Jezebel's Daughter

While he was still trying to answer that question, the hours of business came to an end, and the clerks were leaving the offices below. He heard them talking about the hard frost as they went out. One of them said there were blocks of ice floating down the river already. The river! It was within a few minutes' walk of the house. Why not throw the bottle into the river?

He waited until there was perfect silence below, and then stole downstairs. As he opened the door, a strange man met him, ascending the house-steps, with a little traveling bag in his hand.

"Is this Mr. Keller's?" asked the strange man.

He was a jolly-looking old fellow with twinkling black eyes and a big red nose. His breath was redolent of the smell of wine, and his thick lips expanded into a broad grin, when he looked at Jack.

"My name's Schwartz," he said; "and here in this bag are my sister's things for the night."

"Who is your sister?" Jack inquired.

Schwartz laughed. "Quite right, little man, how should you know who she is? My sister's the nurse. She's hired by Doctor Dormann, and she'll be here in an hour's time. I say! that's a pretty bottle you're hiding there under your coat. Is there any wine in it?"

Jack began to tremble. He had been discovered by a stranger. Even the river might not be deep enough to keep his secret now!

"The cold has got into my inside," proceeded the jolly old man. "Be a good little fellow—and give us a drop!"

"I haven't got any wine in it," Jack answered.

Schwartz laid his forefinger confidentially along the side of his big red nose. "I understand," he said, "you were just going out to get some." He put his sister's bag on one of the chairs in the hall, and took Jack's arm in the friendliest manner. "Suppose you come along with me?" he suggested. "I am the man to help you to the best tap of wine in Frankfort. Bless your heart! you needn't feel ashamed of being in my company. My sister's a most respectable woman. And what do you think I am? I'm one of the city officers. Ho! ho! just think of that! I'm not joking, mind. The regular Night Watchman at the Deadhouse is ill in bed, and they're obliged to find somebody to take his place till he gets well again. I'm the Somebody. They tried two other men—but the Deadhouse gave them the horrors. My respectable sister spoke for me, you know. "The regular watchman will be well in a week," she says; "try him for a week." And they tried me. I'm not proud, though I am a city officer. Come along—and let me carry the bottle."

"The bottle" again! And, just as this intrusive person spoke of it, Joseph's voice was audible below, and Joseph's footsteps gave notice that he was ascending the kitchen stairs. In the utter bewilderment of the moment, Jack ran out, with the one idea of escaping the terrible possibilities of discovery in the hall. He heard the door closed behind him—then heavy boots thumping the pavement at a quick trot. Before he had got twenty yards from the house, the vinous breath of Schwartz puffed over his shoulder, and the arm of the deputy-night-watchman took possession of him again.

"Not too fast—I'm nimble on my legs for a man of my age—but not too fast," said his new friend. "You're just the sort of little man I like. My sister will tell you I take sudden fancies to people of your complexion. My sister's a most respectable woman. What's your name?—Jack? A capital name! Short, with a smack in it like the crack of a whip. Do give me the bottle!" He took it this time, without waiting to have it given to him. "There! might drop it, you know," he said. "It's safe in my friendly hands. Where are you going to? You don't deal, I hope, at the public-house up that way? A word in your ear—the infernal scoundrel waters his wine. Here's the turning where the honest publican lives. I have the truest affection for him. I have the truest affection for you. Would you like to see the Deadhouse, some night? It's against the rules; but that don't matter. The cemetery overseer is a deal too fond of his bed to turn out these cold nights and look after the watchman. It's just the right place for me. There's nothing to do but to drink, when you have got the liquor; and to sleep, when you haven't. The Dead who come our way, my little friend, have one great merit. We are supposed to help them, if they're perverse enough to come to life again before they're buried. There they lie in our house, with one end of the line tied to their fingers, and the other end at the spring of the alarm-bell. And they have never rung the bell yet—never once, bless their hearts, since the Deadhouse was built! Come and see me in the course of the week, and we'll drink a health to our quiet neighbors."

They arrived at the door of the public-house.

"You've got some money about you, I suppose?" said Schwartz.

Madame Fontaine's generosity, when she gave Jack the money to buy a pair of gloves, had left a small surplus in his pocket. He made a last effort to escape from the deputy-watchman. "There's the money," he said. "Give me back the bottle, and go and drink by yourself."

Schwartz took him by the shoulder, and surveyed him from head to foot by the light of the public-house lamp. "Drink by myself?" he repeated. "Am I a jolly fellow, or am I not? Yes, or No?"

"Yes," said Jack, trying hard to release himself.

Schwartz tightened his hold. "Did you ever hear of a jolly fellow, who left his friend at the public-house door?" he asked.

"If you please, sir, I don't drink," Jack pleaded.

Schwartz burst into a great roar of laughter, and kicked open the door of the public-house. "That's the best joke I ever heard in my life," he said. "We've got money enough to fill the bottle, and to have a glass a-piece besides. Come along!"

He dragged Jack into the house. The bottle was filled; the glasses were filled. "My sister's health! Long life and prosperity to my respectable sister! You can't refuse to drink the toast." With those words, he put the fatal glass into his companion's hand.

