Posted on 2008-10-31

Catherine Morland’s initial disappointment had been great at finding the Abbey a quite modern building without old, failing and creaking stairs or hidden doors. There weren’t even mysterious wardrobes in which one might find a skeleton. Yet, she was made to feel so welcome by the family that she soon forgot all about the exciting dreadfulness of a gothic Abbey and, when Henry Tilney asked her if she liked her stay so far, she could smile and say with sincerity that she liked it very much indeed.

"So," asked Henry, "have you gotten over your disappointment? Can you forgive us for our lack of sliding panels and artfully concealed divisions in the tapestry which lead to secret rooms?”

“You are making fun of me,” said Catherine. “I wish you would not remind me of my stupidity. I’m now perfectly convinced that nothing unusual is hidden behind any of these walls.”

Making an announcement as this is an open invitation to the universe to prove one wrong. As might be expected, the universe lived up to this challenge, too, and with astounding promptness. A silvery figure of a man, almost transparent, came out of the wall and, at a leisurely walk, made its way up the hall. Catherine started in fright. “That’s a ghost and it’s ...”

“Naked. Yes. I forgot to mention them, didn’t I?” Henry said. “Don’t pay them any attention.”

“But ... It’s a ghost! And it’s naked.” She didn’t know what surprised her most – that there was a ghost or that it was nude. “Why do you have a naked ghost?”

Henry sighed, “If it were only one! We have a whole bunch of them. Don’t worry though. They’re harmless. They only haunt those who are naked, too.” Catherine stared at him and unconsciously gathered her shawl closer around her. She had never heard of nude ghosts before, or of ghosts that haunted only nudes. Henry shrugged and added, “We’ve learned to change clothes really fast here.”

“But who were these people? And why are they naked?” She stared in fascination as even more near-transparent figures appeared through the walls and the closed doors and proceeded down the hall without so much as a glance in their direction.

Henry shrugged again. “I know not all of them by name. They are all Tilneys though. That there,” he said and gestured to a lady who was disinterestedly gliding past, “is my mother.”

“Your mother!”

“Yes. We are not sure what exactly happened but she was too long in dressing for dinner one day.” Henry seemed to have developed a philosophic outlook on the events. He spoke with a certain nonchalance that Catherine found alarming.

“But to see your mother gliding around as a naked ghost,” she tried to put her thoughts into words. “Doesn’t it bother you?”

“It used to bother me a lot. It has got better ever since I started therapy with Doctor Leid. Maybe you should have a talk with him, too. You seem quite fixated on nudity.”

He spoke in no way harshly, but Catherine turned her head from him, ashamed to have incurred this gentle admonishment, and said no more. At least, she now understood Miss Tilney’s anxious entreaty to make as little alteration in her dress as possible.

The next few days were filled with various entertainments, none of which pertained to ghosts. Catherine tried to talk with Miss Tilney about the unusual house-squatters but, beyond the assertion that the Abbey had indeed ghosts, that lady seemed disinclined to discuss the topic. She contemplated asking the General, yet was too afeared of this formidable man to approach him. Even the Tilney’s housekeeper, who was a friendly and chatty lady otherwise and whose middle name she was surprised to discover was indeed Dorothy, clammed up when asked tentatively about the otherworldly inhabitants of Northanger.

It must be said though that Catherine did not see any ghosts again either, which vexed her for she had thought that, even if the living did not want to talk, maybe the dead would. The thought that it might be best to follow her hosts’ lead in this matter and not investigate as they would know best was discarded in a moment. Too exciting! too terrific was the prospect of real, live ghosts. She tried her utmost to think up ways in which the poor undead souls might be drawn into her vicinity but the only option she came up with included the very possible end of becoming a ghost herself – a fate she had rather evade if she was completely honest with herself. As it turned out she need not have feared for while she had no encounter of the supernatural kind for at least a week, events had been set into motion, which brought at least one ghost into her room.

