t the fact was no reflection on my devotion. I was a confirmed
sufferer from insomnia, and although otherwise perfectly well had been
completely fagged out that day, from having slept scarcely at all the
two previous nights. Edith knew this and had insisted on sending me
home by nine o'clock, with strict orders to go to bed at once.

The house in which I lived had been occupied by three generations of
the family of which I was the only living representative in the direct
line. It was a large, ancient wooden mansion, very elegant in an
old-fashioned way within, but situated in a quarter that had long since
become undesirable for residence, from its invasion by tenement houses
and manufactories. It was not a house to which I could think of
bringing a bride, much less so dainty a one as Edith Bartlett. I had
advertised it for sale, and meanwhile merely used it for sleeping
purposes, dining at my club. One servant, a faithful colored man by the
name of Sawyer, lived with me and attended to my few wants. One feature
of the house I expected to miss greatly when I should leave it, and
this was the sleeping chamber which I had built under the foundations.
I could not have slept in the city at all, with its never ceasing
nightly noises, if I had been obliged to use an upstairs chamber. But
to this subterranean room no murmur from the upper world ever
penetrated. When I had entered it and closed the door, I was surrounded
by the silence of the tomb. In order to prevent the dampness of the
subsoil from penetrating the chamber, the walls had been laid in
hydraulic cement and were very thick, and the floor was likewise
protected. In order that the room might serve also as a vault equally
proof against violence and flames, for the storage of valuables, I had
roofed it with stone slabs hermetically sealed, and the outer door was
of iron with a thick coating of asbestos. A small pipe, communicating
with a wind-mill on the top of the house, insured the renewal of air.

It might seem that the tenant of such a chamber ought to be able to
command slumber, but it was rare that I slept well, even there, two
nights in succession. So accustomed was I to wakefulness that I minded
little the loss of one night's rest. A second night, however, spent in
my reading chair instead of my bed, tired me out, and I never allowed
myself to go longer than that without slumber, from fear of nervous
disorder. From this statement it will be inferred that I had