A Mysterious Portrait

I remember some years ago that I went to spend a Christmas with an old
friend who was a bachelor. He might, perhaps, have been verging on
sixty at the time of my visit. On his study wall hung the portrait--
merely the face-of a singularly lovely woman. I did not like to ask
any questions about it. There was no family likeness to him, and we
always thought that early in life he had been disappointed. But one
day, seeing that I could hardly keep my eyes off it, he said to me, "I
have had that picture for many years, although you have never seen it
before. If you like, I will tell you its history." He then told me the
following story.

"In the year 1817, I was beginning life, and struggling to get a
living. I had just started in business. I was alone, without much
capital, and my whole energies were utterly absorbed in my adventure.
In those days the master, instead of employing a commercial traveler,
often used to travel himself, and one evening I had to start for the
North to see some customers. I chose to go by night in order to save
time, and as it was bitterly cold and I was weak in the chest, I
determined to take a place inside the coach. We left St. Martin's-le-
Grand at about half-past eight, and I was the sole passenger. I could
not sleep, but fell into a kind of doze, which was not sufficiently
deep to prevent my rousing myself at every inn where we changed
horses. Nobody intruded upon me, and I continued in the same drowsy,
half-waking, half-slumbering condition till we came to the last stage
before reaching Eaton Socon. I was then thoroughly awake, and
continued awake until after the coach started. But presently I fell
sound asleep for, perhaps, half-an--hour, and woke suddenly. To my
great surprise I found a lady with me. How she came there I could not
conjecture. I was positive that she did not get in when the coach last
stopped. She sat at the opposite corner, so that I could see her well,
and a more exquisite face I thought I had never beheld. It was not
quite English--rather pale, earnest and abstracted, and with a certain
intentness about the eyes which denoted a mind accustomed to dwell
upon ideal objects. I was not particularly shy with women, and perhaps
if she had been any ordinary, pretty girl I might have struck up a
conversation with her. But I was dumb, for I hardly dared to intrude.
It would have been necessary to begin by some commonplaces, and
somehow my lips refused the utterance of commonplaces. Nor was this
strange. If I had happened to find myself opposite the great Lord
Byron in a coach I certainly should not have thrust myself upon him,
and how should I dare to thrust myself upon a person who seemed as
great and grand as she, although I did not know her name? So I
remained perfectly still, only venturing by the light of the moon to
watch her through my half-shut eyes. Just before we got to Eaton,
although I was never more thoroughly or even excitedly awake in my
life, I must have lost consciousness for a minute. I came to myself
when the coach was pulling up at an inn. I looked round instantly, and
my companion was gone. I jumped out on pretense of getting something
to eat and drink, and hastily asked the guard where the lady who had
just got out was put into the coach. He said they had never stopped
since they had last changed horses, and that I must have been
dreaming. He knew nothing about the lady, and he looked at me
suspiciously, as if he thought I was drunk. I for my part was
perfectly confident that I had not been deluded by an apparition of my
own brain. I had never suffered from ghost-like visitations of any
kind, and my thoughts, owing to my preoccupation with business, had
not run upon women in any way whatever. More convincing still, I had
noticed that the lady wore a light blue neckerchief; and when I went
back into the coach I found that she had left it behind her. I took it
up, and I have it to this day. You may imagine how my mind dwelt upon
that night.

I got to Newcastle, did what I had to do, came back again, and made a
point this time of sleeping at Eaton Socon in order to make inquiries.
Everybody recollected the arrival of the down coach by which I
traveled, and everybody was perfectly sure that no lady was in it. I
produced the scarf, and asked whether anybody who lived near had been
observed to wear it.

Eaton is a little village, and all the people in it were as well known
as if they belonged to one family, but nobody recognized it. It was
certainly not English. I thought about the affair for months, partly
because I was smitten with my visitor, and partly because I was half
afraid my brain had been a little upset by worry. However, in time,
the impression f