Sometime after midnight Catherine awoke. At first, she did not know what had torn her away from her dream but then she heard the rain pelt against her window. When rolling thunder joined the ferocious drum concerto, she wondered how she had managed to sleep through the racket for as long as she had. Afterwards, Catherine thought she should have expected it, but when the lightning cracked across the sky in a sudden explosion of electricity, it startled her so much that she fell out of her bed. While she fought with the entangled bedlinen for an upright position, she noticed the visitor who sat calmly at the foot of the bed.

“Mrs Tilney,” she stammered and curtsied.

The woman inclined her head and indicated Catherine to seat herself. The girl clambered back into bed and crouched on her pillow as far away from the silvery spectre at the other end as possible. Theoretically, it had sounded all good and like an adventure to meet a ghost but in the middle of the night, when one such being occupied one’s bed, it was an entirely different matter. Suddenly it didn’t sound like a good idea at all.

Around the Abbey raged a storm but inside girl and ghost stared at each other in complete silence.

Catherine had never been good with silence. Usually, she tried to fill it with words very soon but, at that moment, she wondered what etiquette dictated in regards to dealing with ghosts. Should she speak first or wait to let Mrs Tilney speak? To be sure, Mrs Tilney was the elder woman and as such proper manners demanded that she let the woman speak first but after all, Mrs Tilney was quite dead and not really a woman anymore, was she? On the other hand, what if ghosts were even stricter on the seniority rule than living humans? The girl fidgeted a bit. The silence was almost unbearable to her.

Just when Catherine had decided that she couldn’t take the silence anymore and would speak, the silvery woman opened her mouth.

“You are the girl who has doomed my Henry then,” she said in a voice which would have gotten an Oscar for Special Effects, had there already been such a thing, for it came from everywhere and nowhere at once.

“I don’t understand,” said Catherine but she spoke to thin air. Mrs Tilney had vanished.

Somewhere a clock chimed one.

The girl looked under her bed, in her wardrobe and even opened the big chest, just to make sure, but the ghost had indeed gone. She crawled back into bed and drew the blanket up to her chin. Peeping out from under it, she surveyed the room anxiously. What did Mrs Tilney mean? She had not doomed Henry, had she? Doomed to what anyway? How had she done it? She was unconscious of having done anything dooming lately. She had behaved with propriety in all her dealings with Henry or any other Tilney. After all, she did not appear in other people’s bedrooms in the middle of the night and made such announcements, which, now that she came to think about it, wasn’t exactly genteel. It wasn’t hospitable either. But what did she know of ghosts? Maybe this was indeed the ghost equivalent to a greeting. Mrs Tilney could at least have come clothed though.

A proper heroine would have spent the rest of the night tossing and turning over these questions, not daring to sleep lest the horrible spectre be back. She would have used this opportunity to have one or two fits brought on by anxiety and nerves and maybe swoon dramatically, but as another and far greater authoress has already shown Catherine Morland was no heroine in the common way. While she lay awake for yet some time, at length, without quite noticing it, she closed her eyes, fell asleep again and slept through the remainder of the night until the housemaid came to wake her the next morning.

While completing her morning toilet, she wondered if she should raise the point of her nighttime visitor with the family over breakfast. Yet, in the light of the unequivocal rejection that had been dealt to her whenever she tried to speak about Northanger’s ghosts, she decided not to. In the bright light of the morning she wasn’t even sure that she hadn’t dreamt the whole episode. It seemed likely. She had been quite wrought up by the storm.

On the other hand, ghosts existed at the Abbey. Nobody had denied their existence. It wasn’t out of question that a ghost should visit her at night. But Mrs Tilney’s declaration of doom still puzzled her. It had come so out of the blue. She couldn’t make head or tail of it. And yet, if she approached anyone, wouldn’t she get the same treatment as before? Neither the Tilneys nor their staff wanted to talk about this thing. She didn’t want to anger her hosts by bringing it up constantly. She would have to wait for an opening.

Unfortunately, the conversation didn’t stray into the environment of ghosts for the whole day and she went to bed still undecided on her course of action.

Catherine awoke again some time after midnight. That night, no storm raged around the house. There was no natural explanation why she should have woken at this hour. There was only an unnatural explanation. Mrs Tilney sat again at the foot of the girl’s bed and stared at her. Catherine stared back.

Silence filled the room like the last night and, like the night before, Mrs Tilney spoke just when Catherine had resolved to break the silence herself.

“Are you so set upon dooming my dear Henry?” she asked in the voice that seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere.

Catherine would have liked to answer but apparently this was a rhetorical question for the ghost vanished before she could open her mouth.

The clock chimed one.

The girl frowned and waited whether Mrs Tilney would reappear but the spectre didn’t return. A bit disgruntled, she snuggled back into her pillow and tried to regain sleep. Yet, this second encounter had unsettled her enough that it was a couple of hours until she finally fell asleep again. On the morrow, she would have to speak with someone. If Mrs Tinley intended to wake her every night ... well, she wouldn’t stand for it. Ghosts might be nocturnal creatures but she certainly wasn’t and needed her sleep.

At the breakfast table, Catherine tried to bring Mrs Tilney up in conversation, but was met with a moment of such chilling silence before Miss Tilney abruptly changed the topic that she didn’t dare ask again.

Thus, she spent the next few nights being woken by Mrs Tilney, always some time after midnight, and locked in a silent match of Who Blinks First Has Lost – a game the ghost won every night, on the basis of her being dead and not needing to blink. These visits always ended with the lady of the house making one of her dramatic sentences on how Catherine had doomed Henry, and vanishing just before the clock chimed one.

While nothing worse than this happened, it still did Catherine no good. Her lack of uninterrupted sleep showed itself in a short temper and dark circles under the girl’s eyes. She tried to be an amiable guest but every night made it a little bit more difficult to speak with equanimity the trivial things that make up everyday conversation. She took refuge in the outdoor. Many a daylight hour was spent walking in the garden.

It was there that Henry cornered her one afternoon and expressed his concerns for her well-being. She tried to assure him that she was very well and still enjoying her stay at the Abbey very much but Henry persevered and at length, her tale poured forth.

Henry was a great deal surprised at first and wouldn’t believe that his mother could behave with so much impropriety, which he was not shy to articulate in strong words. But soon any anger evaporated when he looked at the truly tired girl in front of him.

“Poor Miss Morland,” he said not without feeling. “Why didn’t you tell us?”

“Whenever I tried to speak about your mother, you all grew so frightfully silent and angry that I didn’t dare,” said Catherine. “And what would I have said? ‘Mrs Tilney doesn’t like me’? ‘Mrs Tilney haunts me’? I don’t even know why she does it. What does she mean, I have doomed you?”

Henry’s eyes grew large. “Is that what she says?”

“Yes. Every night.” Catherine nodded.

“Well, we can’t have that,” said Henry. “If you don’t mind, Miss Morland – that is, please, don’t think me forward for what I’m about to propose.”

“Oh, I won’t mind, Mr Tilney. I would never think bad of you,” she said hurriedly. “Do propose.”

For a moment, Henry looked as if he might avail himself of Catherine’s offer in another light, but he shook his head slightly and answered instead, “I will spend the night in your room with you. When my mother’s ghost appears, I shall speak to her. Maybe she will listen to me – she usually does – and you will have your nights back to yourself.”

Catherine was a bit uneasy about having a man in her room but she reasoned that it was only for protection and nothing improper. He would never do anything unseemly, she was certain. Still, it would be best if nobody knew about the agreement. Others might not look upon the scheme in an innocent light and completely misconstrue its meaning.

Sworn to secrecy and discretion, Henry came to her room when everyone in the Abbey had gone to bed. A soft knock on her door enlightened her to his presence.

“Come in,” Catherine tried to say but it was more of a strangled whisper which didn’t carry through the door. She cleared her throat and tried again, stronger this time. “Come in!”

“Second thoughts, Miss Morland?” Henry asked when he had closed the door behind him. “Ah, I see it in your eyes. You think that if there are ghosts, you must be in a gothic tale after all and every such needs a rake. What do you think? Shall I make a good rake?”

She looked at him anxiously. “Please, Mr Tilney, I know you don’t mean that. I have nothing to fear from you. You are no rake.”

“No, I’m not, am I?” said Henry with a sigh. “And to prove further to you that I’m every bit a gentleman, I will sit on this chest against the wall and, if you would be so kind as to lend me a pillow and maybe a blanket for the time, I shall not stir from here until my mother arrives.”

Catherine did as he had asked and then returned to bed. From her vantage point she watched Henry as he stared into nothingness. His silence made her uncomfortable. She vainly cast for something, anything to say. “So, you have spoken to her in the past?”

He woke with a start from his thoughts. “Who?”

“Your mother,” explained Catherine. “You said this afternoon that she usually listens to you. So you have spoken to her since ... well, since she became a ghost?”

“Occasionally,” he said and added, “I’m a tad surprised though. Our ghosts have never bothered guests before. They are a bit shy of strangers.”

“You talk about them as if they’re pets.” She was almost certain that one should not speak so about the family ghosts.

Henry saw it in a different light. “I grew up with them. My first friend was a ten-year-old boy by the name of Benedick Richard Tilney who died almost 300 years ago. Once you’ve seen a cup of tea going through your best friend, you lose all fear of them.”

“A cup of tea?”

“Dick tried to drink. Went right through him. Made a terrible mess on the carpet.” Henry grimaced. “And I got yelled at for it. Come to think of it, I got yelled at for a lot of things that were Dick’s fault. If he weren’t a ghost, I’d beat him up for it.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“There, my dear Miss Tilney, you are very mistaken,” said the man with a grin. “After all, we were boys. Dick still is as a matter of fact.”

She frowned. “Well, I know boys. I have brothers and they don’t beat each other up. No, no, you can’t make me believe that you would beat anyone.”

“You will not allow me to add a little something dangerous to my character to make myself interesting in your eyes,” he said tragically. “I’m not to be the rake, nor am I mysterious enough to be the hero of your story.”

Catherine blushed furiously and managed to say through her confusion, “But you have ghosts at your home. That is mysterious, isn’t it?”

“That is nothing I can take credit for. It is entirely to the credit of Charles Bardolph Tilney that the Abbey is over-run with them.”

“How did this come about?” She was curious to know the reason for the ghost infestation.

Henry shrugged and said, “He died and did not like being dead.”

“That explains him being a ghost but not all the others,” she said. “It doesn’t explain the nudity either.”

“You don’t ever give up, do you?”

She wondered if she had angered him with her questioning but he was smiling slightly, so she had the courage to answer, “It’s that I’ve never seen a ghost before and you must admit that their occurrence is so rare one can’t help being a little curious about it all.”

He laughed. “A little? You’re as curious as the fabled cat. But if you feel you can handle all the gory little details, I will tell you.”

Sitting up and leaning comfortably against the headboard, she eagerly assured him that she could handle anything.

“Well, let me see,” began Henry. “Charles Bardolph Tilney lived in the 15th century and, let me assure you, that was a dangerous century to live in. Violent death occurred quite often. Charles himself died because of a woman. Rather I should say, because one of his brothers wanted the same woman as Charles. While not the noblest cause to die, it still was a good enough reason to be killed back then, and Charles was not angry at his brother’s way to ensure the lessening of competition. What he did object to was the manner in which he died. He was drowned while taking a bath. Charles was what we today would call a dandy – always dressed to the nines. That he was sent to death en déshabillé angered him incredibly. It was the humiliation of that he couldn’t endure. So, he came back to exact revenge from the whole family.”

“But that’s horrible! To become a ghost because of clothes!” Catherine was aghast.

“A very silly reason,” agreed Henry. “The Abbey stank quite horribly because nobody dared to take a bath anymore.”

She sniffed the air surreptitiously. “It doesn’t now.”

“They had a bath house built some distance from the Abbey in the 17th century. After my great-great-and a few more greats-grandmother passed out from olfactory over-stimulus. Ever since then, every generation has been working at renovating the main building.”

She thought about this. It did explain why the Abbey was such a modern building. “I didn’t see a bath house during my walks in the park.”

“I can take you tomorrow if you want.” Henry stifled a yawn. Apparently, he wasn’t used to staying up late.

“I’d like that.” She didn’t tell him that she’d enjoy anything as long as it meant time spent with him. She thought it though.

Henry didn’t answer and Catherine listened, as his breathing grew steadier and more regular. “Are you asleep?” she asked.

He made an indistinct sound, which she chose to interpret as alertness. Not looking in his direction, she said, “I don’t know. It seems so petty to humble your family because of something that happened a long time ago.”

“Hm,” said Henry.

“I mean the offender and the object of his desire are long since dead. His revenge should have died with them,” she continued.

“Hm,” said Henry again.

“It must be so embarrassing to be forced to an afterlife without clothes,” she went on.

Henry roused himself enough to say, “Uncle Algernon doesn’t mind. Very liberating, he says.”

Catherine waited if he would follow it up with a few more words, but he had receded into silence again. Uncomfortably, she fidgeted. She started to chatter, saying everything that came to her mind. Soon, Henry didn’t even give any listener signals anymore. She spoke for a while longer but eventually fell silent as well.

It didn’t take long and Henry was fast asleep on the chest, leaning against the wall for support. His head had lolled to the side and his mouth was wide open. His snoring was the only noise that filled the room. Catherine wouldn’t have minded it so much, had it been some discreet, restrained noise but the man snored loudly and with much perseverance.

For the first time in a week Mrs Tilney did not appear and instead of losing half a night of sleep, Catherine lost a whole.

Henry awoke the next morning with a slightly stiff neck but otherwise well rested. “Well, I’m sorry my mother didn’t make an appearance,” he said, “but at least, you were able to sleep a whole night without ghostly intervention.”

Catherine wasn’t certain whether it was good form to tell him that his snoring had destroyed any chance of sleep and agreed with him.

“Maybe she has given up on haunting me,” she said.

“I’m sure it’s as you say,” answered Henry with a parting smile before he sneaked out of her room.

The following night, Catherine slept alone again. The silence was bliss. Sleep was heavenly. Though she was not at all surprised to wake up sometime after twelve and find Mrs Tilney in her room. Not surprised but certainly annoyed. She crossed her arms and said to the staring ghost, “I know you’re not bound to the midnight hour. The first time I saw you it was broad daylight.”

The ghost looked slightly taken aback at being addressed thus.

“Well,” said Catherine and crossed her arms defensively. “You can’t expect me to be anything but direct when you’ve been nothing but rude to me.”

“I have never been rude,” said Mrs Tilney forcefully.

“Because of your behaviour I haven’t been able to sleep for a week,” the girl answered. “I call that rude.”

The ghost’s face contorted with indignation. “Boohoo, poor girl,” she said derisively. “Excuse me if I’m trying to save my son from doom. Excuse my motherly instincts which urge me to protect him.”

It was Catherine’s turn to be indignant. “I am not dooming your son. I never had nor do I have any intention to doom him.”

“Tilneys do not marry for love. Tilneys do not fall in love. It makes them careless.” The silvery ghost glared at her.

Despite this frightening sight, Catherine managed to stammer, “What does love have to do with this? There was no talk about love or marriage.”

Mrs Tilney coloured grey in anger. “You schemer can’t fool me!” she snapped. “All your naivety and cute stupidity is just an act. You’re here to entrap him. You doom him.”

The situation might well have escalated, had not another ghost chosen to make his entrance then.

“Why is everybody yelling?” he asked.

Mrs Tilney took it upon herself to explain. She accompanied her words with wide and hectic gestures and spoke so fast that her voice cracked several times. The newcomer grimaced. “Esther, dear, please stop the special voice. The effect is ear splitting.”

She glared at him but complied with his wish. Mrs Tilney’s voice stopped coming from everywhere and nowhere at once. She sounded almost like a human, thought Catherine. There was still an unreal quality to the voice but all in all, quite human.

“Thank you,” said the male and turned to Catherine. “You’re the little schemer Esther’s so hung up about, aren’t you?” A friendly smile lit up his face. “Peter Tilney at your service, ma’am.” He bowed.

“Catherine Morland, sir. Pleased to make your acquaintance,” mumbled the girl and tried not to stare at the vast expanse of stomach that stretched in her direction.

Peter noticed her stare and patted his stomach. “Quite a paunch, eh?”

Catherine blushed and averted her eyes. “Sir,” she said. “I’m no schemer.”

“Schemer or not,” said Mrs Tilney harshly. “She’s still turning Henry’s head.”

“I’m not,” said Catherine. “Not intentionally … well … that is to say … I don’t want him to come to harm. Please, don’t kill him. He wouldn’t like eternal nudity. He’s a vicar.”

Peter couldn’t quite follow her train of thought. “What does him being a vicar has to do with it? There are quite a few vicars around here already. He’ll be in excellent company.” Seeing Catherine’s anxious face, he added, “You can meet them if you want. They are not bad fellows. A bit boring maybe but nice enough.”

“Oh no,” said Catherine quickly. “There’s really no need. I believe you.”

The ghost smiled in sudden understanding. “Never seen a naked man before, have you?”

“I’m still trying not to,” said Catherine and blushed again.

Peter laughed uproariously. “Alright, little bird. I shall remove myself from your presence.” Still chuckling, he walked out of the room.

A moment later, his head appeared again through the wall. “Esther,” he said. “Stop haunting that girl. I actually came to get you for the gathering downstairs. Algy is holding a free spirits party.”

“Free spirits,” huffed Mrs Tilney. “Algernon is an idiot.”

“He would disagree,” said Peter good-naturedly. “Come now. He will be disappointed if you don’t come. Miss Morland, it’s been a pleasure. Good night.”

Only Eleanor was in the breakfast room when Catherine came down the next morning.

“My father and brother have gone into the village,” she told the young woman.

Catherine properly expressed all that is sensible upon such a disclosure and then asked, “Who is Peter Tilney?”

Miss Tilney looked at her inquisitively. Catherine answered the unvoiced question. “I met him last night. He seems like a jovial man and I was wondering about him.”

While it answered one of Eleanor’s questions, it didn’t answer the important one. “Which one do you mean?”

“There are several?”

“Yes, three.” Miss Tilney shrugged. “Happens when you name Tilney-children after ancestors.”

Catherine thought how she could best describe him. “He’s a bit on the heavy side,” she said tactfully.

“Do you mean Peter Paunch?” Eleanor laughed. “Don’t look so shocked. That’s what we called him when we were children. If you’ve met him you must have noticed his stomach. One can’t fail to notice it. He doesn’t mind the name and we needed something to tell the Peters apart.”

“Yes, I think I mean him,” Catherine said.

“He’s one of the nicer ghosts. If you meet him, he’s always good for a small chat. He has proper manners, too. Not like some others. Uncle Algernon, for example, is a weird one.”

It was the third time she heard someone mention this man. He seemed to be almost the ghostly version of her crazy Aunt Perenia whom everybody talked about but was careful to avoid meeting if it was possible. “He held a free spirits party yesternight.”

“Yes, that sounds just like something he would do,” said Eleanor. “Try to avoid talking with him. He’s a tad passionate about this nude ghost thing.” Her tone of voice indicated that Uncle Algernon was a bit gaga. “We suspect there’s some French blood in him. From his mother’s side.”

“Why do you suspect this?”

“His mother is not a Tilney,” explained Eleanor. “We can’t ask her ancestors if there’s a Frenchman down the line.”

Catherine thought it must be nice to have a living – or rather ghosting – family tree in your home. It must be reassuring if you knew exactly where you’re coming from. She said so.

“Possibly,” Miss Tilney agreed though she was sceptical. “It also means that no nutcase will ever be forgotten as well.”

“A slight drawback, I agree,” said Catherine. “On the other hand, I don’t even know what my grandfather did.” She had to admit though this was because she hadn’t ever listened when her parents told her about her family.

“Sometimes it’s better not to know about your ancestors. There are some things that should be forgotten over the years. I wish Uncle Algernon could be forgotten,” said Eleanor.

“He can’t be too bad. Peter Paunch seemed to like him,” argued Catherine.

Eleanor didn’t think so. “Peter likes everyone. Everyone likes Peter. I defy you to find anyone who does not like him. Uncle Algernon is quite, quite mad. He’s the only one who became a ghost voluntarily. Did you know that?”