Jack tasted the wine. It was cool; it was good. Perhaps it was not so strong as Mr. Keller's wine? He tried it again—and emptied the glass.

An hour later, there was a ring at the door of Mr. Keller's house.

Joseph opened the door, and discovered a red-nosed old man, holding up another man who seemed to be three parts asleep, and who was quite unable to stand on his legs without assistance. The light of the hall lamp fell on this helpless creature's face, and revealed—Jack.

"Put him to bed," said the red-nosed stranger. "And, look here, take charge of the bottle for him, or he'll break it. Somehow, the wine has all leaked out. Where's my sister's bag?"

"Do you mean the nurse?"

"Of course I do! I defy the world to produce the nurse's equal. Has she come?"

Joseph held up his hand with a gesture of grave reproof.

"Not so loud," he said. "The nurse has come too late."

"Has the lady got well again?"

"The lady is dead."

CHAPTER XV

Doctor Dormann had behaved very strangely.

He was the first person who made the terrible discovery of the death. When he came to the house, on his evening visit to his patient, Mr. Keller was in the room. Half an hour before, Mrs. Wagner had spoken to him. Seeing a slight movement of her lips, he had bent over her, and had just succeeded in hearing her few last words, "Be kind to Jack." Her eyelids dropped wearily, after the struggle to speak. Mr. Keller and the servant in attendance both supposed that she had fallen asleep. The doctor's examination was not only prolonged beyond all customary limits of time in such cases—it was the examination (judging by certain expressions which escaped him) of a man who seemed to be unwilling to trust his own experience. The new nurse arrived, before he had definitely expressed his opinion; and the servant was instructed to keep her waiting downstairs. In expectation of the doctor's report, Mr. Keller remained in the bedroom. Doctor Dormann might not have noticed this circumstance, or might not have cared to conceal what was passing in his mind. In either case, when he spoke at last, he expressed himself in these extraordinary terms:—

"The second suspicious illness in this house! And the second incomprehensible end to it!"

Mr. Keller at once stepped forward, and showed himself.

"Did you mean me to hear what you have just said?" he asked.

The doctor looked at him gravely and sadly. "I must speak to you privately, Mr. Keller. Before we leave the room, permit me to send for the nurse. You may safely trust her to perform the last sad duties."

Mr. Keller started. "Good God!" he exclaimed, "is Mrs. Wagner dead?"

"To my astonishment, she is dead." He laid a strong emphasis on the first part of his reply.

The nurse having received her instructions, Mr. Keller led the way to his private room. "In my responsible position," he said, "I may not unreasonably expect that you will explain yourself without reserve."

"On such a serious matter as this," Doctor Dormann answered, "it is my duty to speak without reserve. The person whom you employ to direct the funeral will ask you for the customary certificate. I refuse to give it."

This startling declaration roused a feeling of anger, rather than of alarm, in a man of Mr. Keller's resolute character. "For what reason do you refuse?" he asked sternly.

"I am not satisfied, sir, that Mrs. Wagner has died a natural death. My experience entirely fails to account for the suddenly fatal termination of the disease, in the case of a patient of her healthy constitution, and at her comparatively early age."

"Doctor Dormann, do you suspect there is a poisoner in my house?"

"In plain words, I do."

"In plain words on my side, I ask why?"

"I have already given you my reason."

"Is your experience infallible? Have you never made a mistake?"

"I made a mistake, Mr. Keller (as it appeared at the time), in regard to your own illness."

"What! you suspected foul play in my case too?"

"Yes; and, by way of giving you another reason, I will own that the suspicion is still in my mind. After what I have seen this evening—and only after that, observe—I say the circumstances of your recovery are suspicious circumstances in themselves. Remember, if you please, that neither I nor my colleague really understood what was the matter with you; and that you were cured by a remedy, not prescribed by either of us. You were rapidly sinking; and your regular physician had left you. I had to choose between the certainty of your death, and the risk of letting you try a remedy, with the nature of which (though I did my best to analyze it) I was imperfectly acquainted. I ran the risk. The result has justified me—and up to this day, I have kept my misgivings to myself. I now find them renewed by Mrs. Wagner's death—and I speak."

Mr. Keller's manner began to change. His tone was sensibly subdued. He understood the respect which was due to the doctor's motives at last.

"May I ask if the symptoms of my illness resembled the symptoms of Mrs. Wagner's illness?" he said.

"Far from it. Excepting the nervous derangement, in both cases, there was no other resemblance in the symptoms. The conclusion, to my mind, is not altered by this circumstance. It simply leads me to the inference that more than one poison may have been used. I don't attempt to solve the mystery. I have no idea why your life has been saved, and Mrs. Wagner's life sacrificed—or what motives have been at work in the dark. Ask yourself—don't ask me—in what direction suspicion points. I refuse to sign the certificate of death; and I have told you why."

"Give me a moment," said Mr. Keller, "I don't shrink from my responsibility; I only ask for time to compose myself."

