“The Veiled Portrait”
James Grant
Available in The Valancourt Book of Victorian Christmas Ghost Stories, Volume 2
Paper $16.99
Ebook $7.99

Today’s selection is a nice little tale that isn’t set at Christmas but is still chilling.

The story is set a year after the Indian mutiny of 1857. Narrated by an unnamed soldier recovering from wounds, it concerns an act of betrayal by a fellow soldier.

The narrator is invited to spend some time with an old acquaintance, one Sidney Warren, at Warren’s country estate.  Warren shows the narrator around the place, and all seems well. There’s just one thing that’s puzzling. In the library is a life-size painting covered with a cloth that Warren doesn’t want to talk about.

So you know the narrator is going to look behind the cloth when Warren is otherwise occupied. It’s the portrait of a beautiful young girl in a riding outfit standing beside a horse.

And this is the only flaw in the story’s logic. When was the painting done, and how and why does Warren still have it?  The reader can make some guesses, I’ll not speculate.

The painting is a reminder of a grave sin Warren committed against the young woman. I’ll let you read the story rather than give any more details. There aren’t many twists and turns in this brief story. The way in which Warren wronged the young woman won’t be any big surprise. But he does get what he deserves in the end.

I enjoyed this one. I’ve never heard of James Grant before, but I’m going to see if I can find some more of his work.  Even though the story was written over a hundred years ago, it’s quite readable still. The introductory note says that Grant wrote a number of adventure tales, and I’d like to track them down.