mystery frightened me. It could not be Miss Chinfeather who had visited
me, I argued with myself. The lips that had touched mine were not those
of a corpse, but were instinct with life and love. Who, then, could my
mysterious visitor be? Not Lady Chillington, surely! I half started up
in bed at the thought. Just as I did so, without warning of any kind, a
solemn muffled tramp became audible in the room immediately over mine. A
tramp, slow, heavy, measured, from one end of the room to the other, and
then back again. I slipped back into the bedclothes and buried myself up
to the ears. I could hear the beating of my heart, oppressed now with a
new terror before which the lesser one faded utterly. The very monotony
of that dull measured walk was enough to unstring the nerves of a child,
coming as it did in the middle of the night. I tried to escape from it
by going still deeper under the clothes, but I could hear it even then.
Since I could not escape it altogether, I had better listen to it with
all my ears, for it was quite possible that it might come down stairs,
and so into my room. Had such a thing happened, I think I should have
died from sheer terror. Happily for me nothing of the kind took place;
and, still listening, I fell asleep at last from utter weariness, and
knew nothing more till I was awoke by a stray sunbeam smiting me across
the eyes.




CHAPTER III.

A VOYAGE OF DISCOVERY.


A golden sunbeam was shining through a crevice in the blinds; the birds