It was the pride of his life to lean on nobody for help. He walked to the window; hiding all outward betrayal of the consternation that shook him to the soul. When he returned to his chair, he scrupulously avoided even the appearance of asking Doctor Dormann for advice.

"My course is plain," he said quietly. "I must communicate your decision to the authorities; and I must afford every assistance in my power to the investigation that will follow. It shall be done, when the magistrates meet to-morrow morning."

"We will go together to the town-hall, Mr. Keller. It is my duty to inform the burgomaster that this is a case for the special safeguards, sanctioned by the city regulations. I must also guarantee that there is no danger to the public health, in the removal of the body from your house."

"The immediate removal?" Mr. Keller asked.

"No! The removal twenty-four hours after death."

"To what place?"

"To the Deadhouse."

CHAPTER XVI

Acting on the doctor's information, the burgomaster issued his order. At eight o'clock in the evening, on the third of January, the remains of Mrs. Wagner were to be removed to the cemetery-building, outside the Friedberg Gate of Frankfort.

Long before the present century, the dread of premature interment—excited by traditions of persons accidentally buried alive—was a widely-spread feeling among the people of Germany. In other cities besides Frankfort, the municipal authorities devised laws, the object of which was to make this frightful catastrophe impossible. In the early part of the present century, these laws were re-enacted and revised by the City of Frankfort. The Deadhouse was attached to the cemetery, with a double purpose. First, to afford a decent resting-place for the corpse, when death occurred among the crowded residences of the poorer class of the population. Secondly, to provide as perfect a safeguard as possible against the chances of premature burial. The use of the Deadhouse (strictly confined to the Christian portion of the inhabitants) was left to the free choice of surviving relatives or representatives—excepting only those cases in which a doctor's certificate justified the magistrate in pronouncing an absolute decision. Even in the event of valid objections to the Deadhouse as a last resting-place on the way to the grave, the doctor in attendance on the deceased person was subjected to certain restrictions in issuing his certificate. He was allowed to certify the death informally, for the purpose of facilitating the funeral arrangements. But he was absolutely forbidden to give his written authority for the burial, before the expiration of three nights from the time of the death; and he was further bound to certify that the signs of decomposition had actually begun to show themselves. Have these multiplied precautions, patiently applied in many German cities, through a long lapse of years, ever yet detected a case in which Death has failed to complete its unintelligible work? Let the answer be found in the cells of the dead. Pass, with the mourners, through the iron gates—hear and see!

On the evening of the third, as the time approached for the arrival of the hearse, the melancholy stillness in the house was only broken by Mr. Keller's servants, below-stairs. Collecting together in one room, they talked confidentially, in low voices. An instinctive horror of silence, in moments of domestic distress, is, in all civilized nations, one of the marked characteristics of their class.

"In ten minutes," said Joseph, "the men from the cemetery will be here to take her away. It will be no easy matter to carry her downstairs on the couch."

"Why is she not put in her coffin, like other dead people?" the housemaid asked.

"Because the crazy creature she brought with her from London is allowed to have his own way in the house," Joseph answered irritably. "If I had been brought to the door drunk last night, I should have been sent away this morning. If I had been mad enough to screech out, 'She isn't dead; not one of you shall put her in a coffin!'—I should have richly deserved a place in the town asylum, and I should have got my deserts. Nothing of the sort for Master Jack. Mr. Keller only tells him to be quiet, and looks distressed. The doctor takes him away, and speaks to him in another room—and actually comes back converted to Jack's opinion!"

"You don't mean to tell us," exclaimed the cook, "that the doctor said she wasn't dead?"

"Of course not. It was he who first found out that she was dead—I only mean that he let Jack have his own way. He asked me for a foot rule, and he measured the little couch in the bedroom. 'It's no longer than the coffin' (he says); 'and I see no objection to the body being laid on it, till the time comes for the burial.' Those were his own words; and when the nurse objected to it, what do you think he said?—'Hold your tongue! A couch is a pleasanter thing all the world over than a coffin.'"

"Blasphemous!" said the cook—"that's what I call it."

"Ah, well, well!" the housemaid remarked, "couch or coffin, she looks beautiful, poor soul, in her black velvet robe, with the winter flowers in her pretty white hands. Who got the flowers? Madame Fontaine, do you think?"

"Bah! Madame Fontaine, indeed! Little Crazybrains went out (instead of eating the good dinner I cooked for him), and got the flowers. He wouldn't let anybody put them into her hands but himself—at least, so the nurse said. Has anybody seen Madame Housekeeper? Was she downstairs at dinner to-day, Joseph?"

"Not she! You mark my words," said Joseph, "there's some very serious reason for her keeping her room, on pretense of being ill."

"Can you give any guess what it is?"

"You shall judge for yourself," Joseph answered. "Did I tell you what happened yesterday evening, before Jack was brought home by the nurse's brother? I answered a ring at the door-bell—and there was Mr. Fritz in a towering passion, with Miss Minna on his arm looking ready to drop with fatigue. They rang for some wine; and I heard what he said to his father. It seems that Madame Fontaine had gone out walking in the dark and the cold (and her daughter with her), without rhyme or reason. Mr. Fritz met them, and insisted on taking Miss Minna home. Her mother didn't seem to care what he said or did. She went on walking by herself, as hard as she could lay her feet to the ground. And what do you suppose her excuse was? Her nerves were out of order! Mr. Fritz's notion is that there is something weighing on her mind. An hour afterwards she came back to the house—and I found reason to agree with Mr. Fritz."

