rned
her not to frighten the others by speaking about the affair at all, but
we could not leave off speaking about it among ourselves. We spoke about
it so much for the next few days, that at last my mother lost patience,
and forbade us to mention it again. At least she _pretended_ to lose
patience; in reality I believe she put a stop to the discussion because
she thought it might have a bad effect on our nerves, on mine especially;
for I found out afterwards that in her anxiety she even went the length
of writing about it to our old doctor at home, and that it was by his
advice she acted in forbidding us to talk about it any more. Poor dear
mother! I don't know that it was very sound advice. One's mind often
runs all the more on things one is forbidden to mention. It certainly
was so with me, for I thought over my strange adventure almost
incessantly for some days after we left off talking about it."

Here Margaret paused.

"And is that all?" I asked, feeling a little disappointed, I think, at
the unsatisfactory ending to the "true ghost story."

"All!" repeated Lady Farquhar, rousing herself as if from a reverie,
"all! oh, dear no. I have sometimes wished it had been, for I don't
think what I have told you would have left any long-lasting impression
on me. All! oh, dear no. I am only at the beginning of my story."

So we resettled ourselves again to listen, and Lady Farquhar
continued:--

"For some days, as I said, I could not help thinking a good deal of the
mysterious old woman I had seen. Still, I assure you, I was not exactly
frightened. I was more puzzled--puzzled and annoyed at not being able in
any way to explain the mystery. But by ten days or so from the time of
my first adventure the impression was beginning to fade. Indeed, the day
before the evening I am now going to tell you of, I don't think my old
lady had been in my head at all. It was filled with other things. So,
don't you see, the explaining away what I saw as entirely a delusion,
a fancy of my own brain, has a weak point here; for _had_ it been all
my fancy, it would surely have happened _sooner_--at the time my mind
really was full of the subject. Though even if it had been so, it would
not have explained the curious coincidence of my 'fancy' with facts,
actual facts of which at the time I was in complete ignorance. It must
have been just about ten days after my first adventure that I happened
one evening, between eight and nine o'clock, to b