more than ever. I stood there with open
mouth and staring eyes, ice-cold chills ran down my back, and drops of
perspiration stood out on my forehead. Finally, I could endure it no
longer. I sprang to the door, seized the key with both hands and put
it on my desk under a pile of heavy books. Then I breathed a sigh of
relief.

My lamp was about to go out and I discovered that I had no more oil.
With feverish haste I threw my clothes off, blew out the light and
sprang into bed as if to smother my fears.

But once alone in the darkness the fears grew worse than ever. They
grew into dreams and visions. It seemed to me as if I were out in the
graveyard again, and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane as
the wind turned it. Then I was in the mill again; the wheels were
turning and stretching out ghostly hands to draw me into the yawning
maw of the machine. Then again, I found myself in a long, low,
pitch-black corridor, followed by Something I could not see--Something
that drove me to the mouth of a bottomless abyss. I would start up out
of my half sleep, listen and look about me, then fall back again into
an uneasy slumber.

Suddenly something fell from the ceiling onto the bed, and
"buzz--buzz--buzz" sounded about my head. It was a huge fly which had
been sleeping in a corner of my room and had been roused by the heat
of the stove. It flew about in great circles, now around the bed, now
in all four corners of the chamber--"buzz--buzz--buzz"--it was
unendurable! At last I heard it creep into a bag of sugar which had
been left on the window sill. I sprang up and closed the bag tight.
The fly buzzed worse than ever, but I went back to bed and attempted
to sleep again, feeling that I had conquered the enemy.

I began to count: I counted slowly to one hundred, two hundred,
finally up to one thousand, and then at last I experienced that
pleasant weakness which is the forerunner of true sleep. I seemed to
be in a beautiful garden, bright with many flowers and odorous with
all the perfumes of spring. At my side walked a beautiful young girl.
I seemed to know her well, and yet it was not possible for me to
remember her name, or even to know how we came to be wandering there
together. As we walked slowly through the paths she would stop to pick
a flower or to admire a brilliant butterfly swaying in the air.
Suddenly a cold wind blew through the garden. The young girl trembled
and her cheeks grew pale. "I am cold," she sai