Dr. Bennett, with his finger on his lip, slid by. I hastened after him, and together we mounted the last flight.
We were now in a portion of the building as new to the doctor as to myself. When we reached the top of the stairs we found the whole place dark save for a little glimmer towards the front which proved to be a gas-jet burning low in one of the attic rooms.
Turning this up we looked around, opened a closet-door or two, then walked into the back, where the doctor struck a match. Two closed doors met our eyes. One of these upon being opened disclosed a well-furnished room, similar in appearance to those in front, the other an unfinished garret half filled with trunks and boxes.
"Well!" he ejaculated, as the match went out upon this scene. "This is a mystery."
"Hark!" I urged; "our ears rather than our eyes must do service in this emergency."
He took the hint, and together we listened till some sound—was it the breathing of a person concealed near us?—caused us both to start and the doctor to light another match.
This time we saw something, but the match went out before we could determine what.
Annoyed by these momentary flashes of light, I dashed back into one of the rooms we had left, and catching up a candle I had previously noted there, lit it at the gas-jet, and proceeded back with it to this garret room.
Instantly a sight full of the strangest interest revealed itself.
Crouched against the farther wall, with wide-extended eyes fixed full upon us, we perceived a woman, upon whose pallid face and risen locks terror or some other equally emphatic passion had so fixed its impress that she looked like some affrighted creature balked in flight by some dreadful, some unprecedented sight which held her spell-bound. That she was beautiful, in that touching, feminine way which goes to the heart, did not lessen the effect of her appearance, nor were we unmoved by the fact that the child for whom the house had just been ransacked lay curled up and asleep at her feet.