Hauntings

  _Oke of Okehurst_

  To COUNT PETER BOUTOURLINE,_AT TAGANTCHA_,GOVERNMENT OF KIEW, RUSSIA.

  MY DEAR BOUTOURLINE,

  Do you remember my telling you, one afternoon that you sat upon thehearthstool at Florence, the story of Mrs. Oke of Okehurst?

  You thought it a fantastic tale, you lover of fantastic things, and urgedme to write it out at once, although I protested that, in such matters, towrite is to exorcise, to dispel the charm; and that printers' ink chasesaway the ghosts that may pleasantly haunt us, as efficaciously as gallonsof holy water.

  But if, as I suspect, you will now put down any charm that story mayhave possessed to the way in which we had been working ourselves up,that firelight evening, with all manner of fantastic stuff--if, as Ifear, the story of Mrs. Oke of Okehurst will strike you as stale andunprofitable--the sight of this little book will serve at least to remindyou, in the middle of your Russian summer, that there is such a seasonas winter, such a place as Florence, and such a person as your friend,

  VERNON LEE

  Kensington, _July_ 1886.