Glamis Castle

Scary Books: Scottish Ghost Stories

Of all the hauntings in Scotland, none has gained such widespread

notoriety as the hauntings of Glamis Castle, the seat of the Earl of

Strathmore and Kinghorne in Forfarshire.



Part of the castle--that part which is the more frequently haunted--is

of ancient though uncertain date, and if there is any truth in the

tradition that Duncan was murdered there by Macbeth, must, at any

rate, have been in existence at the commencement of the eleventh

century. Of course, extra buildings have, from time to time, been

added, and renovations made; but the original structure remains pretty

nearly the same as it always has been, and is included in a square

tower that occupies a central position, and commands a complete view

of the entire castle.



Within this tower--the walls of which are fifteen feet thick--there

is a room, hidden in some unsuspected quarter, that contains a secret

(the keynote to one, at least, of the hauntings) which is known only

to the Earl, his heir (on the attainment of his twenty-first

birthday), and the factor of the estate.



In all probability, the mystery attached to this room would challenge

but little attention, were it not for the fact that unearthly noises,

which at the time were supposed to proceed from this chamber, have

been heard by various visitors sleeping in the Square Tower.



The following experience is said to have happened to a lady named

Bond. I append it more or less in her own words.





It is a good many years since I stayed at Glamis. I was, in fact, but

little more than a child, and had only just gone through my first

season in town. But though young, I was neither nervous nor

imaginative; I was inclined to be what is termed stolid, that is to

say, extremely matter-of-fact and practical. Indeed, when my friends

exclaimed, You don't mean to say you are going to stay at Glamis!

Don't you know it's haunted? I burst out laughing.



Haunted! I said, how ridiculous! There are no such things as

ghosts. One might as well believe in fairies.



Of course I did not go to Glamis alone--my mother and sister were with

me; but whereas they slept in the more modern part of the castle, I

was, at my own request, apportioned a room in the Square Tower.



I cannot say that my choice had anything to do with the secret

chamber. That, and the alleged mystery, had been dinned into my ears

so often that I had grown thoroughly sick of the whole thing. No, I

wanted to sleep in the Square Tower for quite a different reason, a

reason of my own. I kept an aviary; the tower was old; and I naturally

hoped its walls would be covered with ivy and teeming with birds'

nests, some of which I might be able to reach--and, I am ashamed to

say, plunder--from my window.



Alas, for my expectations! Although the Square Tower was so ancient

that in some places it was actually crumbling away--not the sign of a

leaf, not the vestige of a bird's nest could I see anywhere; the

walls were abominably, brutally bare. However, it was not long before

my disappointment gave way to delight; for the air that blew in

through the open window was so sweet, so richly scented with heather

and honeysuckle, and the view of the broad, sweeping, thickly wooded

grounds so indescribably charming, that, despite my inartistic and

unpoetical nature, I was entranced--entranced as I had never been

before, and never have been since. Ghosts! I said to myself,

ghosts! how absurd! how preposterously absurd! such an adorable spot

as this can only harbour sunshine and flowers.



I well remember, too--for, as I have already said, I was not

poetical--how much I enjoyed my first dinner at Glamis. The long

journey and keen mountain air had made me hungry, and I thought I had

never tasted such delicious food--such ideal salmon (from the Esk) and

such heavenly fruit. But I must tell you that, although I ate

heartily, as a healthy girl should, by the time I went to bed I had

thoroughly digested my meal, and was, in fact, quite ready to partake

of a few oatmeal biscuits I found in my dressing-case, and remembered

having bought at Perth. It was about eleven o'clock when my maid left

me, and I sat for some minutes wrapped in my dressing gown, before the

open window. The night was very still, and save for an occasional

rustle of the wind in the distant tree-tops, the hooting of an owl,

the melancholy cry of a peewit and the hoarse barking of a dog, the

silence was undisturbed.



The interior of my room was, in nearly every particular, modern.

The furniture was not old; there were no grim carvings; no

grotesquely-fashioned tapestries on the walls; no dark cupboards; no

gloomy corners;--all was cosy and cheerful, and when I got into bed no

thought of bogle or mystery entered my mind.



