"On the day of his death he was followed from a distance by two policemen in plain clothes. They watched him leave the cottage in which he lived at Kilcash, take to the downs, and make straight for Kilcash House. They were not able to get near him until he had just gained the house. He then became aware that he was followed, and ran straight for the cliffs. The rest I have already told you. There never was an inquest, for, as you may know, the bodies of people drowned there are never found.
"A week ago I was in the neighbourhood of Kilcash House. I had left my horse and car at Kilcash, and was walking over the downs to the village, when on the cliffs, just over the Black Rock, I cast my eyes down, and there, on that large shelf of rock, as plain as I see you now, I saw him. The same coat, the same Scotch bonnet, the same trousers-not a thing altered since the first day he stood in my office, going on eleven years ago."
"What time of the day was it?"
"Broad day. About three o'clock in the afternoon."
"It must have been some one of about his stature dressed identically."
"Must it?" cried the lawyer, scornfully. "You have not heard all yet. I made up my mind to be sure. I ran-I ran to the top of
the path, and went down to the rocks below. There was nobody there. You know the place. Tell me how a living man could get away alive, except up the path that I went down? It was Michael Fahey's ghost, as sure as I am a living man."
"I confess," said Jerry, in perplexity, "I cannot explain away what you say, except upon the supposition that you were suffering from delusion. How do you account for the appearance yourself?"
"This is my way of reasoning it out. I either saw the ghost of Michael Fahey or I did not. If I did, I account for it by the fact that Davenport and he were associated together in something while they were alive, and now that both are dead, one of them has to come back and see that something left undone-a wrong unrighted, a debt unpaid, an explanation unmade-is put straight."
"But why should the one be Fahey? And why should it be at the Black Rock? And why should he appear to you?"
"The first, because I had nothing to do with Mr. Davenport; the second, because seeing Fahey's ghost there would recall to my mind most vividly the circumstance of his death; and the third, because I hold the documents to which I have referred."
"But don't you think the fact of Davenport's name having been brought before the public so lately, and that you recollected the documents you held belonging to Fahey, and that you looked over the cliff at the very spot where he lost his life, may all have helped to impose upon your imagination?"
"Sir, an attorney of my years does not know the meaning of the word imagination. You may say I am mad if you like, but don't attribute imagination to me, or I shall break down altogether. O'Brien, do you mean to say seriously that you take me for a crazy young poet? Great heavens, sir, it can't have come to that with me in my declining years!"
"But, then, what did you see?"
"A ghost-Fahey's ghost."
"You don't mean to tell me seriously you believe in ghosts!"
"I mean to tell you most emphatically I do not."
"Then what is your contention?"
"That I, being one who does not believe in ghosts, saw the ghost of Michael Fahey this day week at the Black Rock."
"I can make nothing of your position."
"I can make nothing of my position either. I am beginning to think I shall lose my reason. You are the first person I spoke to on the subject. Don't say anything about it to a soul. I have no wife to blab to, and I look on you as a friend. I had hoped you would have brought me news from London-some facts not published in the papers, and bearing on this branch of the case. But you haven't. If you let this get abroad, some of my kind friends will get me locked up. I got old Coolahan locked up because he kept on saying that farthings were as valuable as sovereigns because they had the Queen's head on them."
O'Brien was sorely puzzled. It did not now look like a matter which ought to be laughed at. Either O'Hanlon had seen the ghost of this man, or he was losing his reason. There was one other possibility. He said: "I am not going to make light of what you have told me, or communicate it to a soul. There is one other question-a wild one, I own. I wonder have you thought of it?"
"What is it? If you have thought of anything which has escaped me, you are a very Daniel come to judgment."
"Could it be that man was not really drowned ten or eleven years ago? Either the police may have been mistaken in their man, and the wrong man may have leaped into the hole, or Fahey may have leaped in and by some miracle escaped."
"Yes, I have thought of both possibilities. The only answer will dispose of both. The clothes seen ten or eleven, years ago, and those seen this day week, were identical."
"What! You identify them?"
"Yes, if" with a shudder-"those of last week could be produced and handled. O'Brien, I'm not afraid of ghosts, but I begin to be afraid of myself, now that I have begun to see them."