lad to see some wood blazing in the
grate; and a pair of candles aiding the light of the fire, made the
room look cheerful. A small table, with a very white cloth, and
preparations for supper, was also a very agreeable object.

I should have liked very well, under these influences, to have
listened to Tom Wyndsour's story; but after supper I grew too sleepy
to attempt to lead him to the subject; and after yawning for a time, I
found there was no use in contending against my drowsiness, so I
betook myself to my bedroom, and by ten o'clock was fast asleep.

What interruption I experienced that night I shall tell you presently.
It was not much, but it was very odd.

By next night I had completed my work at Barwyke. From early morning
till then I was so incessantly occupied and hard-worked, that I had
not time to think over the singular occurrence to which I have just
referred. Behold me, however, at length once more seated at my little
supper-table, having ended a comfortable meal. It had been a sultry
day, and I had thrown one of the large windows up as high as it would
go. I was sitting near it, with my brandy and water at my elbow,
looking out into the dark. There was no moon, and the trees that are
grouped about the house make the darkness round it supernaturally
profound on such nights.

"Tom," said I, so soon as the jug of hot punch I had supplied him
with began to exercise its genial and communicative influence; "you
must tell me who beside your wife and you and myself slept in the
house last night."

Tom, sitting near the door, set down his tumbler, and looked at me
askance, while you might count seven, without speaking a word.

"Who else slept in the house?" he repeated, very deliberately. "Not a
living soul, sir"; and he looked hard at me, still evidently expecting
something more.

"That _is_ very odd," I said returning his stare, and feeling really a
little odd. "You are sure _you_ were not in my room last night?"

"Not till I came to call you, sir, this morning; _I_ can make oath of
that."

"Well," said I, "there was some one there, _I_ can make oath of that.
I was so tired I could not make up my mind to get up; but I was waked
by a sound that I thought was some one flinging down the two tin boxes
in which my papers were locked up violently on the floor. I heard a
slow step on the ground, and there was light in the room, although I
remembered having put out my candle. I thought it must have been you,