In a few minutes I was asleep, and for some time there was nothing but

a blank--a blank in which all identity was annihilated. Then suddenly

I found myself in an oddly-shaped room with a lofty ceiling, and a

window situated at so great a distance from the black oaken floor as

to be altogether inaccessible from within. Feeble gleams of

phosphorescent light made their way through the narrow panes, and

served to render distinct the more prominent objects around; but my

eyes struggled in vain to reach the remoter angles of the wall, one of

which inspired me with terror such as I had never felt before. The

walls were covered with heavy draperies that were sufficient in

themselves to preclude the possibility of any save the loudest of

sounds penetrating without.



The furniture, if such one could call it, puzzled me. It seemed more

fitted for the cell of a prison or lunatic asylum, or even for a

kennel, than for an ordinary dwelling-room. I could see no chair, only

a coarse deal table, a straw mattress, and a kind of trough. An air of

irredeemable gloom and horror hung over and pervaded everything. As I

stood there, I felt I was waiting for something--something that was

concealed in the corner of the room I dreaded. I tried to reason with

myself, to assure myself that there was nothing there that could hurt

me, nothing that could even terrify me, but my efforts were in

vain--my fears grew. Had I had some definite knowledge as to the cause

of my alarm I should not have suffered so much, but it was my

ignorance of what was there, of what I feared, that made my terror so

poignant. Each second saw the agony of my suspense increase. I dared

not move. I hardly dare breathe, and I dreaded lest the violent

pulsation of my heart should attract the attention of the Unknown

Presence and precipitate its coming out. Yet despite the perturbation

of my mind, I caught myself analysing my feelings. It was not danger I

abhorred so much, as its absolute effect--fright. I shuddered at the

bare thought of what result the most trivial incident--the creaking of

a board, ticking of a beetle, or hooting of an owl--might have on the

intolerable agitation of my soul.



In this unnerved and pitiable condition I felt that the period was

bound to come, sooner or later, when I should have to abandon life and

reason together in the most desperate of struggles with--fear.



At length, something moved. An icy chill ran through my frame, and the

horror of my anticipations immediately reached its culminating point.

The Presence was about to reveal itself.



The gentle rubbing of a soft body on the floor, the crack of a bony

joint, breathing, another crack, and then--was it my own excited

imagination--or the disturbing influence of the atmosphere--or the

uncertain twilight of the chamber that produced before me, in the

stygian darkness of the recess, the vacillating and indistinct outline

of something luminous, and horrid? I would gladly have risked futurity

to have looked elsewhere--I could not. My eyes were fixed--I was

compelled to gaze steadily in front of me.



Slowly, very slowly, the thing, whatever it was, took shape.

Legs--crooked, misshapen, human legs. A body--tawny and hunched.

Arms--long and spidery, with crooked, knotted fingers. A head--large

and bestial, and covered with a tangled mass of grey hair that hung

around its protruding forehead and pointed ears in ghastly mockery of

curls. A face--and herein was the realisation of all my direst

expectations--a face--white and staring, piglike in formation,

malevolent in expression; a hellish combination of all things foul and

animal, and yet withal not without a touch of pathos.



As I stared at it aghast, it reared itself on its haunches after the

manner of an ape, and leered piteously at me. Then, shuffling forward,

it rolled over, and lay sprawled out like some ungainly turtle--and

wallowed, as for warmth, in the cold grey beams of early dawn.



At this juncture the handle of the chamber door turned, some one

entered, there was a loud cry--and I awoke--awoke to find the whole

tower, walls and rafters, ringing with the most appalling screams I

have ever heard,--screams of some thing or of some one--for there was

in them a strong element of what was human as well as animal--in the

greatest distress.



Wondering what it meant, and more than ever terrified, I sat up in bed

and listened,--listened whilst a conviction--the result of intuition,

suggestion, or what you will, but a conviction all the same--forced me

to associate the sounds with the thing in my dream. And I associate

them still.





It was, I think, in the same year--in the year that the foregoing

account was narrated to me--that I heard another story of the

hauntings at Glamis, a story in connection with a lady whom I will

call Miss Macginney. I append her experience as nearly as possible as

she is stated to have told it.





I seldom talk about my adventure, Miss Maginney announced, because so

many people ridicule the superphysical, and laugh at the mere mention

of ghosts. I own I did the same myself till I stayed at Glamis; but a

week there quite cured me of scepticism, and I came away a confirmed

believer.



The incident occurred nearly twenty years ago--shortly after my return

from India, where my father was then stationed.



It was years since I had been to Scotland, indeed I had only once

crossed the border and that when I was a babe; consequently I was

delighted to receive an invitation to spend a few weeks in the land of

my birth. I went to Edinburgh first--I was born in Drumsheugh

Gardens--and thence to Glamis.



It was late in the autumn, the weather was intensely cold, and I

arrived at the castle in a blizzard. Indeed, I do not recollect ever

having been out in such a frightful storm. It was as much as the

horses could do to make headway, and when we reached the castle we

found a crowd of anxious faces eagerly awaiting us in the hall.



Chilled! I was chilled to the bone, and thought I never should thaw.

But the huge fires and bright and cosy atmosphere of the rooms--for

the interior of Glamis was modernised throughout--soon set me right,

and by tea time I felt nicely warm and comfortable.



My bedroom was in the oldest part of the castle--the Square Tower--but

although I had been warned by some of the guests that it might be

haunted, I can assure you that when I went to bed no subject was

farther from my thoughts than the subject of ghosts. I returned to my

room at about half-past eleven. The storm was then at its height--all

was babel and confusion--impenetrable darkness mingled with the

wildest roaring and shrieking; and when I peeped through my casement

window I could see nothing--the panes were shrouded in snow--snow

which was incessantly dashed against them with cyclonic fury. I fixed

a comb in the window-frame so as not to be kept awake by the constant

jarring; and with the caution characteristic of my sex looked into

the wardrobe and under the bed for burglars--though Heaven knows what

I should have done had I found one there--placed a candlestick and

matchbox on the table by my bedside, lest the roof or window should be

blown in during the night or any other catastrophe happen, and after

all these preparations got into bed. At this period of my life I was a

sound sleeper, and, being somewhat unusually tired after my journey, I

was soon in a dreamless slumber. What awoke me I cannot say, but I

came to myself with a violent start, such as might have been

occasioned by a loud noise. Indeed, that was, at first, my impression,

and I strained my ears to try and ascertain the cause of it. All was,

however, silent. The storm had abated, and the castle and grounds were

wrapped in an almost preternatural hush. The sky had cleared, and the

room was partially illuminated by a broad stream of silvery light that

filtered softly in through the white and tightly drawn blinds. A

feeling that there was something unnatural in the air, that the

stillness was but the prelude to some strange and startling event,

gradually came over me. I strove to reason with myself, to argue that

the feeling was wholly due to the novelty of my surroundings, but my

efforts were fruitless. And soon there stole upon me a sensation to

which I had been hitherto an utter stranger--I became afraid. An

irrepressible tremor pervaded my frame, my teeth chattered, my blood

froze. Obeying an impulse--an impulse I could not resist, I lifted

myself up from the pillows, and, peering fearfully into the shadowy

glow that lay directly in front of me--listened. Why I listened I do

not know, saving that an instinctive spirit prompted me. At first I

could hear nothing, and then, from a direction I could not define,

there came a noise, low, distinct, uninterpretative. It was repeated

in rapid succession, and speedily construed itself into the sound of

mailed footsteps racing up the long flight of stairs at the end of the

corridor leading to my room. Dreading to think what it might be, and

seized with a wild sentiment of self-preservation, I made frantic

endeavours to get out of bed and barricade my door. My limbs, however,

refused to move. I was paralysed. Nearer and nearer drew the sounds;

and I could at length distinguish, with a clearness that petrified my

very soul, the banging and clanging of sword scabbards, and the

panting and gasping of men, sore pressed in a wild and desperate race.

And then the meaning of it all came to me with hideous abruptness--it

was a case of pursued and pursuing--the race was for--LIFE. Outside my

door the fugitive halted, and from the noise he made in trying to draw

his breath, I knew he was dead beat. His antagonist, however, gave him

but scant time for recovery. Bounding at him with prodigious leaps, he

struck him a blow that sent him reeling with such tremendous force

against the door, that the panels, although composed of the stoutest

oak, quivered and strained like flimsy matchboard.



The blow was repeated; the cry that rose in the victim's throat was

converted into an abortive gurgling groan; and I heard the ponderous

battle-axe carve its way through helmet, bone, and brain. A moment

later came the sound of slithering armour; and the corpse, slipping

sideways, toppled to the ground with a sonorous clang.



