he and the old woman held it easier to believe that a dead man might
revisit the world he had left, than that one who went on living for
hundreds of years should be a man at all.

He had never heard that Mr. Raven meddled with anything in the
house, but he might perhaps consider himself privileged in regard
to the books. How the old woman had learned so much about him he
could not tell; but the description she gave of him corresponded
exactly with the figure I had just seen.

"I hope it was but a friendly call on the part of the old gentleman!"
he concluded, with a troubled smile.

I told him I had no objection to any number of visits from
Mr. Raven, but it would be well he should keep to his resolution
of saying nothing about him to the servants. Then I asked him if
he had ever seen the mutilated volume out of its place; he answered
that he never had, and had always thought it a fixture. With that
he went to it, and gave it a pull: it seemed immovable.




CHAPTER II

THE MIRROR

Nothing more happened for some days. I think it was about a week
after, when what I have now to tell took place.