The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1882-12-07
A Woman Alone in the House.

A Woman Alone in the House.
When the house is all alone by it.
self, inexperienced persons may be-
lieve thai it behaves exactly as it
does when there are people in it, but
that is a deluSion, as you will dis
cover if you are ever left alone in it
at midnight sitting up for the fam
| lily; at this hour its true disposition
will reveal itself.
To catch it at its best pretend to
retire, put out the gas or lamp and
go up stairs. Afterwards, come
down softly, light no more than one
lamp, go into the empty parlor and
seat yourself at table with some
thing to read.
No sooner have you done so than
you Will hear little chip, chip,
chip, along the top of the room-a
small sound but persistent. It is
Ievldently the wall paper coming
OFF, and you decide after some trib-
ulation, that if it does come off you
J can't help it, and go on with your
! book.
AS you sit with your book in
your hand you begin to be quite
sure that some one is coming down
stairs. Squeak-squeak--squeak
What follyl There is nobody up
there to come down; but there
it is on the kitchen stairs. Some
body is coming up.
Squeak-snap! Well, if it is a
robber you might as we'll face him.
You get the poker and stand with
your back against the wall. Nobody
comes up, finally you decide that
you are a goose, put the poker
down, get magazine and try to
read
There, that's the door. You heard
the lock turn. They are coming
home, You run to the back door,
unlock and unbolt it, and peep out.
Nobody there?
But, as YOU linger, the door lock
gives click that makes you Jump.
BY daylight neither lock or stairs
make any of these noises unless
they are touched or trodden on.
You go back to the parlor in a
hurry, with feeling that the next
thing you know Something may
catch you by the back hair, and you
try to remember where you left off.
Now it is the table that snaps and
cracks as if all the spiritualist
knocks were hidden in its mahog
ANY, You dc not lean on it heavily
without this result, but it fdgets
you, and you take an easy chair and
Iput your book on your knees.
Your eyes wander up and down
the page and you grow dreamy
when, apparently, the bookcase fire;
off pistol.
! At least loud, fierce crack comes
from that piece of furniture-sC
loud, so fierce, that you jump to you
feet trembling.
You cannot stand the parlor any
how. You go up stairs.
II No sooner do you get there thai
: it seems to you that somebody il
walking on the roof. If the hous
is detached one and the thing j
impossible, that makes it all tn
more mysterious.
Nothing ever moaned in TIA
chimney before, but something
means now. There is a ghostl,
step in the bathroom. You find GU
afterwards it is the tap dripping
but you do not dare to look at tn
time.
: And it is evident that there i
}, something UP the chimney-yol
: would not like to ask what.
If you have gas it hobs up ant
a down in phantom dance. If yol
have q lamp it goes out in a blu
explosion. If you have a candle
shrOud plainly enWrapS the Wicl
and falls toward you.
The blinds shake as if a hant
clutched them, and, finally, a dole
full cat begins to moan in the cellar
You do not keep a cat and thi
It finishes you.
:. You pretend to read no longer, an
sitting with a towel over your hear
o and face, and hearing sometime
below go "shew, sheW, shew," Xix
a little saw, you believe in the oil
ghost stories.
4 Ten minutes later the bells ring
the belated one comes home, tn
lights are lit; perhaps somethin
must be put out to eat. Peopl
e talk and tell where they have beer
q and ask if you are lonesome.
d And not stair cracks. No ste
It is heard on the roof; no click to th
. front door. Neither bookcase nc
table cracks. The house has on il
% company manners-only you hay
5 found out how it behaves when
g is alone.