A silence too awful for words now ensued. Having finished his hideous

handiwork, the murderer was quietly deliberating what to do next;

whilst my dread of attracting his attention was so great that I

scarcely dare breathe. This intolerable state of things had already

lasted for what seemed to me a lifetime, when, glancing involuntarily

at the floor, I saw a stream of dark-looking fluid lazily lapping its

way to me from the direction of the door. Another moment and it would

reach my shoes. In my dismay I shrieked aloud. There was a sudden stir

without, a significant clatter of steel, and the next moment--despite

the fact that it was locked--the door slowly opened. The limits of my

endurance had now happily been reached, the over-taxed valves of my

heart could stand no more--I fainted. On my awakening to consciousness

it was morning, and the welcome sun rays revealed no evidences of the

distressing drama. I own I had a hard tussle before I could make up my

mind to spend another night in that room; and my feelings as I shut

the door on my retreating maid, and prepared to get into bed, were not

the most enviable. But nothing happened, nor did I again experience

anything of the sort till the evening before I left. I had lain down

all the afternoon--for I was tired after a long morning's tramp on the

moors, a thing I dearly love--and I was thinking it was about time to

get up, when a dark shadow suddenly fell across my face.



I looked up hastily, and there, standing by my bedside and bending

over me, was a gigantic figure in bright armour.



Its visor was up, and what I saw within the casque is stamped for ever

on my memory. It was the face of the dead--the long since dead--with

the expression--the subtly hellish expression--of the living. As I

gazed helplessly at it, it bent lower. I threw up my hands to ward it

off. There was a loud rap at the door. And as my maid softly entered

to tell me tea was ready--it vanished.





The third account of the Glamis hauntings was told me as long ago as

the summer of 1893. I was travelling by rail from Perth to Glasgow,

and the only other occupant of my compartment was an elderly

gentleman, who, from his general air and appearance, might have been

a dominie, or member of some other learned profession. I can see him

in my mind's eye now--a tall, thin man with a premature stoop. He had

white hair, which was brushed forward on either side of his head in

such a manner as suggested a wig; bushy eyebrows; dark, piercing eyes;

and a stern, though somewhat sad, mouth. His features were fine and

scholarly; he was clean-shaven. There was something about

him--something that marked him from the general horde--something that

attracted me, and I began chatting with him soon after we left Perth.



In the course of a conversation, that was at all events interesting to

me, I adroitly managed to introduce the subject of ghosts--then, as

ever, uppermost in my thoughts.





Well, he said, I can tell you of something rather extraordinary that

my mother used to say happened to a friend of hers at Glamis. I have

no doubt you are well acquainted with the hackneyed stories in

connection with the hauntings at the castle; for example, Earl Beardie

playing cards with the Devil, and The Weeping Woman without Hands or

Tongue. You can read about them in scores of books and magazines. But

what befel my mother's friend, whom I will call Mrs. Gibbons--for I

have forgotten her proper name--was apparently of a novel nature. The

affair happened shortly before Mrs. Gibbons died, and I always thought

that what took place might have been, in some way, connected with her

death.



She had driven over to the castle one day--during the absence of the

owner--to see her cousin, who was in the employ of the Earl and

Countess. Never having been at Glamis before, but having heard so much

about it, Mrs. Gibbons was not a little curious to see that part of

the building, called the Square Tower, that bore the reputation of

being haunted.



Tactfully biding an opportunity, she sounded her relative on the

subject, and was laughingly informed that she might go anywhere about

the place she pleased, saving to one spot, namely, Bluebeard's

Chamber; and there she could certainly never succeed in poking her

nose, as its locality was known only to three people, all of whom were

pledged never to reveal it. At the commencement of her tour of

inspection, Mrs. Gibbons was disappointed--she was disappointed in the

Tower. She had expected to see a gaunt, grim place, crumbling to

pieces with age, full of blood-curdling, spiral staircases, and deep,

dark dungeons; whereas everything was the reverse. The walls were in

an excellent state of preservation--absolutely intact; the rooms

bright and cheerful and equipped in the most modern style; there were

no dungeons, at least none on view, and the passages and staircases

were suggestive of nothing more alarming than--bats! She was

accompanied for some time by her relative, but, on the latter being

called away, Mrs. Gibbons continued her rambles alone. She had

explored the lower premises, and was leisurely examining a handsomely

furnished apartment on the top floor, when, in crossing from one side

of the room to the other, she ran into something. She looked

down--nothing was to be seen. Amazed beyond description, she thrust

out her hands, and they alighted on an object, which she had little

difficulty in identifying. It was an enormous cask or barrel lying in

a horizontal position.



