Today | News | Books | Recipes Adventure | Science Fiction | Ghost stories | Poetry | Children | History Bookman confused between curiosity and the fear of wounding the sensibilities of the ghost. "Just so," resumed the ghost. "A misfit leg. Indeed I think it belongs to that young lady over there. But, as I see that she is provided with another, and I can manage to walk with this, I do not like to mortify her by mentioning it. You must admit that it would be very unpleasant for the young lady in company, now wouldn't it?" "Would it be considered rude of me to ask how so deplorable an accident occurred?" asked the reporter with much interest. "Certainly not," replied the ghost with a Chesterfieldian bow. "It was just this way. I was a Van Der Dam, and I have been dead a long time. First I was buried in a little graveyard away down town, and all the dead were moved from there to make place for the leather trade warehouses, and we were taken to another cemetery that was so far from the business section that we thought we were to stay there forever. But, in a few years we had to get up and go on again. In a short time that land was wanted for building purposes, and I was removed again to another place so far out that it was thought no one would ever require that land, I am sure you have seen that place, for it was where the old and well-liked Metropolitan Hotel was afterwards built. And just to think! The trustees of Trinity Corporation once had the offer of a gift of six acres of land on the corner of Canal Street and Broadway, and refused it, thinking the expense of fencing it too great, and that it was so far from the city that it would cost more for taxes than it was worth. What those six acres are worth now must mount up to millions. "It was swampy, and we were not so very comfortable in this place, and we were not sorry when the order came to move us so they could build the hotel, which is but a memory now, with a big business house in its place. Many of my friends lie in unsuspected spots about that neighborhood yet. "When the foundation for the hotel was dug many of us were discovered, and they took the bones and threw them into a cart in one big box, and held an inquest over the lot, and carted them away, and I do not know where they put them. I was moved from there to another place right in the heart of the retail dry goods district. We were put in a Protestant cemetery and right opposite was an old Jewish graveyard. No money consideration had ever been powerful enough to get this spot, nor any other Jewish cemetery, for business. Stores have been built up all around it. A friend of mine lies right under a water butt, for our graves were crowded as much as possible. That is a very unpleasant location. You must admit that." The newspaper man did admit it, and condoled with the ghost, who kept his head bent always in sign of hopeless sorrow. He continued: "When the march of progress reached as high as this place we had to get up again and go further so that a street could be cut through. A half brother of mine lost his head during the confusion resulting from this removal, and has never found it after that exodus. I suppose that head and the other fellow's body must have got together somehow, for my half brother found a head, but it does not fit, and the mental calibre cannot compare with that of my half brother." "I should like to know, if it pleases you to tell me, which portion of a person's anatomy is the seat of the spirit or soul, or whatever you say when you wish to designate the human intelligence, and the spirit as I see it here to-night? I can scarcely formulate my meaning, but it seems to me that it is all that part of you that I see here to-night, and that seems to have all the intelligence of your living selves. Some of you appear to have all your faculties, can eat and drink and show a certain degree of physical force, and I cannot understand anything about it. Now, you mentioned the misfortune of your brother, and I am at a loss to know which is the most of him, his head that another wears, or the body which bears a head not his own. Which, in short, is your brother? The head without his body or his body without a head?" "My dear sir, you raise a serious question there, and one very difficult to answer. All I can say is that I think my brother must be leading what you call a double life. His body acts as it always did, but there is a total lack of sequence in his conversation. I fairly hate to hear him speak. He is always declaring that the world is coming to an end. Now, what does he or any one know about the end of the world, when we do not know anything of the beginning of it, not even the scientists." "The Bible says-" began the young man. "Yes; and science says-Life is too short to go into those questions, and we might better talk of the present." The young man took the hint and said: "You were speaking of your several removals." "Yes, and in each one I suffered, but it was after my removal from this last-mentioned place that the worst of my misfortunes befell me. We were moved to another burying ground about two miles further out of town. We were all beginning to feel at home and quite sociable, when it became necessary to grade the place and cut streets through. They cut the street through and left my coffin sticking out about two feet, and alas! I have never had two feet to stick out since. "You see, my coffin was over a hundred years old, and it all crumbled away, and that is how I lost my foot. It was as solid and handsome a leg as you would wish to see, but the rascal who moved us broke up our coffins, and threw me into a dirty cart with a score of fellow sufferers, and were dumped into one hole, all in a heap. Somehow in the transportation my fine leg was lost, from the knee downward, and as if this was not enough, as I was the last one I had to take this and do the best I can with it. And, there sits the young lady, who, I am sure, has my leg, and this is probably hers, as I am sure that this is a woman's leg, it is so very small." The newspaper man thought just as the ghost did, for not for worlds would he have dared to disagree with one of the ghosts down here in the bowels of the world. The ghost continued: "It is impossible to portray the mental agony which one of my size and build experiences as he is obliged to go limping along in disgraceful manner, and I assure you that my everlasting gratitude would be given to the person who could relieve me of this hideous deformity." "Why do you not go to the young lady and ask her frankly if she has not got a leg that does not belong to her? If so, she would doubtless be glad to make the exchange, and perhaps you will never have the opportunity again. You would know if it is really your leg, would you not? If her leg is too small for you your leg must be much too large for her, and she would appreciate the exchange." "Young sir, I do not know how a young lady of the present day would take such a thing, but I assure you I would rather go through all eternity lame than to so sully |