"Why, don't you know?" asked the girl. "Has nobody told you our
family ghost-story?"

"No one as yet," answered Hayes.

"Then mine be the pleasing task; and there is a peculiar fitness
in your hearing it just now, for to-morrow will be New-Year's Day."

Harold failed to see the applicability of the date, but he made no
observation, and Miss Connolly went on.

"Ever so many years ago this place belonged to an ancestor of mine
who was devoted to field-sports of all kinds. He lived for nothing
else, people thought, but suddenly he surprised all the world by
getting married."

Harold thought that if her remote grandmother had chanced to
resemble the fair young girl at his side, there was a good excuse
for the sportsman; but he held his tongue.

"The bride was exacting--or perhaps she was only timid. At any
rate, she used her influence to wean her husband from his outdoor
pursuits--especially hunting. He must have been very much in love
with her, for she succeeded, and he promised to give it all up--after
one day more. It seems that he could not get out of this last run.
The meet was on the lawn; the hunt breakfast was to be at Lisnahoe
House. In short, it was an affair that could neither be altered
nor postponed.