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Page 23
"'What may you be wantin'?' she asked, in a Northern
accent.
"'I am your neighbor over yonder,' said I, nodding
towards my house. 'I see that you have only just
moved in, so I thought that if I could be of any help
to you in any--'
"'Ay, we'll just ask ye when we want ye,' said she,
and shut the door in my face. Annoyed at the churlish
rebuff, I turned my back and walked home. All
evening, though I tried to think of other things, my
mind would still turn to the apparition at the window
and the rudeness of the woman. I determined to say
nothing about the former to my wife, for she is a
nervous, highly strung woman, and I had no wish that
she would share the unpleasant impression which had
been produced upon myself. I remarked to her,
however, before I fell asleep, that the cottage was
now occupied, to which she returned no reply.
"I am usually an extremely sound sleeper. It has been
a standing jest in the family that nothing could ever
wake me during the night. And yet somehow on that
particular night, whether it may have been the slight
excitement produced by my little adventure or not I
know not, but I slept much more lightly than usual.
Half in my dreams I was dimly conscious that something
was going on in the room, and gradually became aware
that my wife had dressed herself and was slipping on
her mantle and her bonnet. My lips were parted to
murmur out some sleepy words of surprise or
remonstrance at this untimely preparation, when
suddenly my half-opened eyes fell upon her face,
illuminated by the candle-light, and astonishment held
me dumb. She wore an expression such as I had never
seen before--such as I should have thought her
incapable of assuming. She was deadly pale and
breathing fast, glancing furtively towards the bed as
she fastened her mantle, to see if she had disturbed
me. Then, thinking that I was still asleep, she
slipped noiselessly from the room, and an instant
later I heard a sharp creaking which could only come
from the hinges of the front door. I sat up in bed
and rapped my knuckles against the rail to make
certain that I was truly awake. Then I took my watch
from under the pillow. It was three in the morning.
What on this earth could my wife be doing out on the
country road at three in the morning?
"I had sat for about twenty minutes turning the thing
over in my mind and trying to find some possible
explanation. The more I thought, the more
extraordinary and inexplicable did it appear. I was
still puzzling over it when I heard the door gently
close again, and her footsteps coming up the stairs.
"'Where in the world have you been, Effie?' I asked as
she entered.
"She gave a violent start and a kind of gasping cry
when I spoke, and that cry and start troubled me more
than all the rest, for there was something
indescribably guilty about them. My wife had always
been a woman of a frank, open nature, and it gave me a
chill to see her slinking into her own room, and
crying out and wincing when her own husband spoke to
her.
"'You awake, Jack!' she cried, with a nervous laugh.
'Why, I thought that nothing could awake you.'
"'Where have you been?' I asked, more sternly.
"'I don't wonder that you are surprised,' said she,
and I could see that her fingers were trembling as she
undid the fastenings of her mantle. 'Why, I never
remember having done such a thing in my life before.
The fact is that I felt as though I were choking, and
had a perfect longing for a breath of fresh air. I
really think that I should have fainted if I had not
gone out. I stood at the door for a few minutes, and
now I am quite myself again.'
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