n prove
it--_but I won't!_'

That moment, something glittered in Mervyn's hand, and he strode towards
Irons, overturning a chair with a crash.

'I have you--come on and you're a dead man,' said the clerk, in a hoarse
voice, drawing into the deep darkness toward the door, with the dull
gleam of a pistol-barrel just discernible in his extended hand.

'Stay--don't go,' cried Mervyn, in a piercing voice; 'I conjure--I
implore--whatever you are, come back--see, I'm unarmed,' (and he flung
his sword back toward the window).

'You young gentlemen are always for drawing upon poor bodies--how would
it have gone if I had not looked to myself, Sir, and come furnished?'
said Irons, in his own level tone.

'I don't know--I don't _care_--I don't care if I were dead. Yes, yes,
'tis true, I almost wish he had shot me.'

'Mind, Sir, you're on honour,' said the clerk, in his old tone, as he
glided slowly back, his right hand in his coat pocket, and his eye with
a quiet suspicion fixed upon Mervyn, and watching his movements.

'I don't know what or who you are, but if ever you knew what human
feeling is--I say, if you are anything at all capable of compassion, you
will kill me at a blow rather than trifle any longer with the terrible
hope that has been my torture--I believe my insanity, all my life.'

'Well, Sir,' said Irons, mildly, and with that serene suspicion of a
smile on his face, 'if you wish to talk to me you must take me
different; for, to say truth, I was nearer killing you that time than
you were aware, and all the time I mean you no harm! and yet, if I
thought you were going to say to anybody living, Zekiel Irons, the
clerk, was here on Tuesday night, I believe I'd shoot you now.'

'You wish your visit secret? well, you have my honour, no one living
shall hear of it,' said Mervyn. 'Go on.'

'I've little to say, your honour; but, first, do you think your servants
heard the noise just now?'

'The old woman's deaf, and her daughter dare not stir after night-fall.
You need fear no interruption.'

'Ay, I know; the house is haunted, they say, but dead men tell no tales.
'Tis the living I fear, I thought it would be darker--the clouds broke
up strangely; 'tis as much as my life's worth to me to be seen near this
Tyled House; and never you speak to me nor seem to know me when you
chance to meet me, do you mind, Sir? I'm bad enough myself, but there's
some that's worse.'

'Tis agreed, there shall be no recognition,' an