Two days later we were seated in the firelight near the bed of Monsieur Picot. He had rallied some, though I was unable to say whether or not it was merely temporarily. The large old room was played upon by the flickering flame and a thousand ghostly shadows stole about the furniture and hid in the darkest corners. The bright, feverish face of the AbbÉ could be seen among the pillows. The rest of the bed was hidden by the half-drawn curtains. Nance sat upon a stool and gazed at the embers, beneath the andirons, from time to time lifting her face, aglow with interest. My patient, whom I cautioned to become less animated for his nerves' sake, was speaking. For many minutes he had been telling us of some of the strange and wonderful happenings within his old house, so long a mystery for the children of Oldmeadow.

"Now as for ghosts," said he whimsically, "it is a matter of choice. Frankly I rather like them, Mademoiselle.... Now there is the old lover's ghost of the banquet hall in the west wing. He's such a gentle, tobacco-loving shade. I assure you he is fully as harmless as a spinster. He is almost domesticated. A little timid, however, and a bit suspicious of you.... He—comes—every—Christmas—eve," he slowly and solemnly reiterated, with a twinkle in his eye, "and sits and dreams over the empty banquet table. The feast is ended. The spoils strew the table. Among the empty glasses and forgotten viands lies a broken fan. Here my gentle friend is to be found. He is a solemn spook.... Perhaps it is his liver, Monsieur Doctor.... Thus he sits with bowed head before the wreck of tasted pleasures, and seems to dream of another day. You may enter as quietly as you please, yet, with a sort of hurt expression about him, as if, though quite unconsciously, yet surely, you had gently broken his heart, he fades away like the smoke. This look of reproach upon his face, doubtless because of his knowledge of your innocent intentions, is tempered by plainly written forgiveness. When he is gone you catch the faint odor of tobacco, with the still more subtle perfume of a handkerchief, as if a lady had at least been present in his dreams."

"I think I should love him," ventured Nance, speaking softly.

"I hope you will, my daughter," was the AbbÉ's reply.... Then he continued:

"Perhaps my friendly ghost has something to do with the Love Story of the East Room and the Duel in the Wine Cellars.... Yes?" and he waited for an answer.

"Go on!" cried Nance gleefully, looking at me with an appeal to share her delight in the adventures of the old house.

"Prosper tells me," continued the AbbÉ, "that every midsummer's eve—you know I am always away in midsummer and I only know this of old Prosper—there is a beautiful quaintly dressed lady of the long ago who makes her abode in the great east room. She is a very weepy, pretty lady, at first, Prosper asserts. Then, when a great splendid buck of a fellow in laces and frills and long-plaited powdered hair comes climbing up by way of the portico, she quickly becomes very beautiful and the light of her eyes brightens the whole room. In fact it is this very brilliancy which attracts another gentleman who comes from the hallway. Immediately, with much bowing, he invites the gallant cavalier off to the wine cellars, where blood is spilled.... Now I tell Prosper it is merely rats he hears with his deaf old ears.

"'Non, Monsieur,' he insists; 'what of the casks of good red wine I find spilled upon the floor the morning following midsummer eve?'"

"He's right, Monsieur," said Nance simply. "I myself have seen the light and believed it elf-fire."

"I believe you, my dear-a," he replied.

"Go on," said she.

"Then there is the cabinet with the hidden drawer, and the secret stairway we shall climb when I am well.... Ah, it is at the top of the magic stairway where old Jacques finds his forest of Arden.... Some day you shall know.... There are the merry ghosts of two happy children in the very heydey of youth. There is the spook of an old vagabond who sleeps in dingles in phantom greenwoods. There, my children, are a thousand dreams of mine: the ghosts of yesterday; there the little narrow streets of old Paris—St. Jacques, Rue de l'AbbÉ de l'Epee, the Rue de la Fouarre; there, gentle Amiens and her great cathedral; a long, white road—le trimard—through Picardy; a tiny garret in the Rue St. Jacques, where first I knew all the bright hopes and brave fancies of youth. All—all these and a thousand more at the top of my secret stairs, and some day, le bon Dieu knows how soon, I shall bequeath it all—all to you!"

Then Nance bade him be quiet and began to smooth his brow with her hand. Presently he fell into a troubled sleep, murmuring of roads and rivers and tree-clad hills.

"I think we had better go, Charles," said she, leading the way into the library and closing the door after us. Old Prosper with the wonderful eyes, and who was deaf, was with his master.