"No, I went noiselessly across the carpet up to the door of the wardrobe and looked in."
"Heavens! you are daring. I wonder you are alive to tell this tale."
"I saw a shadowy form," I replied—"dark and tall—the one brilliant eye kept on looking past me, straight into the room. I made a very slight noise; it immediately disappeared. I waited for some time—nothing more happened. I got into your bed, Sir Henry, and slept. I can't say that I had a comfortable night, but I slept, and was not disturbed by anything extraordinary for the remaining hours of the night."
"Now what do you mean to do? You say you can trace this thing to its foundation. It seems to me that all you have seen only supports my firm belief that a horrible apparition visits that room."
"A material one," I responded. "The shadowy form had substance, of that I am convinced. Sir Henry, I intend to sleep in that room again to-night."
"Lady Studley will find out."
"She will not. I sleep in the haunted room again to-night, and during the day you must so contrive matters that I have plenty of time to examine the wardrobe. I did not do so yesterday because I had not an opportunity. You must contrive to get Lady Studley out of the way, either this morning or afternoon, and so manage matters for me that I can be some little time alone in your room."
"Henry, Henry, how awestruck you look!" said a gay voice at the window. Lady Studley had come out, had come round to the library window, and, holding up her long, dark-blue velvet dress, was looking at us with a peculiar smile.
"Well, my love," replied the baronet. He went to the window and flung it open. "Lucilla," he exclaimed, "you are mad to stand on the damp grass."
"Oh, no, not mad," she answered. "I have come to that stage when nothing matters. Is not that so, Dr. Halifax?"