The darkness comes up at
once. The canoe safely pulled up and turned over on her face, I groped
my way up the little narrow pathway to the verandah. The six lamps were
soon burning merrily in the front room; but in the kitchen, where I
"dined," the shadows were so gloomy, and the lamplight was so
inadequate, that the stars could be seen peeping through the cracks
between the rafters.
I turned in early that night. Though it was calm and there was no wind,
the creaking of my bedstead and the musical gurgle of the water over the
rocks below were not the only sounds that reached my ears. As I lay
awake, the appalling emptiness of the house grew upon me. The corridors
and vacant rooms seemed to echo innumerable footsteps, shufflings, the
rustle of skirts, and a constant undertone of whispering. When sleep at
length overtook me, the breathings and noises, however, passed gently to
mingle with the voices of my dreams.
A week passed by, and the "reading" progressed favourably. On the tenth
day of my solitude, a strange thing happened. I awoke after a good
night's sleep to find myself possessed with a marked repugnance for my
room.
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