den his
face."

Dr. Fall frowned.

"I do not quite follow you," he said.

"Perhaps if I were to follow you back to the room," said T. B.
good-humouredly, "you might understand better."

He heard a strange wailing sound and a shivering motion beneath his
feet, as though a heavy traction engine were passing close to the house.

"What is that?" he asked.

"It is one of the unpleasant consequences of building one's house over a
disused coal-mine," said the doctor easily; "but as regards your strange
hallucination," he went on, "I should rather like to disabuse your mind
of your fantastic vision."

He walked slowly back to the room which T. B. had quitted, and the
inner door yielded to his touch. It was in darkness. Dr. Fall put his
hand inside the room and there was a click of a switch.

"Come in," he said, and T. B. stepped into the room.

It was the room he had left in the earlier part of the day. There was
the blue square of carpet and the silver bedstead, and the same yellow
face and unwinking eyes of the patient. The walls were panelled in
myrtle, the same electrolier hung from the ceiling as he had seen on his
previous visit. Smith gasped, and passed his hand over his forehead.

"You see," said the secretary, "you have been the victim of a peculiar
and unhappy trick of eyesight; in fact, Mr. Smith, may I suggest that
you have been dreaming?"

"You may suggest just what you like," said T. B. pleasantly. "I should
like to see the room below and the room above."

"With pleasure," said the other; "there is a storeroom up above which
you may see if you wish."

He led the way upstairs, unlocked the door of the room immediately over
that which they had just left, and entered. The room was bare, and the
plain deal floor, the distempered walls, and the high skylight showed it
to be just as the doctor had described, a typical storeroom.

"You do not seem to use it," said T. B.

"We are very tidy people," smiled the doctor; "and now you shall see the
room below."

As they went down the stairs again they heard the curious wail, and T.
B. experienced a tremulous jar which he had noted before.

"Unpleasant, is it not?" said Dr. Fall. "I was quite alarmed at that at
first, but it has no unpleasant consequences."

On the second floor he entered the third room, immediately below that in
which the sick Mr. Moole was lying. He unlocked this door and they
entered a well-furnished bedroom; on a more elaborate scale