"Tell us all about it, Joseph! What did she do?"

"You shall hear. It happened, just after I had seen crazy Jack safe in his bed. When I heard the bell, I was on my way downstairs, with a certain bottle in my hand. One of you saw the nurse's brother give it to me, I think? How he and Crazybrains came into possession of it, mind you, is more than I know."

"It looked just like the big medicine-bottle that cured Mr. Keller," said the cook.

"It was the bottle; and, what is more, it smelt of wine, instead of medicine, and it was empty. Well, I opened the door to Madame Housekeeper, with the bottle in my hand. The instant she set eyes on it, she snatched it away from me. She looked—I give you my word of honor, she looked as if she could have cut my throat. "You wretch!"—nice language to use to a respectable servant, eh?—"You wretch" (she says), "how did you come by this?" I made her a low bow. I said, "Civility costs nothing, ma'am; and sometimes buys a great deal" (severe, eh?). I told her exactly what had happened, and exactly what Schwartz had said. And then I ended with another hard hit. "The next time anything of yours is put into my hands," I said, "I shall leave it to take care of itself." I don't know whether she heard me; she was holding the bottle up to the light. When she saw it was empty—well! I can't tell you, of course, what was passing in her mind. But this I can swear; she shivered and shuddered as if she had got a fit of the ague; and pale as she was when I let her into the house, I do assure you she turned paler still. I thought I should have to take her upstairs next. My good creatures, she's made of iron! Upstairs she went. I followed her as far as the first landing, and saw Mr. Keller waiting—to tell her the news of Mrs. Wagner's death, I suppose. What passed between them I can't say. Mr. Fritz tells me she has never left her room since; and his father has not even sent a message to know how she is. What do you think of that?"

"I think Mr. Fritz was mistaken, when he told you she had never left her room," said the housemaid. "I am next to certain I heard her whispering, early this morning, with crazy Jack. Do you think she will follow the hearse to the Deadhouse, with Mr. Keller and the doctor?"

"Hush!" said Joseph. As he spoke, the heavy wheels of the hearse were heard in the street. He led the way to the top of the kitchen stairs. "Wait here," he whispered, "while I answer the door—and you will see."

Upstairs, in the drawing-room, Fritz and Minna were alone. Madame Fontaine's door, closed to everyone, was a closed door even to her daughter.

Fritz had refused to let Minna ask a second time to be let in. "It will soon be your husband's privilege, my darling, to take care of you and comfort you," he said. "At this dreadful time, there must be no separation between you and me."

His arm was round her; her head rested on his shoulder. She looked up at him timidly.

"Are you not going with them to the cemetery?" she asked.

"I am going to stay with you, Minna."

"You were angry yesterday, Fritz, when you met me with my mother. Don't think the worse of her, because she is ill and troubled in her mind. You will make allowances for her as I do—won't you?"

"My sweet girl, there is nothing I won't do to please you! Kiss me, Minna. Again! again!"

On the higher floor of the house, Mr. Keller and the doctor were waiting in the chamber of death.

Jack kept his silent watch by the side of the couch, on which the one human creature who had befriended him lay hushed in the last earthly repose. Still, from time to time, he whispered to himself the sad senseless words, "No, no, no—not dead, Mistress! Not dead yet!"

There was a soft knock at the door. The doctor opened it. Madame Fontaine stood before him. She spoke in dull monotonous tones—standing in the doorway; refusing, when she was invited by a gesture, to enter the room.

"The hearse has stopped at the door," she said. "The men wish to ask you if they can come in."

It was Joseph's duty to make this announcement. Her motive for forestalling him showed itself dimly in her eyes. They were not on Mr. Keller; not on the doctor; not on the couch. From the moment when the door had been opened to her, she fixed her steady look on Jack. It never moved until the bearers of the dead hid him from her when they entered the room.

The procession passed out. Jack, at Mr. Keller's command, followed last. Standing back at the doorway, Madame Fontaine caught him by the arm as he came out.

"You were half asleep this morning," she whispered. "You are not half asleep now. How did you get the blue-glass bottle? I insist on knowing."

"I won't tell you!"

Madame Fontaine altered her tone.

"Will you tell me who emptied the bottle? I have always been kind to you—it isn't much to ask. Who emptied it?"

His variable temper changed; he lifted his head proudly. Absolutely sure of his mistress's recovery, he now claimed the merit that was his due.

"I emptied it!"

"How did you empty it?" she asked faintly. "Did you throw away what was in it? Did you give it to anybody?"

He seized her in his turn—and dragged her to the railing of the corridor. "Look there!" he cried, pointing to the bearers, slowly carrying their burden down the stairs. "Do you see her, resting on her little sofa till she recovers? I gave it to her!"

