their room.

He was a man of middle size, clean shaven, with small, bright, yellowish
eyes, which shone with restless eagerness from under thick, bushy brows.
Although he had lived for years in Paris, he was dressed like a man from
the country, wearing a flowered silk vest, and a long frock-coat with an
immense collar.

"Quick, Chevassat!" he cried, with a voice full of trouble. "Take your
lamp, and follow me; an accident has happened upstairs."

He was so seriously disturbed, although generally very calm and cool,
that the two Chevassats were thoroughly frightened.

"An accident!" exclaimed the woman; "that was all that was wanting. But
pray, what has happened, dear M. Ravinet?"

"How do I know? This very moment, as I was just coming out of my room, I
thought I heard the death-rattle of a dying person. It was in the fifth
story. Of course I ran up a few steps, I listened. All was silent. I
went down again, thinking I had been mistaken; and at once I heard again
a sighing, a sobbing--I can't tell you exactly what; but it sounded
exactly like the last sigh of a person in agony, and at the point of
death."

"And then?"

"Then I ran down to tell you, and ask you to come up. I am not sure,
you understand; but I think I could swear it was the voice of Miss
Henrietta,--that pretty young girl who lives up there. Well, are you