The Birkenhead News and Wirral General Advertiser. — 1893-12-23 (Birkenhead, Merseyside, England)

THE FACE WITH THB BROWN SPOT A PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY TOE CHRISTMAS.  BY .1. F. NISBET.  You ask me for a ghost story, a Christmas ghost Miry; something creepy,_ thrilling and up to date. I don't know that I can oldie you. I am bet at all sure that there are any ghosts in the old-fashioned sense of the term, and I am 24—a good hand at inventing them. I get all =host lore from the worthy people who relate experiences to the Psychical Research Society. At the name time. I believe with Handed that there is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in our philosophy, and an adventure whioh came under my notice stew years o seems to require at least all the resources of the mew Psychology to explain it. I I was living at that time in a brand-new villa ap Putney way, the last place in the world where one would expect any visitation of a ghostly, or let me say ultra-scientific, nature to wear. The 'house stood alone, but it was in a main road, with houses on either side of it, and I cannot better describe it than by saying tnat it was a suburban residence of the "eligible" class—rent £l2O a year. My neighbours were as prosaic as one could wish. The nearest one regularly caught the 9.45 am. train up to town. I understood he was secretary to a  the hones in the middle of the night, and that he had been asleep from twelve till half-past six without stirring. As I pressed him with questions, and as he gathered that one of my friends had been disturbed in the night, the man, I fancy, looked guilty, or, at least, uneasy in his mind, but in the face of his reiterated denials I oould do nothing. We were driven back upon the theory that M'lntosh had been walking in his sleep, which, of course, was satisfactory en onol in its way. By lunch time we had dismissed the subject, and Robertson and the Major went off on engagements of their own as if nothing had happened. Then a circumstance occurred which gave an entirely new complexion to the affair. In the course of the afternoon both the female servants announced their intention of leaving, and M'lntosh himself seemed strangely perturbed. On being questioned as to the abrupt step they were taking, the cook and the housemaid bluntly declared that they could not stop in a haunted house. That the house was haunted they were now convinced. M'lntosh, it appeared, had a brother who had committed suicide near that very place. He had repeatedly spoken of his brother "coming back." They had taken little notice of his statements, because they themselves had never seen or heard anything ; but now that a visitor had been disturbed in his room, the case was getting serious. They were very sorry, but they thought it best there was nothing for it, of course, but to question M•lntosh again, and get, if possible, at the bottom of this new complication. What he had to say was rather satisfactory than otherwise. He had had a vision of his brother shortly before the latter died—a circumstance which, to my mind, lent a gratifying c .nsistency to the somnambulistic theory. If M'lntosh is subject to hallucinations, I argued, he is very likely to be a sleep-walker, and this would account for his appearance in the night in Jack's room, high hat and all—a detail which certainly, was not very consistent with Coombes' original idea of robbery. The suicide of the brother, of which Mlntosla was able to produce an account in a local newspaper, proved to be of a very ordinary character. The unfortunate man had been subject to melancholia, and had drunk a quantity of poison which he was shown to have bought a few hours before at a neighbouring chemist's. In view of these circumstances I did not think It necessary to push the investigation further, and as a sleep-walker is a danger, not only to himself, but to others, I thought it well to give M'lntosh a few words of advice as to seeing a doctor on the condition of his nervous system. This I did in the presence of the servants, whose apprehensions as to the house being haunted I thought by that means to allay. To my. surprise the young women remained firm in their intention to leave. They would have nothing to say to the sleekwalking theory. "Why, he has not told you all, nor half," said one of them. Then turning to M'lntosh, who was evidently by this time regarded as a dangerous person belowstdirs— ' You tell what you have seen here," she continued, tossing her head with an air of determination, intended for me and the company generally, as who should say, "and you'll see we are right after all and that this house is no fit place for no to be in. 4 "What does this mean, M'lntosh ? " I inquired, for it was now necessary to probe the matter to the bottom. The poor fellow evidently !lid not like this new phase upon which the inquiry was entering; but, as the interest of the company was now thoroughly aroused, I insisted that he should speak. Briefly, he had had experiences in the house to which his fellow-servants MEd not attached much Importance, believing them to be only his "gammon,' but which, in the light of the events of the past night, acquired a new and startling significance. More than once—many times, indeed—M'lntosh had caught glimpses in the house, on the stairs, or disappearing into a bedroom, of the figure of a man —a man in a black coat and a top hat Remade a clean breast of the whole affair, and seemed glad to have the opportunity of getting it off his mind. "The first time I saw anything in this house," said M'lntosh, 'was about six weeks ago. I was in the pantry one morning about eleven o'clock, when I hmrd a lmock at the side door. It was a rat-tat-tat like an ordinary visitor, and I thought it curious that the person, whoever it might be,