He left her, and descended the stairs. She staggered back against the wall of the corridor. Her sight seemed to be affected. She groped for the stair-rail, and held by it. The air was wafted up through the open street-door. It helped her to rally her energies. She went down steadily, step by step, to the first landing—paused, and went down again. Arrived in the hall, she advanced to Mr. Keller, and spoke to him.

"Are you going to see the body laid in the Deadhouse?"

"Yes."

"Is there any objection to my seeing it too?"

"The authorities have no objection to admitting friends of the deceased person," Mr. Keller answered. He looked at her searchingly, and added, "Do you go as a friend?"

It was rashly said; and he knew it. The magistrates had decided that the first inquiries should be conducted with the greatest secrecy. For that day, at least, the inmates of the house were to enjoy their usual liberty of action (under private superintendence), so that no suspicion might be excited in the mind of the guilty person. Conscious of having trifled with the serious necessity of keeping a guard over his tongue, Mr. Keller waited anxiously for Madame Fontaine's reply.

Not a word fell from her lips. There was a slight hardening of her face, and no more. In ominous silence, she turned about and ascended the stairs again.

CHAPTER XVII

The departure from the house was interrupted by an unforeseen cause of delay.

Jack refused to follow the hearse with Doctor Dormann and Mr. Keller. "I won't lose sight of her!" he cried—"no! not for a moment! Of all living creatures, I must be the first to see her when she wakes."

Mr. Keller turned to the doctor. "What does he mean?"

The doctor, standing back in the shadow of the house, seemed to have some reason for not answering otherwise than by gesture. He touched his forehead significantly; and, stepping out into the road, took Jack by the hand. The canopy of the hearse, closed at the sides, was open at either end. From the driver's seat, the couch became easily visible on looking round. With inexhaustible patience the doctor quieted the rising excitement in Jack, and gained him permission to take his place by the driver's side. Always grateful for kindness, he thanked Doctor Dormann, with the tears falling fast over his cheeks. "I'm not crying for her," said the poor little man; "she will soon be herself again. But it's so dreadful, sir, to go out driving with her in such a carriage as this!"

The hearse moved away.

Doctor Dormann, walking with Mr. Keller, felt his arm touched, and, looking round, saw the dimly-outlined figure of a woman beckoning to him. He drew back, after a word of apology to his companion, who continued to follow the hearse. The woman met him half way. He recognized Madame Fontaine.

"You are a learned man," she began abruptly. "Do you understand writing in cipher?"

"Sometimes."

"If you have half an hour to spare this evening, look at that—and do me the favor of telling me what it means."

She offered something to him, which appeared in the dim light to be only a sheet of paper. He hesitated to take it from her. She tried to press it on him.

"I found it among my husband's papers," she said. "He was a great chemist, as you know. It might be interesting to you."

He still hesitated.

"Are you acquainted with chemical science?" he asked.

"I am perfectly ignorant of chemical science."

"Then what interest can you have in interpreting the cipher?"

"I have a very serious interest. There may be something dangerous in it, if it fell into unscrupulous hands. I want to know if I ought to destroy it."

He suddenly took the paper from her. It felt stiff, like a sheet of cartridge-paper.

"You shall hear," he said. "In case of necessity, I will destroy it myself. Anything more?"

"One thing more. Does Jack go to the cemetery with you and Mr. Keller?"

"Yes."

Walking away rapidly to overtake Mr. Keller, he looked behind him once or twice. The street was dimly lit, in those days, by a few oil lamps. He might be mistaken—but he thought that Madame Fontaine was following him.

On leaving the city, the lanterns were lit to guide the hearse along the road that led to the cemetery. The overseer met the bearers at the gates.

They passed, under a Doric portico, into a central hall. At its right-hand extremity, an open door revealed a room for the accommodation of mourners. Beyond this there was a courtyard; and, farther still, the range of apartments devoted to the residence of the cemetery-overseer. Turning from the right-hand division of the building, the bearers led the way to the opposite extremity of the hall; passed through a second room for mourners; crossed a second courtyard beyond it; and, turning into a narrow passage, knocked at a closed door.

The door was opened by a watchman. He admitted them into a long room, situated between the courtyard at one end, and the cemetery at the other, and having ten side recesses which opened out of it. The long room was the Watchman's Chamber. The recesses were the cells which held the dead.

The couch was set down in the Watchman's Chamber. It was a novelty in the Deadhouse; and the overseer asked for an explanation. Doctor Dormann informed him that the change had been made, with his full approval, to satisfy a surviving friend, and that the coffin would be provided before the certificate was granted for the burial.

While the persons present were all gathered round the doctor and the overseer, Madame Fontaine softly pushed open the door from the courtyard. After a look at the recesses—situated, five on either side of the length of the room, and closed by black curtains—she parted the curtains of the nearest recess to her, on her left hand; and stepped in without being noticed by anyone.

"You take the responsibility of the couch, doctor, if the authorities raise any objection?" said the overseer.

This condition being complied with, he addressed himself to the watchman. "The cells are all empty to-night, Duntzer, are they not?"

"Yes, sir."

"Are you off duty, early or late this evening?"