Catherine said that she didn’t.

“One day he decided that he was quite fed up with living and clothing and became a ghost,” explained Miss Tilney.

A voice said behind them, “Which is the reason why I’m the only dead Tilney who could wear clothes if I wanted to.”

The girls turned around. A man of perhaps thirty years in appearance lounged on the sideboard. A silvery, incorporeal party hat sat askew on his head. Eleanor glared at him disapprovingly. “Naturally, you’re the only Tilney who doesn’t want to wear clothes.”

Catherine was surprised how much Eleanor looked like her mother at that moment. The family resemblance was hard to miss. The same eyes narrowed in disapproval. The same frown on her forehead.

“It’s the choice I’ve made,” Algernon Tilney agreed.

Miss Tilney’s glare intensified and with a short “Please excuse me, Miss Morland,” she rushed out of the room.

Catherine stared at the closing door. “If you’ll excuse me,” she said distractedly. “I’d better go after her.”

With quick steps she left the room, too. A few meters down the hall, she felt a coldness in her back. She fastened her steps. The coldness stayed.

“Are you following me, sir?” she asked.

The ghost’s voice answered. “Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re going after Miss Tilney and if I’m with you it will upset her,” he said.

“That is not nice.”

Niceties were of no interest to Algernon. “She is ridiculously prudish. If she’s not careful, she will turn into her mother.”

“Literally or figuratively?”

The ghost laughed appreciatively. “You have humour. I’m surprised.”

Catherine hadn’t meant her question humorously but didn’t correct the ghost. She stopped in the middle of the hall. “Why don’t you leave her alone?”

“Because she doesn’t like my choice,” said Algernon. “I have made it and it’s the right one. I don’t know why she wouldn’t see this. What do you think?”

“About your choice?”

“Yes.”

Catherine thought about it. “Are you going to stalk me, too, if I say that I’m of Miss Tilney’s mind?”

“I don’t stalk. I try to persuade by argument.”

“In this case, I think that you have made the right choice for yourself,” said Catherine and smiled innocently.

Catherine dodged Algernon and his arguments for the rest of the morning. By midday she fled into the ghost-free zone of the outdoors.

Miss Tilney had long before her done the same and the two girls spent a lovely afternoon, conversing and walking leisurely around the park.

As happens every day, night invariably fell. Catherine returned to the Abbey in a state of mild trepidation. She had enough of angry ghosts, chatty ghosts and missionary ghosts. Just once she wanted to sleep peacefully and not be disturbed by ghosts in her waking hours either.

Someone must have heard her silent prayer. No ghost appeared at any time during the evening and she went to bed a little relieved.

Catherine awoke the next morning and felt as rested as she hadn’t in a while. No ghost had appeared during the night as well and she was happier for it. Her happiness died when she learned why.

As Catherine returned to her room after breakfast, Mrs Tilney already waited for her.

“You have doomed him,” she said the moment the girl entered.

Not again, thought Catherine and said, “How so?”

Mrs Tilney looked at her as if she doubted the girl’s intelligence. “Haven’t you noticed that he didn’t appear for breakfast?”

Catherine indicated that she had noted it indeed but thought nothing of it.

“Wretched girl. He is at this moment being turned into a ghost. Because of you,” cried Mrs Tilney.

“No, that can’t be.”

“Yes, it can and it does. I told you Tilneys and love don’t mix well. It makes us careless. You’ve turned his head and he’s lost it. Spends his time daydreaming about you little vixen instead of taking care to be dressed as soon as possible. You killed him.”

Catherine nearly cried. “Can’t anything be done to stop it? Please. I don’t want him to come to harm.”

For the first time since she took note of Catherine, Henry’s mother looked upon the girl with something akin to compassion.

“The harm has been done. A human will have to become a ghost tonight. The balance has to be maintained. You can’t change that,” said Mrs Tilney and left the girl alone.

Catherine stared thoughtfully ahead and contemplated her options. She could leave and never see Henry again or ...

She stopped thinking and shrugged out of her dress. It would be an adventure, she decided.