"You must come and see me on Thursday, and must also come to breakfast. I shall be alone, and have something to show you. You are going along with him, I find,—so much the better; take care of him, and good night."
Starwood had followed Seraphael implicitly; they were both below. We got into a carriage at the door, and were driven I knew not whither; but it was enough to be with him, even in that silent mood.
With the same absent grace he ordered another bed-room when we stayed at his hotel. I could no more have remonstrated with him than with a monarch when we found ourselves in the stately sitting-room.
"A pair of candles for the chamber," was his next command; and when they were brought, he said to us: "The waiter will show you to your rooms, dear children; you must not wait a moment."
I could not, so I felt, object, nor entreat him himself to sleep. Starwood and I departed; and whether it was from the novelty of the circumstances, or my own transcending happiness, or whether it was because I put myself into one of Starwood's dresses in default of my own, I do not conjecture, but I certainly could not sleep, and was forced to leave it alone.
I sat upright for an hour or two, and then rolled amongst the great hot pillows; I examined the register of the grate; I looked into the tall glass at my own double: but all would not exhaust me, and towards the very morning I left my bed and made a sally upon the landing-place. I knew the number of Seraphael's door, for Starwood had pointed it out to me as we passed along, and I felt drawn, as by odyllic force, to that very metal lock.
There was no crack, but a key-hole, and the key-hole was bright as any star; I peeped in also, and shall never forget my delight, yet dread, to behold that outline of a figure, which decided me to make an entrance into untried regions, upon inexperienced moods. Without any hesitation, I knocked; but recalling to myself his temperament, I spoke simultaneously,—
"Dear sir, may I come in?"
Though I waited not for his reply, and opened the door quite innocent of the ghostly apparel I wore—and how very strange must have been my appearance!—never shall I forget the look that came home to me as I advanced more near him,—that indrawn, awful aspect, that sweetness without a smile.
The table was loaded with papers, but there was no strew,—that "spirit" ever moulded to harmony its slightest "motion;" one delicate hand was outspread over a sheet, a pen was in the other: he did not seem surprised, scarcely aroused. I rushed up to him precipitately.