The Circular Staircase

e city, took a furnished house for the summer out of town, and found herself involved in one of

put up and the furniture covered with brown linen; for as many summers I had said good-by to my friends, and, after watching their perspiring hegir

wear and tear of my harrowing experiences. I have turned very gray-Liddy reminded me of it, only yesterday, by saying that a little bluing

going to use bluing at my tim

egins to go around with a lump in her throat, all I have to do is to threaten to return to Sunnyside, and she is fr

as the tenant at the time the thing happened-that I feel it my due to tell what I know. Mr. Jamieson, the de

ecisely as many years as the child has lived, like the man who started to carry the calf and ended by walking along with the bull on his shoulders. However, I did the best I could. When Gertrude got past the hair-ribbon age, and Halsey asked for a scarf-pin and put on long trousers-and a wonderful help t

denly changed. The winter Gertrude came out was nothing but a succession of sitting up late at night to bring her home from things, taking her to the dressmakers between naps the next day, and discouraging ineligible youths with either more money than brains, or more brains than money. Also, I acquired a great many things: to say lingerie for under-garments, "frocks" and "gowns" instead of dresses, and that b

Halsey suggested camping in the Adirondacks and Gertrude wanted Bar Harbor, we compromised on a good country house w

d moved from the house to the gardener's lodge, a few days before. As the lodge was far enough away from the house, it seemed to me that either fire or thieves could complete their work of destruction undisturbed. The property was an extensiv

roads. As for the house, it's big enough for a hospital, if it has a Queen An

if the series of catastrophes there did nothing else, it taught me one thing-that somehow, somewhere, from perhaps a half-civilized ancestor who wore a sheepskin garment and trailed his food or his prey, I have in me the instinct of the chase. Were I a man I should be a trapper of

been rather attentive to her the winter before, but as Halsey was always attentive to somebody, I had not thought of it seriously, although she was a charming girl. I knew of Mr. Armstrong only through his connection with the bank, where the

dead leaves, and on the way from the station, a short mile, while the car stuck in the mud, I found a bank showered with tiny forget-me-nots. The birds-don't ask me what kind; they all look alike to me, unless they have a hall mark of some bright color-th

hows what the country might be, under favorable circumstances. Never after that night did I put my

xpectedly with a pain in his right side, much worse when I was within hearing distance, and by afternoon he was started cityward. That night the cook's sister had a baby-the cook, seeing indecis

ub, and might come back. I have the usual scruples about coercing people's servants away, but few of us have any conscience regarding institutions or corporations-

p in the gardener's lodge, empty since the house was rented. The old man-he was white-haired and a

onths as ain't natchal. 'Tain't one thing an' 'tain't another-it's jest a door squealin' here, an' a winder closin' there, but

ght, and was afraid of her shadow in that great barn of a place, scre

rly the next morning, and if I gave him a key, he would come in time to get some sort of breakfast. I stood on the huge veranda and watched him shuffle along down the shado

woman of your age ought to have better sense." It usually braces Liddy to mention her age: she owns to forty-which is a

windows in the drawing-room and the billiard-room wing, and every one opens on a porch. And Mary

im in the kitchen and been feeding him what was left from dinner, inside of an hour, from fo

er lips tight a

d. "I am going to pack up, and

to part company, but never at the same time. "If you are afraid, I

ct was cool and spacious, but scarcely cozy. As Liddy and I went from one window to another, our voices echoed back at us uncomfortably. There was plenty of light-the electric plant down in

hich, separated only by a row of pillars, was a huge living-room. Beyond that was the drawing-room, and in the end, the billiard-room. Off the billiard-room, in the extreme

wise to a few things. Arnold Armstrong and his friends could sit here and play cards all nigh

ut to me the disgracefully dusty condition of the hard-wood floor, when suddenly the lights went out. We waited a moment; I think Liddy was stunned with fright, or she would have screamed. And then I clutched her by the arm and pointed to o