ething in
the man that daunted me.

He directed a most curious look towards the red light near the
tunnel's mouth, and looked all about it, as if something were missing
from it, and then looked at me.

That light was part of his charge? Was it not?

He answered in a low voice, "Don't you know it is?"

The monstrous thought came into my mind, as I perused the fixed
eyes and the saturnine face, that this was a spirit, not a man.
I have speculated since whether there may have been infection in
his mind.

In my turn, I stepped back. But in making the action, I detected
in his eyes some latent fear of me. This put the monstrous thought
to flight.

"You look at me," I said, forcing a smile, "as if you had a dread
of me."

"I was doubtful," he returned, "whether I had seen you before."

"Where?"

He pointed to the red light he had looked at.

"There?" I said.

Intently watchful of me, he replied (but without sound), "Yes."

"My good fellow, what should I do there? However, be that as it
may, I never was there, you may swear."

"I think I may," he rejoined. "Yes, I am sure I may."

His manner cleared, like my own. He replied to my remarks with
readiness, and in well-chosen words. Had he much to do there? Yes;
that was to say, he had enough responsibility to bear; but exactness
and watchfulness were what was required of him, and of actual
work--manual labor--he had next to none. To change that signal,
to trim those lights, and to turn this iron handle now and then,
was all he had to do under that head. Regarding those many long
and lonely hours of which I seemed to make so much, he could only
say that the routine of his life had shaped itself into that form,
and he had grown used to it. He had taught himself a language down
here,--if only to know it by sight, and to have formed his own
crude ideas of its pronunciation, could be called learning it.
He had also worked at fractions and decimals, and tried a little
algebra; but he was, and had been as a boy, a poor hand at figures.
Was it necessary for him, when on duty, always to remain in that
channel of damp air, and could he never rise into the sunshine from
between those high stone walls? Why, that depended upon times and
circumstances. Under some conditions there would be less upon the
Line than under others, and the same held good as to certain hours
of the day and night. In bright weather, he did choose occasions
for getting a little above these lower sh