CHAPTER IV. A HAUNTED HOUSE
The model tenement which Miss Lovejoy had pointed out to them was soonreached. A door on the ground floor was labeled "Office," and so Gloriapushed the electric button.
A trim young woman whose long-lashed, dark eyes suggested hernationality, received them, but regretted to have to tell them that everyflat in the model tenement was occupied. She looked, with but slightlyconcealed curiosity, at these three applicants who, as was quite evident,were from other environments.
Gloria glanced about the neat courtyard and up at windows where flowerswere blossoming in bright window boxes, then glowingly she turned back tothe girl: "It was a splendid thing for those wealthy society women to do,wasn't it," she said, "erecting this really handsome yellow brickbuilding in the midst of so much poverty and squalor. It must have a mostuplifting effect on the lives of the poor people to be able to live herewhere everything is so sweet and clean, rather than there," nodding, asshe spoke, at a building across the street which looked gloomy,crumbling, unsafe and unsanitary.
The office attendant spoke with enthusiasm. "No one knows better than I,for I used to live in the other kind of tenement when I was a child, butMiss Lovejoy's club for factory girls gave me my chance to learnbookkeeping, and now I am agent here. My name is Miss Selenski. Would youlike to see the model apartment?"
"Thank you. Indeed we would," Gloria replied with enthusiasm; then sheadded, "Miss Selenski, I am Miss Vandergrift, and these are my sisters,Roberta and Lena May. We hope to be your neighbors soon."
If there was a natural curiosity in the heart of the dark-eyed girl, shesaid nothing of it, and at once led the way through the neatly tiledhalls and soon opened a door admitting them to a small flat of threerooms, which was clean and attractively furnished. The windows, floodedwith sunlight, overlooked the East River.
"This is the apartment that we show," Miss Selenski explained. "Theothers are just like it, or were, before tenants moved in," shecorrected.
"Say, this _is_ sure cosy! Who lives in this one?" Bobs inquired.
"I do," Miss Selenski replied, hurrying to add, "But I did not fit it up.The ladies did that. It has all the modern appliances that help to makehousekeeping easy, and once every week a teacher comes here to instructthe neighborhood women how to cook, clean and sew; in fact, how to live.And the lessons and demonstrations are given in this apartment."
When the girls were again in the office, Gloria turned to their newacquaintance, saying, "Do you happen to know of any place around herethat is vacant where we might like to live?"
At first Miss Selenski shook her head. Then she added, with a queerlittle smile, "Not unless you're willing to live in the old Pensingermansion."
Then she went on to explain: "Long, long ago, when New York was littlemore than a village, and Seventy-eighth Street was country, all along theEast River there were, here and there, handsome mansion-like homes andvast grounds. Oh, so different from what it is now! Every once in a whileyou find one of these old dwellings still standing.
"Some of them house many poor families, but the Pensinger mansion isseldom occupied. If a family is brave enough to move in, before manyweeks the 'for rent' sign is again at the door. The rent is almostnothing, but--" the girl hesitated, then went on to say, "Maybe I oughtnot to tell you the story about the old place if you have any thought ofliving there."
"Oh, please tell it! Is it a ghost story?" Bobs begged, and Gloria added,"Yes, do tell it, Miss Selenski. We are none of us afraid of ghosts."
"Of course you aren't," Miss Selenski agreed, "and, for that matter,neither am I. But nearly all of our neighbors are superstitious. Mr.Tenowitz, the grocer at the corner of First and Seventy-ninth has therenting of the place, and he declares that the last tenant rushed intohis store early one morning, paid his bill and departed without a word ofexplanation, but he looked, Mr. Tenowitz told me, as though he _had_ seena ghost. I don't think there is anything the matter with the old house,"their informant continued, "except just loneliness.
"Of course, big, barnlike rooms, when they are empty, echo every sound ina mournful manner without supernatural aid."
"But how did it all start?" Bobs inquired. "Did anything of an unusualnature ever happen there?"
Miss Selenski nodded, and then continued: "The story is that the onlydaughter of the last of the Pensingers who lived there disappeared onenight and was never again seen. Her mother, so the tale goes, wished herto marry an elderly English nobleman, but she loved a poor Hungarianviolinist whom she was forbidden to see. Because of her grief, she didmany strange things, and one of them was to walk at midnight, dressed allin white, along the brink of the dark swirling river which edged the widelawn in front of her home. Her white silk shawl was found on the bank onemorning and the lovely Marilyn Pensinger was never seen again.
"Her father, however, was convinced that his daughter was not drowned,but that she had married the man she loved and returned with him to hisnative land, Hungary. So great was his faith in his own theory that, inhis will, he stated that the taxes on the old Pensinger mansion should bepaid for one hundred years and that it should become the property of anydescendant of his daughter, Marilyn, who could be found within that time.
"I believe that will was made about seventy-five years ago and so, yousee, there are twenty-five years remaining for an heir to turn up."
"What will happen if no one claims the old place?" Gloria inquired.
"It is to be sold and the money devoted to charity," Miss Selenski toldthem.
"That certainly is an interesting yarn," Bobs declared; then addedgleefully, "I suppose the people around here think that the fair Marilynreturns at midnight, prowling along the shores of the river looking forher white silk shawl."
Miss Selenski nodded. "That's about it, I believe." Then she addedbrightly, "I'll tell you what, I'm not busy at this hour and if you wishI'll take you over to see the old place. Mr. Tenowitz will give me thekeys."
"Thank you, Miss Selenski," Gloria said. "We would be glad to have youshow us the place. There seems to be nothing else around here to rent andwe might remain in the Pensinger mansion until you have a model flatunoccupied."
"That will not be soon," they were told, "as there is a long waitinglist."
Then, after hanging a sign on the door which stated that she would begone for half an hour, Miss Selenski and the three interested youngpeople went down Seventy-eighth Street and toward the East River.
Bobs was hilariously excited. Perhaps, after all, she was going to havean opportunity to really practice what she had, half in fun, called herchosen profession, for was there not a mystery to be solved and an heirto be found?