"I am off duty in half an hour, sir."

The overseer pointed to the couch. "You can attend to this," he said. "Take the cell that is the nearest to you, where the watchman's chair is placed—Number Five."

He referred to the fifth recess, at the upper end of the room on the right, counting from the courtyard door. The watchman looped up the black curtains, while the bearers placed the couch in the cell. This done, the bearers were dismissed.

Doctor Dormann pointed through the parted curtains to the lofty cell, ventilated from the top, and warmed (like the Watchman's Chamber) by an apparatus under the flooring. In the middle of the cell was a stand, placed there to support the coffin. Above the stand a horizontal bar projected, which was fixed over the doorway. It was furnished with a pulley, through which passed a long thin string hanging loosely downward at one end, and attached at the other to a small alarm-bell, placed over the door on the outer side—that is to say, on the side of the Watchman's Chamber.

"All the cells are equal in size," said the doctor to Mr. Keller, "and are equally clean, and well warmed. The hot bath, in another room, is always ready; and a cabinet, filled with restorative applications, is close by. Now look at the watchman, and mark the care that is taken—in the event, for instance, of a cataleptic trance, and of a revival following it."

Duntzer led the way into the cell. He took the loose end of the string, hanging from above, and attached to it two shorter and lighter strings, each of which terminated in five loose ends.

From these ten ends hung ten little thimble-shaped objects, made of brass.

First slightly altering the position of the couch on the stand, Duntzer lifted the dead hands—fitted the ten brass thimbles to the fingers and the thumbs—and gently laid the hands back on the breast of the corpse. When he had looked up, and had satisfied himself of the exact connection between the hands and the line communicating with the alarm-bell outside, his duty was done. He left the cell; and, seating himself in his chair, waited the arrival of the night-watchman who was to relieve him.

Mr. Keller came out into the chamber, and spoke to the overseer.

"Is all done now?"

"All is done."

"I should like, while I am here, to speak to you about the grave."

The overseer bowed. "You can see the plan of the cemetery," he said, "in my office on the other side of the building."

Mr. Keller looked back into the cell. Jack had taken his place in it, when the couch had been carried in; and Doctor Dormann was quietly observing him. Mr. Keller beckoned to Jack. "I am waiting for you," he said. "Come!"

"And leave Mistress?" Jack answered. "Never!"

Mr. Keller was on the point of stepping into the cell, when Doctor Dormann took his arm, and led him away out of hearing.

"I want to ask you a question," said the doctor. "Was that poor creature's madness violent madness, when Mrs. Wagner took him out of the London asylum?"

"I have heard her say so."

"Be careful what you do with him. Mrs. Wagner's death has tried his weak brain seriously. I am afraid of a relapse into that violent madness—leave him to me."

Mr. Keller left the room with the overseer. Doctor Dormann returned to the cell.

"Listen to me, Jack," he said. "If your mistress revives (as you think), I want you to see for yourself how she will tell it to the man who is on the watch." He turned, and spoke to Duntzer. "Is the alarm-bell set?"

"Yes, sir."

The doctor addressed himself once more to Jack.

"Now look, and listen!" he said.

He delicately touched one of the brass thimbles, fitted to the fingers of the corpse. The bell rang instantly in the Watchman's Chamber.

"The moment the man hears that," he resumed, "he will make the signal, which calls the overseer and the nurses to help your mistress back to life. At the same time, a messenger will be sent to Mr. Keller's house to tell you what has happened. You see how well she is taken care of—and you will behave sensibly, I am sure? I am going away. Come with me."

Jack answered as he had answered Mr. Keller.

"Never!" he said.

He flung himself on the floor, and clasped his arms round one of the pillars supporting the stand on which the couch was placed. "Tear my arms out of their sockets," he cried—"you won't get me away till you've done that!"

Before the doctor could answer, footsteps were heard in the Watchman's Chamber. A jolly voice asked a question. "Any report for the night, Duntzer?"

Jack seemed to recognize the voice. He looked round eagerly.

"A corpse in Number Five," Duntzer answered. "And strangers in the cell. Contrary to the order for the night, as you know. I have reported them; it's your duty to send them away. Good night."

A red-nosed old man looked in at the doorway of the cell. Jack started to his feet. "Here's Schwartz!" he cried—"leave me with Schwartz!"

CHAPTER XVIII

The discovery of Jack agreeably surprised Schwartz, without in the least perplexing him.

His little friend (as he reasoned) had, no doubt, remembered the invitation to the Deadhouse, and had obtained admission through the interference of the strange gentleman who was with him. But who was the gentleman? The deputy night-watchman (though he might carry messages for his relative the nurse) was not personally acquainted with his sister's medical patrons in Frankfort. He looked at the doctor with an expression of considerable doubt.

"I beg your pardon, sir," he ventured to say, "you're not a member of the city council, are you?"

"I have nothing to do with the city council."

"And nothing to do with managing the Deadhouse?"

"Nothing. I am Doctor Dormann."

Schwartz snapped his clumsy fingers, as an appropriate expression of relief. "All right, sir! Leave the little man with me—I'll take care of him."

