he has n.o.bly defended Esther c.o.x from the platform and the pulpit.

Rev. R.A. Temple, the well known Wesleyan minister pastor of the Wesleyan Church in Amherst, has witnessed some of the manifestations. He saw, among other strange things, a bucket of cold water become agitated, and to all appearances boil, while standing on the kitchen table.

As soon as people in the village found that such eminent men as Dr.

Clay, Dr. Caritte and Rev. Dr. Temple took an interest in the case, it became quite fas.h.i.+onable for people in the village to call at Dan's little cottage to see Esther c.o.x and witness the wonderful manifestations. While the house was filled with visitors, large crowds often stood outside unable to gain admittance. On several occasions the village police force had to be called out to keep order, so anxious were people to see and hear for themselves.

Many believed and still believe the whole affair a fraud, and others say that Esther mesmerizes people, and they think they hear and see things which never have an existence. Dr. Nathan Tupper is of this belief, although he has never witnessed a single manifestation.

Dr. Caritte, who continued to be one of the daily callers at the cottage, would have a theory one day that would seem to account for the manifestations he had witnessed, and the next day something wonderful would occur and upset his latest theory completely, so that he finally gave up in despair and became simply a pa.s.sive spectator. Things went on in this way until December, when Esther was taken ill with diphtheria, and confined to her bed for about two weeks, during which time the manifestations ceased entirely. After she had recovered from her illness, she went to Sackville, N.B., to visit her other married sister, Mrs. John Snowden, remaining at her house for about two weeks. While there she was entirely free from the manifestations.

On returning to Dan's cottage the most startling part of the case was developed. One night while in bed with her sister Jane in another room, her room having been changed to see if that would put a stop to the affair, she told her sister that she could hear a voice saying to her that the house was to be set on fire that night by a ghost. The voice also said that it had once lived on the earth, but had been dead for some years. The members of the household were called in at once, and told what had been said. They only laughed and remarked that no such thing as that could take place, because there were no ghosts. Dr. Clay had said it was all electricity. "And," added Dan, "electricity can't set the house on fire unless it comes from a cloud in the form of lightning." As they were talking the matter over, to the amazement of all present, a lighted match fell from the ceiling to the bed, and would have set it on fire had not Jane put it out instantly. During the next ten minutes, eight or ten lighted matches fell on the bed and about the room, but were all extinguished before any harm could be done. In the course of the night the loud knockings commenced. The family could now all converse with the invisible power in this way. It would knock once for a negative answer, and three times for an answer in the affirmative, giving two knocks when in doubt about a reply. Dan asked if the house would be set on fire, and the reply was three loud knocks on the floor, meaning yes; and a fire was started about five minutes afterwards. The ghost took a dress belonging to Esther that was hanging on a nail in the wall near the door, rolled it up, and, before any of the persons in the room could remove it from under the bed, where the ghost had placed it before their very eyes, it was all in a blaze. It was extinguished, however, without being much injured by the fire. The next morning all was consternation in the cottage. Dan and Olive were afraid that the ghost would start a fire in some inaccessible place and burn the house down. They were both convinced that it really was a ghost, "for" said Olive, "nothing but the devil or a ghost with evil designs, could do so terrible a thing as start a fire in a cottage at the dead of night."

Dr. Clay's theory might be true, but it was not clear to them how electricity could go about a house gifted with the cunning of a fiend.

"It is true," said Dan, "that lightning often sets fire to houses and barns, but it has never yet been known to roam about a man's house, as this strange power does. And as Esther can hear it speak, and it does whatever it says it will, why I believe it to be a ghost, or else the devil." While Olive was churning in the kitchen one morning about three days after the fire under the bed, she noticed smoke coming from the cellar. Esther was seated in the dining room when Olive first saw the smoke, and had been seated there for the last hour, previous to which she had been in the kitchen a.s.sisting her sister to wash the breakfast dishes as was her custom. On seeing the smoke, both she and Esther were for the moment utterly paralyzed with fear. What they so dreaded had at last come to pa.s.s. The house was evidently on fire, and that fire set by a devilish ghost. What was to be done? Olive was the first to recover from the shock. Seizing the bucket of drinking water, always kept standing on the kitchen table, she rushed down the cellar stairs, and was horrified at the sight which burst upon her view. There in the far corner of the cellar was a barrel of shavings blazing almost to the floor above. In the meantime Esther had reached the cellar, and stood looking at the crackling flames in blank astonishment. The water Olive had poured into the barrel was not enough to quench the flames, for in the excitement of the moment she had spilled more than half of it on her way down. What was to be done? The house would catch and probably be burned to the ground, and they would be rendered homeless.

