nd tremble, and fancy It is behind me. I humbly
beg you, honoured sir, to order my clothes, and whatever wages
are due to me, to be sent to my mother's, at Walworth--John
knows her address."

The letter ended with additional apologies, somewhat incoherent, and
explanatory details as to effects that had been under the writer's
charge.

This flight may perhaps warrant a suspicion that the man wished to go to
Australia, and had been somehow or other fraudulently mixed up with the
events of the night. I say nothing in refutation of that conjecture;
rather, I suggest it as one that would seem to many persons the most
probable solution of improbable occurrences. My own theory remained
unshaken. I returned in the evening to the house, to bring away in a
hack cab the things I had left there, with my poor dog's body. In this
task I was not disturbed, nor did any incident worth note befall me,
except that still, on ascending, and descending the stairs I heard the
same footfall in advance. On leaving the house, I went to Mr J----'s. He
was at home. I returned him the keys, told him that my curiosity was
sufficiently gratified, and was about to relate quickly what had passed,
when he stopped me, and said, though with much politeness, that he had
no longer any interest in a mystery which none had ever solved.

I determined at least to tell him of the two letters I had read, as well
as of the extraordinary manner in which they had disappeared, and I then
inquired if he thought they had been addressed to the woman who had died
in the house, and if there were anything in her early history which
could possibly confirm the dark suspicions to which the letters gave
rise. Mr J---- seemed startled, and, after musing a few moments,
answered, "I know but little of the woman's earlier history, except, as
I before told you, that her family were known to mine. But you revive
some vague reminiscences to her prejudice. I will make inquiries, and
inform you of their result. Still, even if we could admit the popular
superstition that a person who had been either the perpetrator or the
victim of dark crimes in life could revisit, as a restless spirit, the
scene in which those crimes had been committed, I should observe that
the house was infested by strange sights and sounds before the old woman
died--you smile--what would you say?"

"I would say this, that I am convinced, if we could get to the bottom of
these mysteries, we should