been the instigator of voice in all that region, was cowed into thinking
that, if the dead could rise from the grave for purposes of revenge, how
much more easily could he rise now from so crude a coffin as he himself
had helped to construct for him!

It was in this absolute silence that he heard a sound. He heard the dead
man turn in his coffin! He heard, and did not doubt his hearing; it was
not a thing that he could easily be deceived about as he sat with his
elbow on the coffin. He sat there not one instant longer; the next
moment he was twenty feet away, standing half-hidden in the edge of the
brushwood, staring at the cart and the coffin, ready to plunge into the
icy swamp and hide farther among the young trees if occasion required.
Occasion did not require. The oxen dozed on; the cart, the barrel, and
the coffin stood just as he had left them.

Perhaps for five minutes the frightened man was still. Gradually his
muscles relaxed, and he ceased to stand with limbs and features all
drawn in horror away from the coffin. He next pulled back his foot from
the icy marsh; but even then, having regained his equilibrium on the
road, he had not decided what to do, and it took him some time longer to
turn over the situation in his mind. He had heard the dead man move; he
was terribly frightened; still, it might have been a mistake, and, any
way, the most disagreeable course, clearly, was to remain there till
nightfall. He had run backward in his first alarm; so, to get to the
nearest habitation, it would be necessary to pass the cart on the road,
even if he left it there. Had any further manifestation of vitality
appeared on the part of the corpse he would have felt justified in
running back into the forest, but this was an extreme measure. He did
not wish to go near the cart, but to turn his back upon it seemed almost
as fearsome. He stood facing it, as a man faces a fierce dog, knowing