the woman I had a legal
right to claim as my wife, without disclosing the reason why I knew
myself to have it.

'I went home to Knapwater the next day, and for nearly a week lived in
a state of indecision. I could not hit upon a scheme for proving my wife
dead without compromising myself.

'Mr. Raunham hinted that I should take steps to discover her whereabouts
by advertising. I had no energy for the farce. But one evening I chanced
to enter the Rising Sun Inn. Two notorious poachers were sitting in
the settle, which screened my entrance. They were half drunk--their
conversation was carried on in the solemn and emphatic tone common to
that stage of intoxication, and I myself was the subject of it.

'The following was the substance of their disjointed remarks: On the
night of the great fire at Carriford, one of them was sent to meet
me, and break the news of the death of my wife to me. This he did;
but because I would not pay him for his news, he left me in a mood
of vindictiveness. When the fire was over, he joined his comrade. The
favourable hour of the night suggested to them the possibility of some
unlawful gain before daylight came. My fowlhouse stood in a tempting
position, and still resenting his repulse during the evening, one of
them proposed to operate upon my birds. I was believed to have gone to
the rectory with Mr. Raunham. The other was disinclined to go, and the
first went off alone.

'It was now about three o'clock. He had advanced as far as the
shrubbery, which grows near the north wall of the house, when he fancied
he heard, above the rush of the waterfall, noises on the other side
of the building. He described them in these words, "Ghostly mouths
talking--then a fall--then a groan--then the rush of the water and creak
of the engine as before." Only one explanation occurred to him; the
house was haunted. And, whether those of the living or the dead, voices
of any kind were inimical to one who had come on such an errand. He
stealthily crept home.

'His unlawful purpose in being behind the house led him to conceal
his adventure. No suspicion of the truth entered his mind till the
railway-porter had startled everybody by his strange announcement. Then
he asked himself, had the horrifying sounds of that night been really an
enactment in the flesh between me and my wife?

'The words of the other man were:

'"Why don't he try to find her if she's alive?"

'"True," said the first. "Well, I don't for