Sir John Bollamore’s
wrath was enduring as well as fiery, for from that day Mrs. Brown, the
charwoman, vanished from our ken, and Thorpe Place knew her no more. And now I wish to tell you the singular chance which solved all these
strange questions and put my employer’s secret in my possession. The
story may leave you with some lingering doubt as to whether my curiosity
did not get the better of my honour, and whether I did not condescend to
play the spy. If you choose to think so I cannot help it, but can only
assure you that, improbable as it may appear, the matter came about
exactly as I describe it. The first stage in this _dénouement_ was that the small room on the
turret became uninhabitable. This occurred through the fall of the
worm-eaten oaken beam which supported the ceiling. Rotten with age, it
snapped in the middle one morning, and brought down a quantity of
plaster with it. Fortunately Sir John was not in the room at the time. His precious box was rescued from amongst the _débris_ and brought into
the library, where, henceforward, it was locked within his bureau. Sir
John took no steps to repair the damage, and I never had an opportunity
of searching for that secret passage, the existence of which I had
surmised. As to the lady, I had thought that this would have brought her
visits to an end, had I not one evening heard Mr. Richards asking Mrs.
Stevens who the woman was whom he had overheard talking to Sir John in
the library. I could not catch her reply, but I saw from her manner that
it was not the first time that she had had to answer or avoid the same
question. “You’ve heard the voice, Colmore?” said the agent. I confessed that I had. “And what do _you_ think of it?”

I shrugged my shoulders, and remarked that it was no business of mine. “Come, come, you are just as curious as any of us. Is it a woman or
not?”

“It is certainly a woman.”

“Which room did you hear it from?”

“From the turret-room, before the ceiling fell.”

“But I heard it from the library only last night. I passed the doors as
I was going to bed, and I heard something wailing and praying just as
plainly as I hear you. It may be a woman——”

“Why, what else _could_ it be?”

He looked at me hard. “There are more things in heaven and earth,” said he. “If it is a woman,
how does she get there?”

“I don’t know.”

“No, nor I. But if it is the other thing—but there, for a practical
business man at the end of the nineteenth century this is rather a
ridiculous line of conversation.” He turned away, but I saw that he felt
even more than he had said. To all the old ghost stories of Thorpe Place
a new one was being added before our very eyes. It may by this time have
taken its permanent place, for though an explanation came to me, it
never reached the others. And my explanation came in this way. I had suffered a sleepless night
from neuralgia, and about mid-day I had taken a heavy dose of chlorodyne
to alleviate the pain. At that time I was finishing the indexing of Sir
John Bollamore’s library, and it was my custom to work there from five
till seven. On this particular day I struggled against the double effect
of my bad night and the narcotic. I have already mentioned that there
was a recess in the library, and in this it was my habit to work. I
settled down steadily to my task, but my weariness overcame me and,
falling back upon the settee, I dropped into a heavy sleep. How long I slept I do not know, but it was quite dark when I awoke. Confused by the chlorodyne which I had taken, I lay motionless in a
semi-conscious state. The great room with its high walls covered with
books loomed darkly all round me. A dim radiance from the moonlight came
through the farther window, and against this lighter background I saw
that Sir John Bollamore was sitting at his study table. His well-set
head and clearly cut profile were sharply outlined against the
glimmering square behind him. He bent as I watched him, and I heard the
sharp turning of a key and the rasping of metal upon metal. As if in a
dream I was vaguely conscious that this was the japanned box which stood
in front of him, and that he had drawn something out of it, something
squat and uncouth, which now lay before him upon the table. I never
realized—it never occurred to my bemuddled and torpid brain that I was
intruding upon his privacy, that he imagined himself to be alone in the
room. And then, just as it rushed upon my horrified perceptions, and I
had half risen to announce my presence, I heard a strange, crisp,
metallic clicking, and then the voice. Yes, it was a woman’s voice; there could not be a doubt of it. But a
voice so charged with entreaty and with yearning love, that it will ring
for ever in my ears. It came with a curious far-away tinkle, but every
word was clear, though faint—very faint, for they were the last words of
a dying woman. “I am not really gone, John,” said the thin, gasping voice. “I am here
at your very elbow, and shall be until we meet once more. I die happy to
think that morning and night you will hear my voice. Oh, John, be
strong, be strong, until we meet again.”

I say that I had risen in order to announce my presence, but I could not
do so while the voice was sounding. I could only remain half lying, half
sitting, paralyzed, astounded, listening to those yearning distant
musical words. And he—he was so absorbed that even if I had spoken he
might not have heard me. But with the silence of the voice came my half
articulated apologies and explanations. He sprang across the room,
switched on the electric light, and in its white glare I saw him, his
eyes gleaming with anger, his face twisted with passion, as the hapless
charwoman may have seen him weeks before. “Mr. Colmore!” he cried. “You here! What is the meaning of this, sir?”

With halting words I explained it all, my neuralgia, the narcotic, my
luckless sleep and singular awakening. As he listened the glow of anger
faded from his face, and the sad, impassive mask closed once more over
his features. “My secret is yours, Mr. Colmore,” said he. “I have only myself to blame
for relaxing my precautions. Half confidences are worse than no
confidences, and so you may know all since you know so much. The story
may go where you will when I have passed away, but until then I rely
upon your sense of honour that no human soul shall hear it from your
lips. I am proud still—God help me!—or, at least, I am proud enough to
resent that pity which this story would draw upon me. I have smiled at
envy, and disregarded hatred, but pity is more than I can tolerate. “You have heard the source from which the voice comes—that voice which
has, as I understand, excited so much curiosity in my household. I am
aware of the rumours to which it has given rise. These speculations,
whether scandalous or superstitious, are such as I can disregard and
forgive. What I should never forgive would be a disloyal spying and
eavesdropping in order to satisfy an illicit curiosity.