Thou Shell of Death by Nicholas Blake

What part of the country do you—?’
    ‘Our seat,’ replied O’Brien with the utmost gravity, ‘reposes on the site of the palace of the great king, Brian Boru.’
    Knott-Sloman began to guffaw but, receiving an icy look from O’Brien, turned it into a cough. Georgia Cavendish , her stubby nose wrinkled up in distaste, said to O’Brien:
    ‘I suppose your family has a banshee as well as a castle. You’ve never told me about it.’
    ‘Banshee? That’s a kind of fairy or something, isn’t it? Can’t see a fairy getting much change out of old Slip-Slop,’ said Knott-Sloman. A curious nickname for O’Brien, Nigel thought, and judging by their puzzled expressions, none of the others knew it. O’Brien cut in quickly:
    ‘A banshee is a spirit that howls about the place when one of the family is going to die. So if anny of yez hears an ululation tonight ye’ll know I’m for ut.’
    ‘And we’ll all come rushing down the stairs and find it’s only Ajax having a nightmare,’ exclaimed Georgia with the barest perceptible tremor in her voice. Lucilla Thrale shivered delicately.
    ‘Brr,’ she said, ‘this is getting a morbid party. Death is too fearfully middle-class and Victorian, don’t you think? I call it a poor do altogether.’
    ‘Dear lady,’ said Lord Marlinworth, leaping in with Edwardian gallantry, ‘you need have no fear. Death has only to look at your face once and he will be like the rest of us—a captive at your feet.’ He sketched a courtly gesture, and continued to the company at large. ‘The death-warning is not confined to the Emerald Isle. I well recollect a similar phenomenon attaching to the family of my old friend, Viscount Hawsewater. The bell of a ruined chantry on the estate was reputed to toll at night when the death of the head of the family was at hand. One night poor Hawsewater, who was enjoying perfect health at the time, heard it: unfortunately he was tone-deaf and mistook it for the fire-bell: he rushed out of the house, omitting to put on any—if the ladies will pardon me—nether garments. It was bitterly cold that night. He caught a chill, contracted pneumonia, and was dead in two days. Poor fellow. A melancholy end. But it shows one must not dismiss too lightly these supernatural warnings. There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, I think. I think so.’
    At this point Lady Marlinworth thought it best to beckon the ladies into the drawing room. The men gathered nearer to their host.
    ‘Coffee for you, Lord Marlinworth? Coffee, Nigel?’ he said, passing the cups along. ‘Pass the port round. Just reach out if you want nuts—afraid I haven’t got any of your speciality, Knott-Sloman: Farquhar’s are late with their consignment. You must show us your parlour trick. I bet you’re the only person here who can crack a walnut with his teeth.’ Knott-Sloman duly showed off, and the rest ignominiously failed. O’Brien went on: ‘I see you are a student of Shakespeare, Lord Marlinworth. Did you ever read any of the post-Elizabethan dramatists? Grand stuff. Shakespeare slew his thousands, but Webster slew his tens of thousands. I must say I like the stage littered with corpses at the final curtain. And what poetry! “Doth the silkworm expend her yellow labors”.’ O’Brien began to recite the passage, his eyes looking away into illimitable distance , his voice soft and thrilling. Before he had finished he broke off suddenly, as though ashamed at being betrayed into such emotion by mere words. Lord Marlinworth tapped the table deprecatingly.
    ‘Very striking, no doubt. But not Shakespeare, not Shakespeare. I may be old-fashioned, but I fancy the Bard stands alone.’
    Before long they joined the ladies. Nigel afterwards retained the vaguest memory of the absurd paper games they played, the blood-curdling ghost stories that were told, the general horseplay, for he felt sleepier and sleepier—as well he might after such a dinner. One thing he remembered