?"

"Well, I can't answer these questions--all I know is this--six weeks ago
I and my wife were in search of a furnished apartment. Passing a quiet
street, we saw on the window of one of the houses a bill, 'Apartments
Furnished.' The situation suited us: we entered the house--liked the
rooms--engaged them by the week--and left them the third day. No power
on earth could have reconciled my wife to stay longer, and I don't
wonder at it."

"What did you see?"

"Excuse me--I have no desire to be ridiculed as a superstitious
dreamer--nor, on the other hand, could I ask you to accept on my
affirmation what you would hold to be incredible without the evidence of
your own senses. Let me only say this, it was not so much what we saw or
heard (in which you might fairly suppose that we were the dupes of our
own excited fancy, or the victims of imposture in others) that drove us
away, as it was an undefinable terror which seized both of us whenever
we passed by the door of a certain unfurnished room, in which we
neither saw nor heard anything. And the strangest marvel of all was,
that for once in my life I agreed with my wife--silly woman though she
be--and allowed, after the third night, that it was impossible to stay a
fourth in that house. Accordingly, on the fourth morning, I summoned the
woman who kept the house and attended on us, and told her that the rooms
did not quite suit us, and we would not stay out our week. She said,
dryly: 'I know why; you have stayed longer than any other lodger; few
ever stayed a second night; none before you, a third. But I take it they
have been very kind to you.'

"'They--who?' I asked, affecting a smile.

"'Why, they who haunt the house, whoever they are. I don't mind them; I
remember them many years ago, when I lived in this house, not as a
servant; but I know they will be the death of me some day. I don't
care--I'm old, and must die soon, anyhow; and then I shall be with them,
and in this house still.' The woman spoke with so dreary a calmness,
that really it was a sort of awe that prevented my conversing with her
farther. I paid for my week, and too happy were I and my wife to get off
so cheaply."

"You excite my curiosity," said I; "nothing I should like better than to
sleep in a haunted house. Pray give me the address of the one which you
left so ignominiously."

My friend gave me the address; and when we parted, I walked straight
towards the house thus indicated.

It is situat