“Come up-stairs, Mevrouw,” she said, in a shrill whisper; and when Ursula hesitated she caught her by the sleeve. “Come up-stairs,” she reiterated, leading the way, but refusing any further explanation. Ursula mechanically followed. Gasping for breath, the woman ran along a dim corridor, and then stopped in the dark of an unused room.
“Hark!” she said, with uplifted finger.
“What?” answered Ursula, impatiently. “I hear nothing. Do you?”
For only answer Hephzibah passed behind her and closed the door, through which a faint glimmer of light had come stealing. They were then in absolute darkness.
“Well, what now? What is the matter?” repeated the young Baroness, with some anxiety in her tone. In the obscurity she yet perceived that Hephzibah had uplifted a finger.
“Hush!” said the maid. “You will hear it presently. There! There it is!” She bent forward, clutching at her companion. “There it is! What do you say now?”
Ursula fell back and tore open the door again, but the light thus admitted only showed looming shapes.
“I hear nothing,” she said, faintly, dazed, alone with this mad-woman. She had always had an undefined dread of the crooked-eyed maid.
“Oh, my God, I had an idea that if you came it would stop!” cried Hephzibah. “Oh, never mind the door. Door or no door, it won’t stop now. I’ve heard it before, several times. It’s like a man gasping. In there.” She pointed to the closed entrance leading to an inner chamber. “Mevrouw, dare you really say you hear nothing at all?”
Ursula shuddered. They were standing in the deserted nursery; the room adjoining was that in which Otto had died. Both were now disused.