"He does n't know any more about chimneys than the man in the moon," my old friend was saying, between coughs.
And then quite unmistakably I smelt smoke, and bending further over the rail and peering down the stair-well I saw smoke pouring from the library into the hall. It seemed to be in greater volume to-night than at previous manifestations. A gray-blue cloud was filling the lower hall and rising toward me. I ran quickly to the third floor, to the chamber whose fireplace was served by the library chimney. The lights in the third-floor hall winked out as I opened the door,—I heard a step behind me somewhere; but I did not trouble about this. The switch inside the unused guest-chamber responded readily to my touch, and on kneeling by the hearth I found it cold, as I had expected. There was absolutely no way of choking the library flue at this point, for, as I had established earlier, all the fireplaces in this chimney had their independent flues. Pepperton would never have built them otherwise, and no one but a skilled mason could have tapped the library flue here or higher up, and the work could not have been done without much noise and labor.
The hall outside was still dark, and I did not try the switch. The pursuit was better carried on in darkness, and I had by this time become accustomed to rapid locomotion through unlighted passages. I leaned over the stair-well and heard exclamations of surprise at the sudden cessation of the smoke, which had evidently abated as abruptly as it had begun. The windows and doors had been opened, and the company had returned to the library.
"Quite extraordinary. Really quite remarkable!" they were saying below. I heard Cecilia's light laughter as the odd ways of the chimney were discussed. And as I stood thus peering down and listening, the Swedish maid's blonde head appeared below me, bending over the well-rail on the second floor. She too was taking note of affairs in the library, and as I watched her she lifted her head and her eyes met mine. Then, while we still stared at each other, the second-floor lights went out with familiar abruptness, and as I craned my neck to peer into the blackness above me I experienced once more that ghostly passing as of some light, unearthly thing across my face. I reached for it wildly with my hands, but it seemed to be caught away from me; and then as I fought the air madly, it brushed my cheek again. I have no words to describe the strange effect of that touch. I felt my scalp creep and cold chills ran down my spine. It seemingly came from above, and it was not like a hand, unless a hand of wonderful lightness! Certainly no human arm could reach down the stair-well to where I stood. And in that touch to-night there was something akin to a gentle, lingering caress as it swept slowly across my face and eyes.
I waited for its recurrence a moment, but it came no more. Then on a sudden prompting I stole swiftly to the fourth floor, lighted my candle, and gazed about. I thought it well to let the electric light alone, for my ghost had once too often plunged me into darkness at critical moments, and a candle in my hands was not subject to his trickery.
The hall was perfectly quiet. The door leading down the hidden stair was invisible, and I had not yet learned how it might be opened from the hall, though Mr. Bassford Hollister had undoubtedly left the house by this means after my interview with him on the roof. And reminded of the roof, I opened the trunk-room door and peered in. The candle-light slowly crept into its dark corners, and looking up I marked the presence of the trap-door secure in the opening. As I stood on the threshold of the trunk-piled room, my hand on the knob and the candle thrust well before me, I heard a slight furtive movement to my left and behind the door. I was quite satisfied now that I was about to solve some of the mysteries of the night, and to make sure I was unobserved—for having gone so far alone I wanted no partners in my investigations—I listened to the murmur of talk below for a moment, then cautiously advanced my candle further into the room. I was not yet so valiant, even after all my night-prowlings and explorations of hidden chambers, but that I thrust the light in well ahead of me and bent my wrist so that the candle's rays might dispel the last shadow that lurked behind the door before I suffered my eyes to look upon the goblin. I took one step and then cautiously another, until the whole of the trunk-room was well within range of my vision.
And there, seated on a prodigious trunk frescoed with labels of a dozen foreign inns, I beheld Hezekiah!
