little acts of preparation with which I am accustomed to calm
my spirits for the night, I went through them all, with just as much
precision as if I had expected to spend the ensuing hours in rest. When
all was done and only my cup of tea remained to be quaffed, I had a
little struggle with myself, which ended in my not drinking it at all.
Nothing, not even this comfortable solace for an unsatisfactory day,
should stand in the way of my being the complete mistress of my wits
this night. Had I known that this tea contained a soporific in the shape
of a little harmless morphine, I would have found this act of
self-denial much easier.

It was now eleven. Confident that nothing would be done while my light
was burning, I blew it out, and, taking a candle and some matches in my
hand, softly opened my door and, after a moment of intense listening,
stepped out and closed it carefully behind me. Nothing could be stiller
than the house or darker than the corridor.

"Am I watched or am I not watched?" I queried, and for an instant stood
undecided. Then, seeing nothing and hearing nothing, I slipped down the
hall to the door beyond mine and, opening it with all the care possible,
stepped inside.

I knew the room. I had taken especial note of it in my visit of the
morning. I knew that it was nearly empty and that there was a key in the
lock which I could turn. I therefore felt more or less safe in it,
especially as its window was undarkened by the branches that hung so
thickly across my own casement, shutting me in, or seeming to shut me
in, from all communication with the outside world and the unknown
guardian which I had been assured constantly attended my summons.

That I might strengthen my spirits by one glimpse of this same outside
world, before settling down for the watch I had set for myself, I
stepped softly to the window and took one lingering look without. A belt
of forest illumined by a gibbous moon met my eyes; nothing else. Yet
this sight was welcome, and it was only after I had been struck by the
possibility of my own figure being seen at the casement by some possible
watcher in the shadows below, that I found the hardihood necessary to
withdraw into the darker precincts of the room, and begin that lonely
watch which my doubts and expectations rendered necessary.

This was the third I had been forced to keep, and it was by far the most
dismal; for though the bolted door between me and the hall promised me
person