"Do you know this person?" asked the doctor, turning to Jack.

"Yes! yes! leave me here with him," Jack answered eagerly. "Good-night, sir—good-night!"

Doctor Dormann looked again at Jack's friend.

"I thought strangers were not allowed here at night," he said.

"It's against the rules," Schwartz admitted. "But, Lord love you, sir, think of the dullness of this place! Besides, I'm only a deputy. In three nights more, the regular man will come on duty again. It's an awful job, doctor, watching alone here, all night. One of the men actually went mad, and hanged himself. To be sure he was a poet in his way, which makes it less remarkable. I'm not a poet myself—I'm only a sociable creature. Leave little Jack with me! I'll send him home safe and sound—I feel like a father to him."

The doctor hesitated. What was he to do? Jack had already returned to the cell in which his mistress lay. To remove him by the brutal exercise of main force was a proceeding from which Doctor Dormann's delicacy of feeling naturally recoiled—to say nothing of the danger of provoking that outbreak of madness against which the doctor had himself warned Mr. Keller. Persuasion he had already tried in vain. Delegated authority to control Jack had not been conferred on him. There seemed to be no other course than to yield.

"If you persist in your obstinacy," he said to Jack, "I must return alone to Mr. Keller's house, and tell him that I have left you here with your friend."

Jack was already absorbed in his own thoughts. He only repeated vacantly, "Good-night."

Doctor Dormann left the room. Schwartz looked in at his guest. "Wait there for the present," he said. "The porter will be here directly: I don't want him to see you."

The porter came in after an interval. "All right for the night?" he asked.

"All right," Schwartz answered.

The porter withdrew in silence. The night-watchman's reply was his authority for closing the gates of the Deadhouse until the next morning.

Schwartz returned to Jack—still watching patiently by the side of the couch. "Was she a relation of yours?" he asked.

"All the relations in the world to me!" Jack burst out passionately. "Father and mother—and brother and sister and wife."

"Aye, aye? Five relations in one is what I call an economical family," said Schwartz. "Come out here, to the table. You stood treat last time—my turn now. I've got the wine handy. Yes, yes—she was a fine woman in her time, I dare say. Why haven't you put her into a coffin like other people?"

"Why?" Jack repeated indignantly. "I couldn't prevent them from bringing her here; but I could have burnt the house down over their heads, if they had dared to put her into a coffin! Are you stupid enough to suppose that Mistress is dead? Don't you know that I'm watching and waiting here till she wakes? Ah! I beg your pardon—you don't know. The rest of them would have let her die. I saved her life. Come here, and I'll tell you how."

He dragged Schwartz into the cell. As the watchman disappeared from view, the wild white face of Madame Fontaine appeared between the curtains of her hiding-place, listening to Jack's narrative of the opening of the cupboard, and the discovery that had followed.

Schwartz humored his little friend (evidently, as he now concluded, his crazy little friend), by listening in respectful silence. Instead of making any remark at the end, he mentioned once more that the wine was handy. "Come!" he reiterated; "come to the table!"

Madame Fontaine drew back again behind the curtains. Jack remained obstinately in the cell. "I mean to see it," he said, "the moment she moves."

"Do you think your eyes will tell you?" Schwartz remonstrated. "You look dead-beat already; your eyes will get tired. Trust the bell here, over the door. Brass and steel don't get tired; brass and steel don't fall asleep; brass and steel will ring, and call you to her. Take a rest and a drink."

These words reminded Jack of the doctor's experiment with the alarm-bell. He could not disguise from himself the stealthily-growing sense of fatigue in his head and his limbs. "I'm afraid you're right," he said sadly. "I wish I was a stronger man." He joined Schwartz at the table, and dropped wearily into the watchman's chair.

His head sank on his breast, his eyes closed. He started up again. "She may want help when she wakes!" he cried, with a look of terror. "What must we do? Can we carry her home between us? Oh! Schwartz, I was so confident in myself a little while since—and it seems all to have left me now!"

"Don't worry that weary little head of yours about nothing," Schwartz answered, with rough good-nature. "Come along with me, and I'll show you where help's to be got when help's wanted. No! no! you won't be out of hearing of the bell—if it rings. We'll leave the door open. It's only on the other side of the passage here."

He lighted a lantern, and led Jack out.

Leaving the courtyard and the waiting-room on their left hand, he advanced along the right-hand side of the passage, and opened the door of a bed-chamber, always kept ready for use. A second door in the bed-chamber led to a bath-room. Here, opposite the bath, stood the cabinet in which the restorative applications were kept, under the care of the overseer.

When the two men had gone out, Madame Fontaine ventured into the Watchman's Chamber. Her eyes turned towards the one terrible cell, at the farther end of the row of black curtains. She advanced towards it; and stopped, lifting her hands to her head in the desperate effort to compose herself.

The terror of impending discovery had never left her, since Jack had owned the use to which he had put the contents of the blue-glass bottle.

