The Ghost of Guir House

"Do not let what you see alarm you, Mr. Henley, for it is the first

time in which you have perceived Guir House in what you would call

its normal state. As you now behold it, the majority of men would see

it."

"Then I have been duped ever since my arrival!" exclaimed Paul in a

slightly irritated tone.

"Not at all," answered the elder man complacently. "I have simply

presented the house to you as it stood a hundred years ago. The

impression you have had of it is quite as truthful as the one now

before you. Indeed, it is as truthful as the view you now have of

yonder star," he pointed to a twinkling luminary in the north; "for

time has put out its fires more than a thousand years ago, so that

you now behold it as it then was, and not as it is to-night."

"This hypnotism of yours is quite undoing me," answered Paul, passing

his hand across his eyes.

"And yet what you now behold is not hypnotism at all, but fact, as

the world would call it. It is what the vast majority of all men

would see if here to-night. But I perceive that it is troubling you.

Let us return to our old place by the fire, and the house as it was a

century ago. In that state of the past I think you will find more

comfort than in the melancholy ruin before us."

They climbed back over the fallen piles of bricks, stone, and mortar;

and then Ah Ben lifted his withered hand, and touching Henley lightly

upon the forehead, said: "And now we are back in our old seats, just as they used to be in the

days of yore!"

Paul looked about him. The fire was burning brightly. The pictures

had been restored to their places on the walls. The old lamp and the

strangely decorated staircase were all restored, just as he had left

them a few minutes before. He gazed long and earnestly at the scene

around him, and then fixing his eyes upon Ah Ben, helplessly, said: "If then I am to understand that this is no longer real, but that the

old ruin just beheld is the existing fact, might I ask in what part

of the wreck you and Miss Guir have been able to fix your abode, for

I saw nothing but crumbling walls--a roofless ruin?"

"The question you ask involves a story, and if you care to listen I

will tell it to you, although the hour is late and the night far

gone."