"Well, perhaps I shouldn't," said he, sitting down by me, while Tom went off to the kitchen for a cup and saucer. "Sharp enough—but seasonable. Is anything amiss with you, Leah? Indigestion again?"
This caused us to look at Leah. She was whiter than the table-cloth.
"No, sir; I'm all right," answered Leah, as she took the cup from Tom's hand and began to fill it with coffee and hot milk. "Something that the master has been telling us scared me a bit at the moment, that's all."
"And what was that?" asked the Doctor lightly.
So the story had to be gone over again, papa repeating it rather more elaborately. Mr. Penthorn was sceptical, and said it was a dream.
"I have just called it a dream," assented my father. "But, in one sense, it was certainly not a dream. I had not been dreaming at all, to my knowledge; have not the least recollection of doing so. I woke up fully in a moment, with the voice ringing in my ears."
"The voice must have been pure fancy," declared Mr. Penthorn.
"That it certainly was not," said the Rector. "I never heard a voice more plainly in my life; every tone, every word was distinct and clear. No, Penthorn; that someone spoke to me is certain; the puzzle is—who was it?"
"Someone must have got into your room, then," said the Doctor, throwing his eyes suspiciously across the table at Tom.
Leah turned sharply round to face Tom. "Master Tom, if you played this trick, say so," she cried, her voice trembling.