sounds such as I had never heard before. I had been told of an extremely
old woman, a great-great-grandmother, bed-ridden, peevish, and
weak-minded, who had occupied that room for nearly a score of years,
apparently forgotten by fate, and left to drag out a monotonous, weary
existence on not her "mattress grave" (like the poet Heine), but on an
immensely thick feather bed; only a care, a burden, to her relations.

As twilight came on, I always carefully closed that door and shut the
old lady in to sleep by herself. For it seemed that she was still there,
still propped up in an imaginary bed, mumbling incoherently of the
past, or moaning out some want, or calling for some one to bring a
light, as she used to.

Once in a while, they told me, she would regain her strength suddenly
and astonish the family by appearing at the door. When the
grand-daughter was enjoying a Sunday night call from her "intended" it
was rather embarrassing.

I said nothing to my friends about this unpleasant room. But several
were susceptible to the strange influence. One thought she should not
mind so much if the door swung open, and a portière concealed the
gloom. So a cheerful cretonne soon was hung. Then the fancy came that
the curtain stirred and swayed as if some one or something was groping
feebly with ghostly or ghastly fingers behind it. And one night, when
sitting late and alone over the embers of my open fire, feeling a little
forlorn, I certainly heard moans coming from that direction.

It was not the wind, for, although it was late October and the breezes
were sighing over summer's departure, this sound was entirely different
and distinct. Then (and what a shiver ran down my back!) I remembered