"Oh! if Dan were at home, he could put it out," Olive managed to articulate, for both she and Esther were nearly suffocated with the dense black smoke with which the cellar was filled, and now the barrel itself had caught. The cellar was very small, and everything in it would soon be blazing unless the fire could be extinguished at once.

"Oh! what shall we do," cried Esther, "what shall we do?"

"Run out in the street and cry fire as loud as you can. Come, let's run at once or the whole house will burn down," exclaimed Olive, by this time wild with fear.

So, both she and Esther ran up stairs and out into the street, crying "fire! fire!" Of course their cries aroused the whole neighborhood. At the moment a gentleman, a stranger in the village, who happened to be pa.s.sing, instantly threw off his coat, rushed into the cottage, picked up a mat from the dining room floor, and was down in the cellar in a second. He put the fire entirely out, and then, without waiting to be thanked, walked out of the cottage and was soon lost to view in the distance; and, what is remarkably strange, n.o.body knows who he was or whence he came, for from that day he has not been seen.

The news of the fire which the ghost had set in Dan's cellar soon travelled all over the country and created a great deal of curiosity.

People who had set the whole affair down as a fraud began to think that perhaps it was all true after all, for certainly no young girl could set fire to a barrel of shavings in the cellar and be at that instant in another part of the house, under the watchful eye of an older sister, who was continually at her side. The fact that both the little boys were out in the front yard at the time the fire was kindled, and consequently could not have had anything to do with setting it, was also calculated to throw an air of mystery around the whole affair.

The family believed that it had been started by the ghost. The fire marshals of the village seemed to be of the opinion that Esther set both fires herself; the villagers held various opinions. Dr. Nathan Tupper, suggested that if a good raw hide whip were laid over her back by a strong arm, the manifestations would cease at once. Fortunately for Esther, no one had the right or power to beat her as if she were a slave, and so the mystery still remained unsolved.

For the next week manifestations continued to take place daily and were as powerful as ever. The excitement in Amherst was intense. If the cottage in which Dan lived should catch fire when the wind was blowing from the bay, the fire would spread, and if the wind was favorable for such a terrible calamity, the whole village would soon be reduced to ashes.

As if to pile horror upon horror, one night, as Esther and the entire family were seated in the parlor, the ghost appeared. Esther started to her feet and seemed for the moment paralyzed with terror. In a second or two, however, she recovered her self-possession, and pointing with a trembling hand to a distant corner of the room, exclaimed in a hoa.r.s.e and broken voice:

"Look there! Look there! My _G.o.d_, it is the ghost! Don't you all see him? There he stands all in grey; see how his eyes are glaring at me and he laughs when he says I must leave the house to-night or he will start a fire in the loft under the roof and burn us all to death. Oh, what shall I do, where shall I go; the ground is covered with snow--and yet I cannot remain here, for he will do what he threatens; he always does."

"Oh, I wish I were dead." After this exclamation, she fell to the floor and burst into an agony of grief. "Well," said Dan, after lifting her up, "Something will have to be done, and quickly, too. The wind is blowing hard to-night, and if the ghost does as he threatens, the house will burn down sure, and perhaps the whole village. You must go, Esther.

Remember, I don't turn you out; it is this devil of a ghost who drives you from your home."

They all knew none of the neighbors would shelter Esther, because they all feared the ghost. What was to be done? Heaven only knew. It suddenly occurred to Dan that John White would perhaps give her shelter, for he had always taken a deep interest in the manifestations, and had often expressed pity for the unhappy girl. So Dan, after putting on his heavy coat--for it was snowing fast, and the night was intensely cold--went to White's house. After knocking for some time, the door was opened by John White himself. He looked at Dan a moment in amazement, and then exclaimed in an inquiring tone:

"What's the matter, Teed? Has the house burned to the ground or has the girl burst all to pieces?"

Dan explained his mission in a few words. When he had finished, White thought a moment, and then said:

"Wait until I ask my wife; if she says yes, all right, you may bring her here to-night." He asked his wife, and fortunately for the miserable girl, she said "yes," and that very night Esther c.o.x changed her home.

Chapter IV.

THE WALKING OF THE GHOST.

