Emptiness here just as everywhere else. A few chairs, a dresser,--it was
a ladies' dressing-room,--some smouldering ashes on the hearth, a lounge
piled up with cushions. But no person. The sound I had heard had not
issued from this room, yet something withheld me from seeking further.
Chilled to the bone, with teeth chattering in spite of myself, I paused
just inside the door, and when the match went out in my hand remained
shivering there in the darkness, a prey to sensations more nearly
approaching those of fear than any I had ever before experienced in my
whole life.




II

IT WAS SHE--SHE INDEED!

Look on death itself!--up, up, and see
The great doom's visage!

_Macbeth_.


Why, I did not know. There seemed to be no reason for this excess of
feeling. I had no dread of attack; my apprehension was of another sort.
Besides, any attack here must come from the rear--from the open doorway
in which I stood--and my dread lay before me, in the room itself, which,
as I have already said, appeared to be totally empty. What could occasion
my doubts, and why did I not fly the place? There were passage-ways yet
to search, why linger here like a gaby in the dark when perhaps the man I