The Little Stranger

Faraday considers the following few weeks as his courtship period with Caroline, although they are not particularly romantic. Faraday spends all of his time thinking about Caroline and is annoyed that she does not want to move as quickly as he does. Whenever Faraday tries to pull Caroline close and kiss her, she recoils. Furthermore, she repeatedly puts off telling Mrs. Ayres that she plans to marry Faraday.

Several weeks after Faraday’s return from London, more strange incidents occur at Hundreds. In the middle of the night, Caroline wakes up to a ringing telephone, only to find that there is no one on the other end. She asks Faraday if the call came from him, and Faradays says it did not. The following night, the phone rings again. However, again, no one is there.

Although no one answers the phone, Caroline says that it sounds like someone is on the other end, listening. She wonders whether Roderick could be trying to contact her from his mental institution. Faraday assures her that Roderick does not have access to a phone. To appease her, Faraday calls up the institution to double-check. As he assumed, Roderick has not placed any calls to Hundreds. Faraday also tells Caroline to call the phone operator to ask if anyone placed a call. Thinking it a good idea, Caroline rings up the operator and asks her if anyone called Hundreds recently. The operator says that no one has called for a few weeks.

The next day, new problems occur. The bells the Ayerses use to summon their servants start going off at all hours of the day, even though no one touches them. For a while, they create a great deal of confusion for Betty and Mrs. Bazeley, who think the Ayerses are messing with them. Eventually, they realize the house is playing more tricks on them and try to identify the source of the problem. Caroline and Faraday examine the wiring for a problem but cannot find one. Ultimately, Caroline decides to cut the call box’s wires, so it is not an issue.

When the bells are no longer a problem, yet another issue starts to occur. One of the speaking tubes in the nursery starts making a shrill whistling sound, seemingly for no reason. When Mrs. Bazeley picks up the corresponding earpiece, she swears she hears breathing, although there is no one willing to answer her on the other end.

Faraday takes a look at the speaking tube in an attempt to figure out the problem. Because he cannot find anything wrong, he listens to the earpiece, hearing nothing. For a moment, he wonders if he will hear his mother’s voice on the other end because she once worked in the nursery. However, he quickly dismisses the notion as ridiculous and sets the earpiece back down. In an attempt to silence the speaking tube for good, Faraday places a cork in it.

Unfortunately, Faraday’s solution does not last long. A few days later, while Betty and Mrs. Bazeley are working in the kitchen, they watch the speaking tube uncork itself. They run out of the kitchen, terrified, and report what they saw to Mrs. Ayers. This is the first Mrs. Ayers hears about the speaking tube because Faraday and Caroline try not to tell her about odd occurrences in the house if they do not have to. Curious and concerned, Mrs. Ayers decides to go up and look at the nursery herself.

In the nursery, Mrs. Ayers picks up the speaking tube and listens to it but does not hear anything. Then, she walks over to the part of the room where Susan died. After a moment, Mrs. Ayers realizes that she made a mistake by coming up to the nursery alone; the trip has only made her feel worse. Mrs. Ayers turns to leave when suddenly, a cold blast of air rushes by her and slams the nursery door shut. Scared, Mrs. Ayers attempts to reopen the door, but finds she cannot.

Mrs. Ayers starts yelling for help, but no one comes. After some time, she thinks she hears footsteps in the hallway, which she assumes belong to Betty, but still, no one arrives to help her. Mrs. Ayers looks through the door’s keyhole and sees what looks like a childlike figure running up and down the hall. However, she never gets a good look at it.

Terrified, Mrs. Ayers moves away from the door. Moments later, the speaking tube lets out a sharp whistle, which only adds to Mrs. Ayers’s fear. She picks up the earpiece, thinking, perhaps, that one of the servants is attempting to contact her. However, all she hears is heavy breathing, which reminds her of Susan’s breath in the days leading up to her death.

Mrs. Ayers’s horror reaches a fever pitch when she looks outside and sees Mrs. Bazeley and Betty with Caroline. At this point, she realizes the breathing must be coming from someone else and she quickly throws down the earpiece. In a panic, Mrs. Ayers starts banging on the windowpanes in the nursery, eventually shattering the glass. The noise gets Caroline’s attention, and everyone runs upstairs to help Mrs. Ayers.

However, by the time Caroline, Betty, and Mrs. Bazeley make their way to the nursery, nothing seems out of place. The only thing amiss is Mrs. Ayers herself and the window she smashed. The sight of her mother frightens Caroline, as she is bleeding profusely from breaking the glass. Caroline calls Faraday and asks him to come over as quick as he can. Faraday arrives soon afterward and tends to Mrs. Ayers. Faraday worries she is going down the same path as Roderick.

After tending to Mrs. Ayers, Faraday and Caroline talk about the incident. Caroline insists that there is some sort of presence in the household that wants to hurt her family, much to Faraday’s dismay. As usual, Faraday assures Caroline there is a rational explanation for everything that has occurred. Additionally, he suggests that they marry soon to give Mrs. Ayers something to look forward to. Faraday believes that with his help, they can start making Hundreds feel like the home it once was.