When John White took Esther to his house to reside, he performed a charitable deed, which no man in the village but himself had the heart to do. Both he and his good wife showed, by the kindness with which they treated the poor unhappy girl, that Heaven had at least inspired two hearts with that greatest of all virtues--_Charity_.

It was now January, 1879,--just four months since the manifestations first commenced. Esther had been at White's residence for two weeks, and had not seen anything of the ghost. She had improved very much in that short time, her nervousness having almost subsided, and she was contented and happy. Mrs. White, who found her of great a.s.sistance in the house, had become much attached to the girl, and treated her with the same kindness that she did her own children.

Towards the end of the third week her old enemy--the ghost--returned.

While Esther was scrubbing the hall at her new home, she was astonished to see her scrubbing brush disappear from her hand. When the ghost told her that he had taken it, she became much alarmed and screamed for Mrs.

White, who, with her daughter Mary, searched the hall for it in vain.

After they had abandoned their search, to the great astonishment of all, the brush fell from the ceiling--just grazing Esther's head in its fall.

Here was a new manifestation of the ghostly power. He was able to take a solid substance from this material world of ours, and render it invisible by taking it into his mysterious state of existence; and, if he could take one object why not another; if a brush, why not a broom?

But why speculate on so great a mystery? The ghost did it, and as we must draw the line somewhere, it is better to draw it here than to allow our minds to become dazed by such fellows as ghosts. Many other remarkable manifestations continued to take place almost daily for the next two weeks. The ghost could now tell how much money people had in their pockets, both by knocking and by telling Esther. He would answer any question asked in the above mentioned manner, and behaved himself very well indeed until the end of the sixth week, when his true devilish nature broke out again. He commenced setting fires about the house, and walking so that he could be heard distinctly. Of course John White would not run the risk of having his house burned down. So he persuaded Esther to remain during the day in his dining saloon, which stands opposite the well known book store of G.G. Bird, on the princ.i.p.al street.

While standing behind the counter in the dining saloon, also while she worked in the adjoining kitchen, many new and wonderful things were witnessed by the inhabitants of Amherst and by strangers from a distance, and many plans were tried to prevent the manifestations. Among others, some one suggested that if she could stand on gla.s.s they would cease. So pieces of gla.s.s were put into her shoes, but as their presence caused her head to ache and her nose to bleed, without stopping the manifestations, the idea was abandoned.

One morning the door of the large stove in the kitchen adjoining the saloon was opened and shut by the ghost, much to the annoyance of Mr.

White, who with an old axe handle so braced the door that it could not be moved by any known mundane power, unless the axe handle was first removed. A moment afterwards, however, the ghost, who seemed never to leave Esther's presence while she was in the saloon, lifted the door off its hinges, removed the axe handle from the position in which it had been placed, and, after throwing them some distance into the air, let both fall to the floor with a tremendous crash. Mr. White was speechless with astonishment, and immediately called in Mr. W.H. Rogers, Inspector of Fisheries for Nova Scotia. After bracing the door as before, the same wonderful manifestation was repeated, in the presence of Mr. Rogers. On another occasion, a clasp-knife belonging to little Fred, Mr. White's son, was taken from his hand by the ghost, who instantly stabbed Esther in the back with it, leaving the knife sticking in the wound, which bled profusely. Fred, after drawing the knife from the wound, wiped it, closed it and put it in his pocket. The ghost took it from his pocket, and in a second stuck it in the same wound. Fred again obtained possession of the knife, and this time hid it so that it could not be found, even by a ghost.

There is something still more remarkable, however, about the following manifestation: Some person tried the experiment of placing three or four large iron spikes on Esther's lap while she was seated in the Dining Saloon. To the astonishment of everybody, the spikes were not removed by the ghost, but instead, became too hot to be handled with comfort, and a second afterwards were thrown by the ghost to the far end of the saloon, a distance of twenty feet.

During her stay at the saloon the ghost commenced to move the furniture about in the broad daylight. On one occasion a large box, weighing fifty pounds, moved was a distance of fifteen feet without the slightest visible cause. The very loud knocking commenced again and was heard by crowds of people, the saloon being continually filled with visitors.

Among other well known inhabitants of Amherst who saw the wonders at this period, I may mention William Hillson, Daniel Morrison, Robt.

Hutchinson, who is John White's son-in-law, and J. Albert Black, Esq., editor of the _Amherst Gazette_.