mber having shut the door behind you?"

"Yes."

An open window in the hall! That was what he was trying to prove--open at
this time. From the expression of such faces of the jury as I could see,
I think he had proved it. The next point he made was in the same line.
Had she, in all the time she was in the building, heard any noises she
could not account for?

"Yes, many times."

"Can you describe these noises?"

"No; they were of all kinds. The pines sighed continually; I knew it was
the pines, but I had to listen. Once I heard a rushing sound--it was when
the pines stopped swaying for an instant--but I don't know what it was.
It was all very dreadful."

"Was this rushing sound such as a window might make on being opened?"

"Possibly. I didn't think of it at the time, but it might have been."

"From what direction did it come?"

"Back of me, for I turned my head about."

"Where were you at the time?"

"At the hearth. It was before Adelaide came in."

"A near sound, or a far?"

"Far, but I cannot locate it--indeed, I cannot. I forgot it in a moment."

"But you remember it now?"

"Yes."

"And cannot you remember _now_ any other noises than those you speak of?
That time you stepped into the hall--when your teeth chattered, you
know--did you hear nothing then but the sighing of the pines?"

She looked startled. Her hands went up and one of them clutched at her
throat, then they fell, and slowly--carefully--like one feeling his
way--she answered:

"I had forgotten. I did hear something--a sound in one of the doorways.
It was very faint--a sigh--a--a--I don't know what. It conveyed nothing
to me then, and not much now. But you asked, and I have answered."

"You have done right, Miss Cumberland. The jury ought to know these
facts. Was it a human sigh?"

"It wasn't the sigh of the pines."

"And you heard it in one of the doorways? Which doorway?"

"The one opposite the room in which I left my sister."

"The doorway to the large hall?"

"Yes, sir."

Oh, the sinister memories! The moments which I myself had spent
there--after this time of her passing through the hall, thank God!--but
not long after. And some one had been there before me! Was it Arthur? I
hardly had the courage to interrogate his face, but when I did, I, like
every one else who looked that way, met nothing but the quietude of a
fully composed man. There was nothing to be learned from him now; the
hour for self-betrayal was past. I b