And when the figure had disappeared, the reverend gentlemen went in, but with an expression of unmingled terror.
"Oh, do leave this house, sir—pray do!" cried Jones, as the reverend gentleman sank into his chair. "It's haunted!—I know, sir, it's haunted! If we stay we shall never go out of it alive!"
"Come what may," returned the reverend gentleman, apparently gasping for breath, "come what may, here will I remain. But," he added, "let me not control you. If you wish to leave, consider yourself at liberty to do so. Go, Jones—go, if you please."
Well, Jones thought this kind—very kind: he appreciated the privilege highly; but then—how was he to get out? He must necessarily go through the hall!—and there the spirit might perchance meet him alone! Could he have vanished through one of the windows, he would have done so with all the alacrity of which he was capable, but as he could not do this, he converted a necessity into a virtue, by saying, "I shouldn't, sir, like to leave you."
"Use your own discretion," said the reverend gentleman, calmly. "Until the morning dawns, Jones, here will I remain. There is much latent wickedness in this world, Jones. I mean by latent, hidden, private, secret."
"Yes, sir."
"Wickedness is in all ages wickedness, but it isn't in all ages proved to be wickedness."
"No, sir."
"Wickedness will, sometimes, prosper for a while."
"Yes, sir."
"But it never can prosper long."
"No, sir."
"It is certain to be found out, and when found out, punished, Jones."
"Yes, sir."
"None who deserve punishment escape."
"Very true, sir."
"This spirit which we have seen is, doubtless, the spirit of one who left the world with some secret unrevealed."
"No doubt, sir. But what do you think, sir, of ghosts in general?"
"The subject is above human comprehension, Jones, and therefore, we ought not to talk on that subject."
This closed Jones's mouth effectually, and he began to reflect upon his sins. He remembered that he was indebted to the estate of a deceased landlord to the amount of sevenpence-halfpenny, which sum, as no one but the landlord himself knew of it, he had never intended to pay. The questions which he therefore proposed were—First: Was this the spirit of that landlord?—Secondly: Would it answer the purpose of any spirit to revisit the earth to enforce the payment of the sum of sevenpence-halfpenny?—and, Thirdly: Wouldn't the spirit rest until that sum was paid? To these questions he could give no satisfactory answer. He thought that it would hardly be worth a spirit's while to disturb itself much about the sum of sevenpence-halfpenny, but he at
