Before his return to London [from Geanies], however, Professor Romanes received an appeal for aid in a somewhat similar case of disturbance. The Secretary of the National Liberal Club in Whitehall Place (established in 1882) wrote to consult him in his capacity of a celebrated naturalist whether there was any living creature who, when enclosed in a wall, could produce a sound like knocks or raps. The Professor at once replied there was not, but begged to know the reason for such a strange inquiry.
The Secretary then explained that for some time past he and his wife and family had been perpetually disturbed by sounds which seemed to proceed from the wall of the rooms they occupied in the Club premises, and for which they could not account. He described these noises minutely, their resonance and their persistence; and the Professor promised that immediately on his return home he would give the matter his utmost attention. To his great disappointment, however, he was again frustrated in his research. It was some weeks before he could return to London, and meanwhile the disturbances at the Liberal Club had ceased. He went to interview the Secretary, and the latter propounded an odd solution of their cause.
He asserted that they had seemed strangely connected with the presence of an otherwise inoffensive German maid who was employed at the Club. It was not suggested that she in any way caused them; indeed, this would have been obviously impossible – the girl could not enter the wall and produce raps inside it! – but the noises definitely seemed to follow her, and she was given notice in consequence. Since her departure the annoyance had ceased.
“There are germ-carriers; can there be ghost-carriers?” asked the Secretary, and the Professor forthwith inquired the address of the girl and said he would like to take her into his own service as an experiment. Unfortunately her address in Germany was unknown and could not be traced, so this line of inquiry was again closed.
Pp. 110-111 in ‘Ghosts Vivisected’, by Anna M.W. Stirling (1957).