he felt it as something peculiarly
terrible that the furtive thing behind slunk after him with soundless
feet. Faster, faster! Traversing only the most unfrequented streets,
and at that late hour of a cold winter night he met no one, and
with a terrifying consciousness that his pursuer was gaining on
him, he desperately strode on. He did not dare to look behind,
dreading less what he might see than the momentary loss of speed
the action might occasion. Faster, faster, faster! And all at once
he knew that the dogging thing had dropped its stealthy pace and
was racing up to him. With a bound he broke into a run, seeing,
hearing, heeding nothing, aware only that the other was silently
louping on his track two steps to his one; and with that frantic
apprehension upon him, he gained the next street, flung himself
around the corner with his back to the wall, and his arms convulsively
drawn up for a grapple; and felt something rush whirring past his
flank, striking him on the shoulder as it went by, with a buffet
that made a shock break through his frame. That shock restored
him to his senses. His delusion was suddenly shattered. The goblin
was gone. He was free.

He stood panting, like one just roused from some terrible dream,
wiping the reeking perspiration from his forehead, and thinking
confusedly and wearily what a fool he had been. He felt he had
wandered a long distance from his house, but had no distinct perception
of his whereabouts. He only knew he was in some thinly peopled
street, whose familiar aspect seemed lost to him in the magical
disguise the superb moonlight had thrown over all. Suddenly a film
seemed to drop from his eyes, as they became riveted on a lighted
window, on the opposite side of the way. He started, and a secret
terror crept over him, vaguely mixed with the memory of the shock
he had felt as he turned the last corner, and his distinct, awful
feeling that something invisible had passed him. At the same instant
he felt, and thrilled to feel, a touch, as of a light finger, on
his cheek. He was in Hanover Street. Before him was the house,--the
oyster-room staring at him through the lighted transparencies of
its two windows, like two square eyes, below; and his tenant's
light in a chamber above! The added shock which this discovery
gave to the heaving of his heart made him gasp for breath. Could
it be? Did he still dream? While he stood panting and staring at
the building the city clocks began to st