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Love
“A Haunted House” is not only a ghost story but also a love story. The characters in the story are two couples, one living and one dead. Although the ghostly couple is dead, their love for each other lives on. They search the house together, “hand in hand.” They finish each other’s sentences. At times, they speak as one. When the woman dies before the man, death is a barrier between them. In her absence, he wanders the Earth, as if looking for her. The buried treasure that the ghostly couple looks for is their joy and love, which inhabits the house. They retain loving memories of their lives.
The ghosts also find love in the sleeping faces of the living couple who have “love on their lips.” They see their love replayed in the actions of the living couple, sleeping, reading in the garden, laughing, and rolling apples in the loft. When awoken, the narrator is thrilled at the realization that the ghostly couple’s buried treasure is the love in their living hearts.
Loss
Early in the story, readers discover that the ghostly couple is searching the house for something. Readers do not initially know what they are looking for. They have lost something, a buried treasure. Yet they find it repeatedly and in different places in the house and garden. Once they find the treasure, they begin the search anew.
Centuries earlier, the husband experiences loss when his wife dies before him. He leaves her and the house and travels the world. In his grief he seems unmoored, searching for something in life which eludes him. He has lost his wife, and he cannot find her. Eventually, he returns to the house. In death, he finds what he has lost, his wife and their love. In the house once more, he is safe and the lost treasure is his again.
In listening to the ghostly couple’s search, the narrator feels their loss vicariously. The narrator listens for them, and when the ghosts find their treasure, the narrator wants to know what it is. At the story’s end, the ghosts look at the sleeping narrator and their partner. The ghosts find their lost treasure within the pair. Awakening, the narrator realizes that love is their lost treasure. Their lost love exists not only in the house but is also reflected in the hearts of the living couple.
Memory
The theme of memory appears early in “A Haunted House.” In her first words, the ghostly wife says, “Here we left it.” She and her spectral spouse search the house for their treasure. They are drawn to the places in the house and garden that hold their memories.
At one point in the story, the narrator seeks out the ghosts. Having heard them looking for and finding their treasure, the narrator wants to see them and learn what they have found, but all the narrator finds is an empty room. The narrator immediately forgets why they entered the room and what they were searching for. Memory has failed. There is nothing to do but to resume looking. In this scene, the narrator mirrors the ghosts, who seemingly find their treasure but then resume their search almost immediately.
The narrator finally notes that the ghostly couple is looking for their joy. The ghosts find that joy in the memories of their past lives and the love they shared. For example, they say, “Here we slept . . . Kisses without number.” The ghostly couple discover their treasure not only in the different rooms in the house but also as reflected in the life of the couple who now live in the house. The ghostly couple’s memories are replayed by the living couple. Their memories are renewed and reified.
