The Kootenai herald. [volume] (Kootenai, Idaho) 1891-1904, 1892-11-11

ginian, and now lives in Chicago. l shall
try to tell his story in his own words He
said:
I'm 1873 business deal put me in pos
session of what was known as the 'Brinck-
ley place. in Prince George county, Md,
nine or ten miles from Nottingham. l
moved to it from Baltimore. The perma-
nency of my residence lasted just eleven
days.
I'VE went there in May. When say
'we,' mean my wife Mary Emily, my boy
Marion r., my elderly maiden sister Miss
Cynthia Prime and my brother Robert,
then about twenty-seven years old. My
wife's sister, Miss Julia G. Riddell, joined
us a few dty VS. later. The mansion was
fine old structure, splendidly built and of
imposing appearance, having frontage of
fifty feet and a depth of at least sixty.
From large entrance hall, occupying the
middle of the front half of the main floor,
a mahogany rallied staircase, six feet wide,
swept upward by single curve to the
floor above. Left of that hall were re-
ception room and dining room. All to
the right was one huge parlor, suitable
only for state occasions. The head of the
staircase on the second floor was in big
interior space, front and rear of which, and
separated from it only by portieres were
two large apartments, 20 by Is feet, which
we proposed to use as family parlOr and
sitting room. On each side were four
spacious bedrooms, those on the right
slightly diminished by straight stairway,
four feet wide, leading to the third floor
A gallery on the third floor surrounded
the central space which was covered by a
skylight of glass. Twelve bedrooms, in
suites, opened from the gallery.
1.-THE first thing to claim our attention
was the treacherous uncertainty of the
first or last steps-either up or down-of
the main stairway. That made itself APP
parent the first day while we were NOV
ing in, and there was much going from
floor to floor. One ascending the stairs
would either, catching his toe on the rise Of
the last step, tumble forward, smashing
anything he carried that would break,
or he would raise his foot high for a
wholly imaginary final step, and set it
down on the floor with slam that would
jar his teeth loose. But going down was
worse, for the main floor would seem to be
eight inches higher or lower to the sight
than it really was, and the person descend
ing would in either case reach it with jolt
that would seem to loosen the kneecaps
and jam the spine and snap the neck like a
whiplash.
Sometimes the mistake about the step
would occur at the top to the one going
down, and he would descend in cyclonic
whirl of arms and legs, sort of storm CEN
ter, emitting execratiOnal disturbances OF
the atmosphere. Those things happened
to all of us. OF course we blamed ourselves
and the light, and the strange steps; bit
when we came to think it over we were ell
sober, the light was exceptionally good
and the stairs were excellent. Yet we con
tinued to plunge and tumble until we
found our only security, going up or down
was in starting cautiously, going slow
feeling our way and counting the steps
There were twenty-one of them.
''By the third day there was not one Of
us who did not have one or two blacken"o
eyes and a skinned nose from running
against the edges of half opened doors
Wewould see a door either tightly CLOSED
or fully oper and prove the next moment
by painful confusion, that it was really
standing mi, way Then we got to going
around with one arm outstretched arr
bent across the breast as guard, for, .
my wife saia, "A door is liable to come @ L
and hit you at any moment right in y
middle of the room And an annoy
feature of this line of manifestations Y
that our attention would be irresistj' 4
claimed by noises, in apparently cloT
closets, which would compel instant IN
vestigation, with inevitably consequent
personal dar age by the half open door
Those noises would seem to be the fall