t, and turning the stool on which he was
sitting round towards the room, observed, "How very strange,
Johnnie,"--for these young men were on terms of sufficient intimacy to
address each other in a familiar style,--"How very strange! I thought I
heard some one sit down in that chair when we began the _Gagliarda_. I
looked round quite expecting to see some one had come in. Did you hear
nothing?"

"It was only the chair creaking," my brother answered, feigning an
indifference which he scarcely felt. "Certain parts of the wicker-work
seem to be in accord with musical notes and respond to them; let us
continue with the _Minuetto_."

Thus they finished the suite, Mr. Gaskell demanding a repetition of the
_Gagliarda_, with the air of which he was much pleased. As the clocks
had already struck eleven, they determined not to play more that night;
and Mr. Gaskell rose, blew out the sconces, shut the piano, and put the
music aside. My brother has often assured me that he was quite prepared
for what followed, and had been almost expecting it; for as the books
were put away, a creaking of the wicker chair was audible, exactly
similar to that which he had heard when he stopped playing on the
previous night. There was a moment's silence; the young men looked
involuntarily at one another, and then Mr. Gaskell said, "I cannot
understand the creaking of that chair; it has never done so before, with
all the music we have played. I am perhaps imaginative and excited with
the fine airs we have heard to-night, but I have an impression that I
cannot dispel that something has been sitting listening to us all this
time, and that now when the concert is ended it has got up and gone."
There was a spirit of raillery in his words, but his tone was not so
light as it would ordinarily have been, and he was evidently ill at
ease.

"Let us try the _Gagliarda_ again," said my brother; "it is the
vibration of the opening notes which affects the wicker-work, and we
shall see if the noise is repeated." But Mr. Gaskell excused himself
from trying the experiment, and after some desultory conversation, to
which it was evident that neither was giving any serious attention, he
took his leave and returned to New College.

CHAPTER II

I shall not weary you, my dear Edward, by recounting similar experiences
which occurred on nearly every occasion that the young men met in the
evenings for music. The repetition of the phenomenon had accustomed them
t