illness of death.

Yet now, in the midst of that black darkness and that deathly
stillness, he became aware, of a sight and a sound.

It was a low, creaking sound, which was repeated at short intervals,
accompanied by a sliding, shuffling noise. It sounded in the
direction of the opening by which the ladder led up from below.
Looking there, he saw a ray of light, faint and flickering, yet
visible enough in that deep darkness; and as the grating, shuffling
sounds succeeded one another at regular intervals, even so did the
faint, flickering ray of light grow brighter and brighter.

As Bob looked at this and took it all in, one thought came to him
in an instant,--

_Somebody was coming up the ladder!_

The thought went through him with a pang.

Somebody is coming up the ladder!

Who?

What for?

That mysterious somebody was coming slowly and stealthily. It was
the tread of one who wished to come unobserved.

On waking out of sleep suddenly, the mind is often confused; but
when, after such a sudden awakening, it is confronted by some
horrible presence, the shock is sometimes too great to be endured.
So was it with Bob at this time. His awaking had been sudden; and
the horror that he found in the object that now presented itself
was, that the shuffling sound that arose from the ladder was the
step of Doom,--and the mysterious visitant was stealing towards
him to make him its prey. There arose within him an awful
anticipation. His eyes fixed themselves upon the place where the
light was shining; all his soul awaited, in dreadful expectation,
the appearance of the mysterious visitor, and as the stealthy step
drew nearer and nearer, the excitement grew stronger, and more
painful, and more racking.

At length the figure began to emerge above the opening.

Bob's eyes were fixed upon the place.

He saw first the light. It emerged above the opening--an old oil-lamp
held in a bony, grisly, skinny hand. Then followed an arm.

Bob's excitement was now terrible. His heart beat with wild throbs.
His whole frame seemed to vibrate under that pulsation which was
almost like a convulsion.

The arm rose higher! Higher still!

_It_ was coming!

There arose a matted shock of greasy, gray hair. The light shone
down upon it as it was upheld in the bony hand. The hair came tip,
and then, gradually, a face.

That face was pale as ashes; it was lean and shrivelled; the cheeks
were sunken; the cheek bones projected; and a m