![]() Taking this also, he stole back to his cell. Carefully closing the door, and carrying the suit with him, he was returning towards the chimney, when he saw the Squire's silver-headed cane leaning against a corner of the wainscot. With little difficulty Israel selected from these the complete suit in which he had last seen his once jovial friend. Opening the door, there hung several coats, small-clothes, pairs of silk stockings, and hats of the deceased. He went straight to a high, narrow door in the opposite wall. With these, thoughts, he cautiously sprung the iron under foot, peeped in, and, seeing all clear, boldly re-entered the apartment. ![]() It is the Squire's private closet, hence it is not unlikely that here some at least of his clothing will be found." I will return to it and see what I can find to serve my purpose. They will hardly come back to the room in a hurry. If I can but lay hands on some of the late Squire's clothing, if but a coat and hat of his, I shall be certain to succeed. By means of the idea of the ghost prevailing among the frightened household, by that means I will this very night make good my escape. Since I seem then to understand how all these strange events have occurred, since I seem to know that they have plain common causes, I begin to feel cool and calm again. Now this will follow no doubt it has followed ere now:-they believe that the woman saw or heard the spirit of Squire Woodcock. The sudden report made her shriek then, afterwards, the noise of my fall prolonging itself, added to her fright, while her repeated shrieks brought every soul in the house to her, who aghast at seeing her lying in a pale faint, it may be, like a corpse, in a room hung with crape for a man just dead, they also shrieked out, and then with blended lamentations they bore the fainting person away. "Some woman, the housekeeper, perhaps, first entered the room alone. "No creature now in the house knows of the cell," thought he. Recovering from his first amazement, Israel revolved these occurrences. Directly he heard other voices of alarm undistinguishably commingled, and then they retreated together, and all again was still. They seemed some nervous female's, alarmed by what must have appeared to her supernatural, or at least unaccountable, noises in the wall. When raising himself instantly, not seriously bruised by his fall, Israel instantly listened, the echoing sounds of his descent were mingled with added shrieks from within the room. In a panic, Israel fled up the dark stairs, and near the top, in his eagerness, stumbled and fell back to the last step with a rolling din, which, reverberated by the arch overhead, smote through and through the wall, dying away at last indistinctly, like low muffled thunder among the clefts of deep hills. Owing to his hurried violence the jamb closed with a dull, dismal and singular noise. Instantly he flew to the jamb, which remained unclosed, and disappearing within, drew the stone after him by the iron knob. While wrapped in these dispiriting reveries, he heard a step not very far off in the passage. If discovered then, prowling here in the inmost privacies of a gentleman's abode, what would befall the wanderer, already not unsuspected in the neighborhood of some underhand guilt as a fugitive? If he adhered to the strict truth, what could he offer in his own defence without convicting himself of acts which, by English tribunals, would be accounted flagitious crimes? Unless, indeed, by involving the memory of the deceased Squire Woodcock in his own self acknowledged proceedings, so ungenerous a charge should result in an abhorrent refusal to credit his extraordinary tale, whether as referring to himself or another, and so throw him open to still more grievous suspicions? With him had perished all knowledge of the fact that a stranger was immured in the mansion. ![]() But what was now to be done? His friend must have died very suddenly most probably struck down in a fit, from which he never more rose. At once the whole three days' mystery was made clear. Knowing nothing of these mournful customs of the country, nevertheless, Israel's instinct whispered him that Squire Woodcock lived no more on this earth. The four corners of the red cloth on the round table were knotted with crape. ![]() The curtains of the window were festooned with long weepers of crape. He started at the funereal aspect of the room, into which, since he last stood there, undertakers seemed to have stolen.
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