She bent down close to where she felt it, but she could see

nothing--nothing but the well-polished boards of the floor. To make

sure again that the barrel was there, she gave a little kick--and drew

back her foot with a cry of pain. She was not afraid--the sunshine in

the room forbade fear--only exasperated. She was certain a barrel was

there--that it was objective--and she was angry with herself for not

seeing it. She wondered if she were going blind; but the fact that

other objects in the room were plainly visible to her, discountenanced

such an idea. For some minutes she poked and jabbed at the Thing, and

then, seized with a sudden and uncontrollable panic, she turned round

and fled. And as she tore out of the room, along the passage and down

the seemingly interminable flight of stairs, she heard the barrel

behind her in close pursuit-bump--bump--bump!



At the foot of the staircase Mrs. Gibbons met her cousin, and, as she

clutched the latter for support, the barrel shot past her, still

continuing its descent--bump--bump--bump! (though the steps as far as

she could see had ended)--till the sounds gradually dwindled away in

the far distance.



Whilst the manifestations lasted, neither Mrs. Gibbons nor her cousin

spoke; but the latter, as soon as the sounds had ceased, dragged Mrs.

Gibbons away, and, in a voice shaking with terror, cried: Quick,

quick--don't, for Heaven's sake, look round--worse has yet to come.

And, pulling Mrs. Gibbons along in breathless haste, she

unceremoniously hustled her out of the Tower.



That was no barrel! Mrs. Gibbons's cousin subsequently remarked by

way of explanation. I saw it--I have seen it before. Don't ask me to

describe it. I dare not--I dare not even think of it. Whenever it

appears, a certain thing happens shortly afterwards. Don't, don't on

any account say a word about it to any one here. And Mrs. Gibbons, my

mother told me, came away from Glamis a thousand times more curious

than she was when she went.





The last story I have to relate is one I heard many years ago, when I

was staying near Balmoral. A gentleman named Vance, with strong

antiquarian tastes, was staying at an inn near the Strathmore estate,

and, roaming abroad one afternoon, in a fit of absent-mindedness

entered the castle grounds. It so happened--fortunately for him--that

the family were away, and he encountered no one more formidable than a

man he took to be a gardener, an uncouth-looking fellow, with a huge

head covered with a mass of red hair, hawk-like features, and high

cheek-bones, high even for a Scot. Struck with the appearance of the

individual, Mr. Vance spoke, and, finding him wonderfully civil, asked

whether, by any chance, he ever came across any fossils, when digging

in the gardens.



I dinna ken the meaning of fossils, the man replied. What are

they?



Mr. Vance explained, and a look of cunning gradually pervaded the

fellow's features. No! he said, I've never found any of those

things, but if you'll give me your word to say nothing about it, I'll

show you something I once dug up over yonder by the Square Tower.



Do you mean the Haunted Tower?--the Tower that is supposed to contain

the secret room? Mr. Vance exclaimed.



An extraordinary expression--an expression such as Mr. Vance found it

impossible to analyse--came into the man's eyes. Yes! that's it! he

nodded. What people call--and rightly call--the Haunted Tower. I got

it from there. But don't you say naught about it!



Mr. Vance, whose curiosity was roused, promised, and the man, politely

requesting him to follow, led the way to a cottage that stood near by,

in the heart of a gloomy wood. To Mr. Vance's astonishment the

treasure proved to be the skeleton of a hand--a hand with abnormally

large knuckles, and the first joint--of both fingers and thumb--much

shorter than the others. It was the most extraordinarily shaped hand

Mr. Vance had ever seen, and he did not know in the least how to

classify it. It repelled, yet interested him, and he eventually

offered the man a good sum to allow him to keep it. To his

astonishment the money was refused. You may have the thing, and

welcome, the fellow said. Only, I advise you not to look at it late

at night; or just before getting into bed. If you do, you may have bad

dreams.



I will take my chance of that! Mr. Vance laughed. You see, being a

hard-headed cockney, I am not superstitious. It is only you

Highlanders, and your first cousins the Irish, who believe nowadays in

bogles, omens, and such-like; and, packing the hand carefully in his

knapsack, Mr. Vance bid the strange-looking creature good morning, and

went on his way.



For the rest of the day the hand was uppermost in his

thoughts--nothing had ever fascinated him so much. He sat pondering

over it the whole evening, and bedtime found him still examining

it--examining it upstairs in his room by candlelight. He had a hazy

recollection that some clock had struck twelve, and he was beginning

to feel that it was about time to retire, when, in the mirror opposite

him, he caught sight of the door--it was open.



