"I thought I did, but I must have been mistaken. Terrified as we were, how could we trust the evidence of our senses? And do you suppose there's a lock in the house in proper order?"
"It must have been my fancy. Did _you_ see nothing?"
How should I answer her? Revive her terror by telling her that she was under no delusion, but that the spectral figure of the young girl had really presented itself; or, out of kindness to her, strive to banish her fears by a pardonable falsehood?
Before I decided how to act I felt it necessary to ascertain whether the cat lying in full view to me was visible to her.
"Maria," I said, "take the evidence of your senses. Look round the room--at the door, at the walls, at the ceiling, on the floor--and tell me what you see."
With timid eyes she obeyed, and glanced in every direction, not omitting the spot upon which the skeleton cat was lying.
"Does not that prove that the figure you spoke of was a trick of the imagination?"
All this time she had been sitting on the floor, keeping tight hold of me. I assisted her to her feet; she was so weak that she could hardly stand.
"For Heaven's sake!" she said "do not let us remain in the house another minute."
I was as anxious to leave as she was, and had I been alone I should have rushed downstairs in blind haste, but I had to attend to my wife. The power of rapid motion had deserted her, and when we were about to pass through the passage she shrunk back, fearing that the apparition of the young girl was lurking there. She experienced the same fear as we descended the stairs, and clung to me in terror when we approached an open door. I was grateful that the apparition of the cat--which followed us faithfully down to the hall--was invisible to her; if it had not been she would have lost her senses again, and it would have been hard work for me to carry her out, as she is by no means of a light weight.
The question which now agitated me was whether the cat would come into the streets with us, or would return to the resting place which should have been its last. It was soon and plainly answered.
I opened the street door, and stood upon the threshold. The cat stood there also. I paused to give it the opportunity of returning, but it evinced no desire to do so. I went down the stone steps to the front garden; the cat accompanied me. I walked through the front garden out of the gate, straight into Lamb's Terrace, and thence across the wretched wastes of ground into more cheerful thoroughfares; and the skeleton cat was by my side the whole of the time.