uld see the soft clay
floor was trodden with the prints of many boots, and marked with a trail
as if some heavy thing had been dragged over it.

So I set out down the passage, reaching out my hand before me lest I
should run against anything in the dark, and sliding my feet slowly to
avoid pitfalls in the floor. But before I had gone half a dozen paces,
the darkness grew so black that I was frightened, and so far from going
on was glad to turn sharp about, and see the glimmer of light that came
in through the hole under the tomb. Then a horror of the darkness seized
me, and before I well knew what I was about I found myself wriggling my
body up under the tombstone on to the churchyard grass, and was once more
in the low evening sunlight and the soft sweet air.

Home I ran to my aunt's, for it was past tea-time, and beside that I knew
I must fetch a candle if I were ever to search out the passage; and to
search it I had well made up my mind, no matter how much I was scared for
this moment. My aunt gave me but a sorry greeting when I came into the
kitchen, for I was late and hot. She never said much when displeased, but
had a way of saying nothing, which was much worse; and would only reply
yes or no, and that after an interval, to anything that was asked of her.
So the meal was silent enough, for she had finished before I arrived, and
I ate but little myself being too much occupied with the thought of my
strange discovery, and finding, beside, the tea lukewarm and the victuals
not enticing.

You may guess that I said nothing of what I had seen, but made up my mind
that as soon as my aunt's back was turned I would get a candle and
tinder-box, and return to the churchyard. The sun was down before Aunt
Jane gave thanks for what we had received, and then, turning to me, she
said in a cold and measured voice:

'John, I have observed that you are often out and about of nights,
sometimes as late as half past seven or eight. Now, it is not seemly for
young folk to be abroad after dark, and I do not choose that my nephew
should be called a gadabout. "What's bred in the bone will come out in
the flesh", and 'twas with such loafing that your father began his wild
ways, and afterwards led my poor sister such a life as never was, till
the mercy of Providence took him away.'

Aunt Jane often spoke thus of my father, whom I never remembered, but
believe him to have been an honest man and good fellow to boot, if
something given to