By Jove! that's odd! he said to himself. I could have sworn I shut

and bolted it. To make sure, he turned round--the door was closed.

An optical delusion, he murmured; I will try again.



He looked into the mirror--the door reflected in it was--open. Utterly

at a loss to know how to explain the phenomenon, he leaned forward in

his seat to examine the glass more carefully, and as he did so he

gave a start. On the threshold of the doorway was a shadow--black and

bulbous. A cold shiver ran down Mr. Vance's spine, and just for a

moment he felt afraid, terribly afraid; but he quickly composed

himself--it was nothing but an illusion--there was no shadow there in

reality--he had only to turn round, and the thing would be gone. It

was amusing--entertaining. He would wait and see what happened.



The shadow moved. It moved slowly through the air like some huge

spider, or odd-shaped bird. He would not acknowledge that there was

anything sinister about it--only something droll--excruciatingly droll.

Yet it did not make him laugh. When it had drawn a little nearer, he

tried to diagnose it, to discover its material counterpart in one of

the objects around him; but he was obliged to acknowledge his attempts

were failures--there was nothing in the room in the least degree like

it. A vague feeling of uneasiness gradually crept over him--was the

thing the shadow of something with which he was familiar, but could not

just then recall to mind--something he feared--something that was

sinister? He struggled against the idea, he dismissed it as absurd; but

it returned--returned, and took deeper root as the shadow drew nearer.

He wished the house was not quite so silent--that he could hear some

indication of life--anything--anything for companionship, and to rid

him of the oppressive, the very oppressive, sense of loneliness and

isolation.



Again a thrill of terror ran through him.



Look here! he exclaimed aloud, glad to hear the sound of his own

voice. Look here! if this goes on much longer I shall begin to think

I'm going mad. I have had enough, and more than enough, of magic

mirrors for one night--it's high time I got into bed. He strove to

rise from his chair--to move; he was unable to do either; some

strange, tyrannical force held him a prisoner.



A change now took place in the shadow; the blurr dissipated, and the

clearly defined outlines of an object--an object that made Mr. Vance

perfectly sick with apprehension--slowly disclosed themselves. His

suspicions were verified--it was the HAND!--the hand--no longer

skeleton, but covered with green, mouldering flesh--feeling its way

slyly and stealthily towards him--towards the back of his chair! He

noted the murderous twitching of its short, flat finger-tips, the

monstrous muscles of its hideous thumb, and the great, clumsy hollows

of its clammy palm. It closed in upon him; its cold, slimy, detestable

skin touched his coat--his shoulder--his neck--his head! It pressed

him down, squashed, suffocated him! He saw it all in the glass--and

then an extraordinary thing happened. Mr. Vance suddenly became

animated. He got up and peeped furtively round. Chairs, bed, wardrobe,

had all disappeared--so had the bedroom--and he found himself in a

small, bare, comfortless, queerly constructed apartment without a

door, and with only a narrow slit of a window somewhere near the

ceiling.



He had in one of his hands a knife with a long, keen blade, and his

whole mind was bent on murder. Creeping stealthily forward, he

approached a corner of the room, where he now saw, for the first

time--a mattress--a mattress on which lay a huddled-up form. What the

Thing was--whether human or animal--Mr. Vance did not know--did not

care--all he felt was that it was there for him to kill--that he

loathed and hated it--hated it with a hatred such as nothing else

could have produced. Tiptoeing gently up to it, he bent down, and,

lifting his knife high above his head, plunged it into the Thing's

body with all the force he could command.





He recrossed the room, and found himself once more in his apartment at

the inn. He looked for the skeleton hand--it was not where he had left

it--it had vanished. Then he glanced at the mirror, and on its

brilliantly polished surface saw--not his own face--but the face of

the gardener, the man who had given him the hand! Features, colour,

hair--all--all were identical--wonderfully, hideously identical--and

as the eyes met his, they smiled--devilishly.





Early the next day, Mr. Vance set out for the spinney and cottage;

they were not to be found--nobody had ever heard of them. He continued

his travels, and some months later, at a loan collection of pictures

in a gallery in Edinburgh, he came to an abrupt--a very abrupt--halt,

before the portrait of a gentleman in ancient costume. The face

seemed strangely familiar--the huge head with thick, red hair--the

hawk-like features--the thin and tightly compressed lips. Then, in a

trice, it all came back to him: the face he looked at was that of the

uncouth gardener--the man who had given him the hand. And to clinch

the matter, the eyes--leered.