"I'll come back and pack 'em," she said."Or perhaps you and Imogene will pack 'em for me.Oh, Mrs.Barnes, you've been so kind.I hate to leave you this way, I do, honest.""But WHY are you leavin'?" asked Thankful once more.For the first time Miss Timpson seemed to hesitate.She looked about, as if to make sure that the two were alone; then she leaned forward and whispered in her companion's ear.
"Mrs.Barnes," she whispered, "I--I didn't mean to tell you.Ididn't mean to tell anybody.'Twas too personal, too sacred a thing to tell.But I don't know's I shan't tell you after all;seem's as if I must tell somebody.Mrs.Barnes, I shan't live much longer.I've had a warning."Thankful stared at her.
"Rebecca Timpson!" she exclaimed."Have you gone crazy? What are you talkin' about? A warnin'!""Yes, a warning.I was warned last night.You--you knew I was a twin, didn't you?""A which?"
"A twin.Probably you didn't know it, but I used to have a twin sister, Medora, that died when she was only nineteen.She and Ilooked alike, and were alike, in most everything.We thought the world of each other, used to be together daytimes and sleep together nights.And she used to--er--well, she was different from me in one way--she couldn't help it, poor thing--she used to snore something dreadful.I used to scold her for it, poor soul.Many's the time I've reproached myself since, but--""For mercy sakes, what's your sister's snorin' got to do with--""Hush! Mrs.Barnes," with intense solemnity."As sure as you and I live and breathe this minute, my sister Medora came to me last night.""CAME to you! Why--you mean you dreamed about her, don't you?
There's nothin' strange in that.When you took that fourth cup of tea I said to myself--""HUSH! Oh, hush! DON'T talk so.I didn't dream.Mrs.Barnes, Iwoke up at two o'clock this morning and--and I heard Medora snoring as plain as I ever heard anything."Thankful was strongly tempted to laugh, but the expression on Miss Timpson's face was so deadly serious that she refrained.
"Goodness!" she exclaimed."Is that all? That's nothin'.A night like last night, with the rain and the blinds and the wind--""Hush! It wasn't the wind.Don't you suppose I know? I thought it was the wind or my imagination at first.But I laid there and listened and I kept hearing it.Finally I got up and lit my lamp;and still I heard it.It was snoring and it didn't come from the room I was in.It came from the little back room I'd made into a study."Thankful's smile faded.She was conscious of a curious prickling at the roots of her black hair.The back bedroom! The room in which Laban Eldredge died! The room in which she herself had heard--"I went into that room," continued Miss Timpson."I don't know how I ever did it, but I did.I looked everywhere, but there was nobody there, not a sign of anybody.And still that dreadful snoring kept on and on.And then I realized--" with a shudder, "Irealized what I hadn't noticed before; that room was exactly the size and shape of the one Medora and I used to sleep in.Mrs.
Barnes, it was Medora's spirit that had come to me.Do you wonder I can't stay here any longer?"Thankful fought with her feelings.She put a hand on the back of her neck and rubbed vigorously."Nonsense!" she declared, bravely.
"You imagined it.Nonsense! Whoever heard of a snorin' ghost?"But Miss Timpson only shook her head."Good-by, Thankful," she said."I shan't tell anybody; as I said, I didn't mean to tell you.If--if you hear that anything's happened to me--happened sudden, you know--you'll understand.You can tell Imogene and Mr.
Daniels and Mr.Hammond that I--that I've gone visiting to my cousin Sarah's.That'll be true, anyway.Good-by.You MAY see me again in this life, but I doubt it."She hurried away along the path.Thankful reentered the house and stood in the middle of the kitchen floor, thinking.Then she walked steadily to the foot of the back stairs, ascended them, and walked straight to the apartments so recently occupied by the schoolmistress.Miss Timpson's trunks were there and the greater part of her belongings.Mrs.Barnes did not stop to look at these.
She crossed the larger room and entered the little back bedroom.
The clouds were breaking and the light of the November sun shone in.The little room was almost cheerful.There were no sounds except those from without, the neigh of George Washington from his stall, the cackle of the hens, the hungry grunts of Patrick Henry, the pig, in his sty beside the kitchen.
Thankful looked and listened.Then she made a careful examination of the room, but found nothing mysterious or out of the ordinary.
And yet there was a mystery there.She had long since decided that her own experience in that room had been imagination, but now that conviction was shaken.Miss Timpson must have heard something; she HAD heard something which frightened her into leaving the boarding-house she professed to like so well.Ghost or no ghost, Miss Timpson had gone; and one more source of income upon which Mrs.
Barnes had depended went with her.Slowly, and with the feeling that not only this world but the next was conspiring to bring about the failure of her enterprise and the ruin of her plans and her hopes, Thankful descended the stairs to the kitchen and set about preparing breakfast.
