Real Ghost Stories

M

y Irish Friend.

Many of the apparitions that are reported are of phantasms that appear in

fulfilment of a promise made to survivors during life. Of this class I came,

in the course of my census, upon a very remarkable case.

Among my acquaintances is an Irish lady, the widow of an official who held a

responsible position in the Dublin Post Office. She is Celt to her back-bone,

with all the qualities of her race. After her husband's death she contracted

an unfortunate marriage-which really was no marriage legally-with an en-

gineer of remarkable character and no small native talent. He, however, did

not add to his other qualities the saving virtues of principle and honesty.

Owing to these defects my friend woke up one fine morning to find that her

new husband had been married previously, and that his wife was still living.

On making this discovery she left her partner and came to London, where

I met her. She is a woman of very strong character, and of some consider-

able although irregular ability. She has many superstitions, and her dreams

were something wonderful to hear. After she had been in London two years

her bigamist lover found out where she was, and leaving his home in Italy

3 W. T. (WILLIAM THOMAS) STEAD

followed her to London. There was no doubt as to the sincerity of his at-

tachment to the woman whom he had betrayed, and the scenes which took

place between them were painful, and at one time threatened to have a very

tragic ending.

Fortunately, although she never ceased to cherish a very passionate affec-

tion for her lover, she refused to resume her old relations with him, and af-

ter many stormy scenes he departed for Italy, loading her with reproaches.

Some months after his departure she came to me and told me she was afraid

something had happened to him. She had heard him calling her outside her

window, and shortly afterwards saw him quite distinctly in her room. She

was much upset about it.

I pooh-poohed the story, and put it down to a hallucination caused by the

revival of the stormy and painful scenes of the parting. Shortly afterwards

she received news from Italy that her late husband, if we may so call him,

had died about the same time she heard him calling her by her name under

her window in East London.

I only learnt when the above was passing through the press that the unfor-

tunate man, whose phantasm appeared to my friend, died suddenly either

by his own hand or by accident. On leaving London he drank on steadily,

hardly being sober for a single day. After a prolonged period of intoxication

he went out of the house, and was subsequently found dead, either having

thrown himself or fallen over a considerable height, at the foot of which he

was found dead.

I asked Mrs. G. F.-to write out for me, as carefully as she could remember

it after the lapse of two years, exactly what she saw and heard. Here is her

report:-

The Promise.

"In the end of the summer of 1886 it happened one morning that Irwin and

myself were awake at 5.30 a.m., and as we could not go to sleep again, we