The Ghost of Guir House

And now, dear comrade, think sometimes of her who loves you, and to

whom you have been the only joy; and she will be with you always,

although you may not know it, except in your dreams.

One more word. Think happily of the dead, for they are happy, and

in a way you can not understand. If you love them truly, rejoice

that they have gone, for what you call their death is but their

birth, with powers transcending those of their former state, as

light transcends the darkness. Disturb them not with idle

yearnings, lest your thought unsettle the serenity of their lives.

Let the ignorance which has ruined me be a warning. Some day I

shall complete my term of loneliness, and begin life anew. We will

know each other then, dear Paul, as here. Remember, I shall always

be your spirit guide. DOROTHY.

Henley folded the letter and looked about him in bewilderment, and

with a sense of loneliness he had never known before. He thought he

could realize the emptiness of life, the dissociation with all

things, of which Dorothy had spoken. He was adrift, without anchor in

either world. Heart-broken and crushed, he determined to find the

girl at all hazards, and bounded down the garden path in search of Ah

Ben, who alone could help him. At the last of the boxwood trees he

stopped, and then, in an agony of horror, beheld the roofless ruin

of the old house as Ah Ben had shown it to him. The crumbling walls

and broken belfry, half hidden amid the encroaching trees, were all

that was left of Guir House and its spacious grounds. Heaps of stone

and piles of rubbish beset his path, and the open portals, choked

with wild grass and bushes, showed glimpses of the sky beyond. In a

panic of terror lest his reason had gone, Paul flew madly on in the

direction from which Dorothy had first brought him. But not an

indication of what once were ornamental grounds remained. Beyond, an

unbroken forest was upon every side, and the growth was wild and

dense. On he rushed, with both hands pressed tightly against his

head, neither knowing nor caring whither he went. But at last two

shadowy forms emerged from a dense thicket of calmia upon his left,

and Paul felt that their influence was kindly, and that they had come

to guide him back into the world he had left behind.