ared to Jonathan that he was, indeed, a
murderer.

What monstrous thing was this that had befallen him who, but a moment
before, had been so entirely innocent of the guilt of blood? What was
he now to do in such an extremity as this, with his victim lying dead
at his feet, a poniard in his heart? Who would believe him to be
guiltless of crime with such a dreadful evidence as this presented
against him? How was he, a stranger in a foreign land, to totally
defend himself against an accusing of mistaken justice? At these
thoughts a developed terror gripped at his vitals and a sweat as cold
as ice bedewed his entire body. No, he must tarry for no explanation or
defense! He must immediately fly from this terrible place, or else,
should he be discovered, his doom would certainly be sealed!

At that moment, and in the very extremity of his apprehensions, there
fell of a sudden a knock upon the door, sounding so loud and so
startling upon the silence of the room that every shattered nerve in
our hero's frame tingled and thrilled in answer to it. He stood
petrified, scarcely so much as daring to breathe; and then, observing
that his mouth was agape, he moistened his dry and parching lips, and
drew his jaws together with a snap.

Again there fell the same loud, insistent knock upon the panel,
followed by the imperative words: "Open within!"

The wretched Jonathan flung about him a glance at once of terror and of
despair, but there was for him no possible escape. He was shut tight
in the room with his dead victim, like a rat in a trap. Nothing
remained for him but to obey the summons from without. Indeed, in the
very extremity of his distraction, he possessed reason enough to
perceive that the longer he delayed opening the door the less innocent
he might hope to appear in the eyes of whoever stood without.

With the uncertain and spasmodic movements of an ill-constructed
automaton, he crossed the room, and stepping very carefully over the
prostrate body upon the floor, and with a hesitating reluctance that he
could in no degree master, he unlocked, unbolted, and opened the door.

The figure that outlined itself in the light of the candle, against the
blackness of the passageway without was of such a singular and foreign
aspect as to fit extremely well into the extraordinary tragedy of which
Jonathan was at once the victim and the cause.

It was that of a lean, tall man with a thin, yellow countenance,
embellished