And yet it was a dread, a frightful, a terrible form, tall and gaunt as could be well known, even in that crouching attitude, by the length of legs and arms. Its skin was like wrinkled parchment, and clung close to its bones. Its face and features were strong and bony and sharp. The eagle nose and the pointed chin nearly met over the sunken mouth. Burning black eyes flashed and flamed under beetling brows. White hair, parted over the top of the head, rolled in silver waves down over shoulders and back. It wore but one garment, a dark red gown, with sleeves that only reached to the elbow, and a skirt that only reached to the knees. It was squatting, as we said before. Its knees were drawn up; its long, gaunt, dark arms were around them, and the great claw-like fingers were clasped upon them. The head was bent, but the blazing eyes were fixed in a burning gaze upon the face of the recumbent girl.
As memory slowly awoke in the mind of the stupefied girl, she began to recall some of the phases of her night’s adventure. When had it happened? How long ago? An hour ago? A day? A year? A century? How long? And where was she now? She dimly remembered when she died, and how she died—how the faintness of death crept upon her; how her breath went and then her sense, and then—nothingness.
But how long was that ago?
She could not think.
Where was she now?
She could not say.
Only one thing was certain. She had died, and she had come to a bad place for her sins. She was in darkness. She was in—that awful pit of utter despair whose name she could not bear to breathe to her own spirit.
And that thing by the smoldering fire was her demon jailer!
Thus much was certainly true, she thought. And yet so dull and stupid was she still that she did not care very much where she was, or even wonder at her own insensibility.
At last, seeing that the creature by the fire still glared at her, she tried to speak, and at length muttered the question: