The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1884-12-19
BEHIND THE TAPESTRY.

BEHIND THE TAPESTRY.
The first part of the strange story
which I am about to tell happened some
ten years ago.
Ten years ago I was in the first sor-
row of my %widowhood. I was child
less, too; and when the grave closed
over my husband I thought there was
no place for me in the world.
l was rich, young; and my friends
and my W reflections in the glass,
told me that I was beautiful.
OF ours I had many acquaintances;
what rich young widow has not? But
acquaintance and friends differ widely.
l did not care for the people who flat
tered and made much of me, but Turn
ed, even in the first days of my trouble,
to one friend.
She, too, was young and beautiful.
We were schoolfcllows; we were engage
ed ut the same time; we were married
in the same month Of the same year.
During the three years of my mar
ried life we had seer little of each 9TH
er, but when my husband died, and
Mary Clifford wrote to me tenderly out
other full heart, / answered back her
love.
She asked me to stay with her, and I
went.
How peaceful were those days spent
in her beautiful home! The house and
place were called Aspen's Vale. The
house was many centuries old. Its
architecture was remarkable; its rooms
curious. It was a rambling old place,
and of course it had a ghost. It stood
in the midst of very lovely grounds,
overlooking the wood and river. AL
together it was one of the show places
in-shire.
I stayed with the Cliffords for a cou-
pie of months. During that time the
house was quiet, visitors few-they
eschewed company for my sake.
At the end of two months left them,
comforted and helped, and with many
promises of by-and-by return.
Circumstances, however, too varied
and two many to mention, prevented
that second visit taking place for a cou-
pie of years. At the end of that time q
great longing came over me to see
Mary Clifford again. I must write to
her, and promise a visit. I did SO.
By return of post I got q short but
characteristic reply.
DEAREST HONOR: OF course I long
to see you, but unfortunately the house
is full. Large as it is, it is crammed
from cellar to attic.
My dear, I don't want to refuse you.
I do long to see you. Will you sleep in
the tapestry room? for, of course, it is
empty. I dare not put anybody else
there, but l don't think, you, Honor.
would be afraid of the ghost. If the
tapestry room will do, come, and a
thousand welcomes. I can put up your
maid. Your loving friend,
MARY CLIFFORD.
To this letter I made a short answer /:
I do not believe in the ghost. The
tapestry room will do beautifully. Ex-
pect me tomorrow.
The next evening I arrived at Asp en's
Vale in time for dinner. The tapestry
room looked charming. I fell in love
with it on the spot, and vowed laughing
w fhoe $ha ~hoek orl 1yo,,1l ,,oIa
friends. ~
Ny maid, however, looked grave over
my testing remarks; it was plain that
she believed in supernatural visitations.
Gayety of heart, however, was over
me. I could not resist the cheerful in
fiuence of my old friends company. I
felt happier than l had done since my
husbands death, and after a delightful
evening, retired to my room, feeling
brave enough to encounter any number
of ghosts that might choose to visit me.
The tapestry room was quite away from
the rest of the house it was at the end
of the wing.
No other bedrooms were in the wing.
There were q smoking room and a little
oriel chamber, which Mrs. Clifford in
her early married life had ~curiously
fitted up for herfelf, but now seldom
occupied. Neither did she believe in
the ghost, but she confessed that this
little oriel chamber had an eerie feel.
The morning-room opposite, cheer
full and pretty enough, was unused. Its
furniture was antique, it belonged to
o by-gone day, and its inhabitants
were dead. The smoking-room also
was deserted; ever the fumes Of tobac-
CO had left it, the squire preferring a
ore central apartment in the modern
part Of the house.
Altogether, this wing u the. old
house seemed dead. Visit,rs only came
to it out of curiosity: they paid brief
visits, and preferred doing so in broad
daylight.
It must have been quite a hundred
years since the Tapestry room in the
far end of the wing had been slept in.
Old as the other rooms in the wing
looked. the tapestry room bore quite the
palm Of ancient appearance. There
was not an article of furniture in it, not
a chair, not a table, which must not
have seen the light of centuries.
The furniture was all of the blacklist
oak; the bedstead the usual four-pos-
ter on which our ancestors loved to
stretch themselves. But the curious
feature of the room, that which gave it
its name, was the tapestry. Not an inch
Of the walls was to be seen; they were
hung completely with very ancient and
very faded tapestry. There was a story
about this tapestry. One Dame Clifford
of long, long by-gone days, had worked
it, with the help of her maidens. She
had come to an untimely end on the
very day on which the great work of
her life was completed.