INABILITY TO HELP
An old ghost in a white waistcoat is described as being piteous at its inability to assist a wretched woman with an infant, indicating a confirmed claim of supernatural inability to help.
OLD GHOST IN WHITE WAISTCOAT
He had been quite familiar with one old ghost in a white waistcoat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to assist a wretched woman with an infant, whom it saw below upon a doorstep.