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Page 6
As he sat and watched the dying embers, he fell into a reverie
concerning the events of the evening. His musings were of a somewhat
perplexed nature. He was at a loss to account for the appearance of a
gentleman, bearing unmistakable marks of refinement and wealth, as did
Mr. Brown, under such circumstances, and in such a region as
Miramichi. The words he had uttered in his delirium, added to the
mystery. He was also puzzled about the family of Dubois. How came
people of such culture and superiority in this dark portion of the
earth? How strange, that they had lived here so many years, without
assimilating to the common herd around them.
Thus his mind, excited by what had recently occurred, wandered on,
until at length his thoughts fell into their accustomed
channel,--dwelling on his own mission to this benighted land, and
framing various schemes by which he might accomplish the object so
dear to his heart.
In the mean time, having turned his face partially aside from the
fire, he was watching unconsciously the fitful gleaming of a light
cast on the opposite wall by the occasional flaring up of a tongue of
flame from the dying embers.
Suddenly he heard a deep, whirring sound as if the springs of some
complicated machinery had just then been set in motion.
Looking around to find whence the noise proceeded, he was rather
startled on observing in the wall, in one corner, just under the
ceiling, a tiny door fly open, and emerging thence a grotesque,
miniature man, holding, uplifted in his hand, a hammer of size
proportionate to his own figure. Mr. Norton sat motionless, while this
small specimen proceeded, with a jerky gait and many bobbing grimaces,
across a wire stretched to the opposite corner of the room, where
stood a tall, ebony clock. When within a short distance of the clock
another tiny door in its side flew open; the little man entered and
struck deliberately with the hammer the hour of midnight. Near the top
of the dial-plate was seen from without the regular uplifting of the
little arm, applying its stroke to the bell within. Having performed
his duty, this personage jerked out of the clock, the tiny door
closing behind him, bobbed and jerked along the wire as before, and
disappeared at the door in the wall, which also immediately closed
after his exit.
Having witnessed the whole manoeuvre with comic wonder and curiosity,
Mr. Norton burst into a loud and hearty peal of laughter, that was
still resounding in the room when he became suddenly aware of the
presence of Mrs. McNab. There she stood in the centre of the
apartment, her firm, square figure apparently rooted to the floor, her
head enveloped in innumerable folds of white cotton, a tower of
strength and defiance.
Her unexpected appearance changed in a moment the mood of the good
man, and he inquired anxiously, "Is the gentleman more ill? Can I
assist you?"
"He's just this minnut closed his eyes to sleep, and naw I expect he's
wide awake again, with the dreadfu' racket you were just a makin' O!
my! wadna you hae made a good nuss?"
Mr. Norton truly grieved at his inadvertency in disturbing the
household at this late hour of the night, begged pardon, and told Mrs.
McNab he would not be guilty of a like offence.
"How has the gentleman been during the evening?" he asked.
"O! he's been ravin' crazy a'maist, and obstacled everything I've done
for him. He's a very sick pusson naw. I cam' down to get a bottle of
muddeson", and Mrs. McNab went to a closet and took from it the
identical bottle of brandy from which Mrs. Dubois had poured when
preparing the stimulating dose for the invalid. Mr. Norton observed
this performance with a twinkle of the eye, but making no comment, the
worthy woman retired from the room.
That night Mr. Norton slept indifferently, being disturbed by exciting
and bewildering dreams. In his slumbers he saw an immense cathedral,
lighted only by what seemed some great conflagration without, which,
glaring in, with horrid, crimson hue upon the pictured walls, gave the
place the strange, lurid aspect of Pandemonium. The effect was
heightened by the appearance of thousands of small, grotesque beings,
all bearing more or less resemblance to the little man of the clock,
who were flying and bobbing, jerking and grinning through the air,
beneath the great vault, as if madly revelling in the scene. Yet the
good man all the while had a vague sense of some awful, impending
calamity, which increased as he wandered around in great perplexity,
exploring the countenances of the various groups scattered over the
place.
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