"The Mystery of O'Connor Death"

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

     Alice had felt bad about even smiling since her mother had left her alone, but since Elizabeth had talked to her and she had come to Ramsgate with the Wharton family, her behavior had changed noticeably and in Isabella's opinion, Alice smiled these days.
   When Alice heard this strange story from Mrs. King, she looked around confused and bewildered and suddenly saw the Wharton family nearby and quickly went to them. After the Bennets wanted to go home, Alice could stay a little longer with Sarah and Jessica.
   Alice said to Mrs. Wharton: "Can we go to that strange castle?"
   Isabella said: "Why do you want to go there?"
   "I heard that house belongs to my grandfather. I was curious to see it."
   Jessica, who found this interesting, helped Alice and insisted more until Isabella finally agreed.
     When they reached the big and strange castle, the children stuck their heads out of the carriage window with great surprise and curiosity. Jessica laughed and said excitedly: "How scary and exciting it is, I like it here."
   The house was a large and black castle that ivy and moss had covered much of its walls. One of the windows on the upper floor was broken, it seemed something or a stone had hit the glass, but the house was so big that it tempted people like legends to open it as soon as possible and find out what mysterious thing there was behind the mysterious door.
   When everyone got off. Mrs. Wharton glanced at the building and said to the coachman: "You go in first. It seems that this house has been abandoned for years."
The coachman lit a lantern and when he wanted to go in, he put his hand on the door and pushed it slightly and the door moved back a little with a loud noise and a slit of light entered the room from behind the door.
   The coachman entered from that slit and turned the lantern around and looked everywhere behind him, Mrs. Wharton and the children entered.
All the furniture, even the family portraits, had been left there and a lot of dust had settled on all the things.
Alice thought the house was cursed because she had heard from Mrs. King that her grandmother loved that house very much but since Alice's mother survived a very severe measles and they returned to Ramsgate, she never set foot there again maybe because the love between mother and child is so much that she can't even remember the suffering of her child in that house and bear it.
   Alice searched a few rooms but found nothing special.
   At that moment, Jessica, who had a few things in her hand, ran towards her and said excitedly: "Alice, look at these portraits on the wall. They are all three-person portraits."
   Alice, who was looking at them very carefully, said: "It means they are related to Aunt Margaret's childhood."
Jessica said with more excitement: "But there is no four-person family portrait."
   Alice looked at Jessica in surprise and said: "Really? Why?"
   Jessica turned over a half-burnt portrait and said: "This is the only four-person family portrait; it seems that someone has burned it on purpose."
   Alice looked closely at the portrait, which belonged to Aunt Margaret's fifteen or sixteen years old and her mother's childhood, and realized that the upper left corner of the picture plus her mother's face was burned. She was surprised and muttered: "Why are all the portraits of my mother burned?"
They returned to the carriage and when they were a little away from the castle, they could still see it if they turned their heads. Alice was deeply lost in thought when Jessica gently tapped her shoulder and brought Alice out of her thoughts. Jessica had a small and mischievous smile on her lips, which was because she had hidden her other discovery from everyone until then. The interesting thing was that she had been able to control her curiosity about this discovery to a great extent at that moment. That discovery was nothing but a small old notebook whose pages were yellowing. A notebook with a brown leather cover and a thin red ribbon that was used to mark the page. Jessica put it on Alice's lap and said: "This notebook belongs to your grandmother. It was lying somewhere that was not easily visible."