numerable
heights and hollows, concealed by the darkness, and favoured not only by
the nurse's deafness, but by the uproar of the wind and surf. She
entered the pavilion, and, going at once to the upper story, opened and
set a light in one of the windows that looked towards the sea.
Immediately afterwards the light at the schooner's mast-head was run
down and extinguished. Its purpose had been attained, and those on board
were sure that they were expected. The old woman resumed her
preparations; although the other shutters remained closed, I could see a
glimmer going to and fro about the house; and a gush of sparks from one
chimney after another soon told me that the fires were being kindled.

Northmour and his guests, I was now persuaded, would come ashore as soon
as there was water on the floe. It was a wild night for boat service;
and I felt some alarm mingle with my curiosity as I reflected on the
danger of the landing. My old acquaintance, it was true, was the most
eccentric of men; but the present eccentricity was both disquieting and
lugubrious to consider. A variety of feelings thus led me towards the
beach, where I lay flat on my face in a hollow within six feet of the
track that led to the pavilion. Thence, I should have the satisfaction
of recognising the arrivals, and, if they should prove to be
acquaintances, greeting them as soon as they had landed.

Some time before eleven, while the tide was still dangerously low, a
boat's lantern appeared close inshore; and, my attention being thus
awakened, I could perceive another still far to seaward, violently
tossed, and sometimes hidden by the billows. The weather, which was
getting dirtier as the night went on, and the perilous situation of the
yacht upon a lee-shore, had probably driven them to attempt a landing at
the earliest possible moment.

A little afterwards, four yachtsmen carrying a very heavy chest, and
guided by a fifth with a lantern, passed close in front of me as I lay,
and were admitted to the pavilion by the nurse. They returned to the
beach, and passed me a second time with another chest, larger but
apparently not so heavy as the first. A third time they made the
transit; and on this occasion one of the yachtsmen carried a leather
portmanteau, and the others a lady's trunk and carriage bag. My
curiosity was sharply excited. If a woman were among the guests of
Northmour, it would show a change in his habits and an apostasy from his
pet theorie