Animated by that all-mastering dread, she had thrown away every poison in the medicine-chest—had broken the bottles into fragments—and had taken those fragments out with her, when she left the house to follow Doctor Dormann. On the way to the cemetery, she had scattered the morsels of broken glass and torn paper on the dark road outside the city gate. Nothing now remained but the empty medicine-chest, and the writing in cipher, once rolled round the poison called the "Looking-Glass Drops."

Under these altered circumstances, she had risked asking Doctor Dormann to interpret the mysterious characters, on the bare chance of their containing some warning by which she might profit, in her present ignorance of the results which Jack's ignorant interference might produce.

Acting under the same vague terror of that possible revival, to which Jack looked forward with such certain hope, she had followed him to the Deadhouse, and had waited, hidden in the cells, to hear what dangerous confidences he might repose in the doctor or in Mr. Keller, and to combat on the spot the suspicion which he might ignorantly rouse in their minds. Still in the same agony of doubt, she now stood, with her eyes on the cell, trying to summon the resolution to judge for herself. One look at the dead woman, while the solitude in the room gave her the chance—one look might assure her of the livid pallor of death, or warn her of the terrible possibilities of awakening life. She hurried headlong over the intervening space, and looked in.

There, grand and still, lay her murderous work! There, ghostly white on the ground of the black robe, were the rigid hands, topped by the hideous machinery which was to betray them, if they trembled under the mysterious return of life!

In the instant when she saw it, the sight overwhelmed her with horror. She turned distractedly, and fled through the open door. She crossed the courtyard, like a deeper shadow creeping swiftly through the darkness of the winter night. On the threshold of the solitary waiting-room, exhausted nature claimed its rest. She wavered—groped with her hands at the empty air—and sank insensible on the floor.

In the meantime, Schwartz revealed the purpose of his visit to the bath-room.

The glass doors which protected the upper division of the cabinet were locked; the key being in the possession of the overseer. The cupboard in the lower division, containing towels and flannel wrappers, was left unsecured. Opening the door, the watchman drew out a bottle and an old traveling flask, concealed behind the bath-linen. "I call this my cellar," he explained. "Cheer up, Jacky; we'll have a jolly night of it yet."

"I don't want to see your cellar!" said Jack impatiently. "I want to be of use to Mistress—show me the place where we call for help."

"Call?" repeated Schwartz, with a roar of laughter. "Do you think they can hear us at the overseer's, through a courtyard, and a waiting-room, and a grand hall, and another courtyard, and another waiting-room beyond? Not if we were twenty men all bawling together till we were hoarse! I'll show you how we can make the master hear us—if that miraculous revival of yours happens," he added facetiously in a whisper to himself.

He led the way back into the passage, and held up his lantern so as to show the cornice. A row of fire-buckets was suspended there by books. Midway between them, a stout rope hung through a metal-lined hole in the roof.

"Do you see that?" said Schwartz. "You have only to pull, and there's an iron tongue in the belfry above that will speak loud enough to be heard at the city gate. The overseer will come tumbling in, with his bunch of keys, as if the devil was at his heels, and the two women-servants after him—old and ugly, Jack!—they attend to the bath, you know, when a woman wants it. Wait a bit! Take the light into the bedroom, and get a chair for yourself—we haven't much accommodation for evening visitors. Got it? that's right. Would you like to see where the mad watchman hung himself? On the last hook at the end of the row there. We've got a song he made about the Deadhouse. I think it's in the drawer of the table. A gentleman had it printed and sold, for the benefit of the widow and children. Wait till we are well warmed with our liquor, and I'll tell you what I'll do—I'll sing you the mad watchman's song; and Jacky, my man, you shall sing the chorus! Tow-row-rub-a-dub-boom—that's the tune. Pretty, isn't it? Come along back to our snuggery." He led the way to the Watchman's Chamber.

CHAPTER XIX

Jack looked eagerly into the cell again. There was no change—not a sign of that happy waking in which he so firmly believed.

Schwartz opened the drawer of the table. Tobacco and pipes; two or three small drinking-glasses; a dirty pack of playing-cards; the mad watchman's song, with a woodcut illustration of the suicide—all lay huddled together. He took from the drawer the song, and two of the drinking-glasses, and called to his little guest to come out of the cell.

"There;" he said, filling the glasses, "you never tasted such wine as that in all your life. Off with it!"

Jack turned away with a look of disgust. "What did you say of wine, when I drank with you the other night?" he asked reproachfully. "You said it would warm my heart, and make a man of me. And what did it do? I couldn't stand on my legs. I couldn't hold up my head—I was so sleepy and stupid that Joseph had to take me upstairs to bed. I hate your wine! Your wine's a liar, who promises and doesn't perform! I'm weary enough, and wretched enough in my mind, as it is. No more wine for me!"

"Wrong!" remarked Schwartz, emptying his glass, and smacking his lips after it.

"You made a serious mistake the other night—you didn't drink half enough. Give the good liquor a fair chance, my son. No, you won't? Must I try a little gentle persuasion before you will come back to your chair?" Suiting the action to the word, he put his arm round Jack. "What's this I feel under my hand?" he asked. "A bottle?" He took it out of Jack's breast-pocket. "Lord help us!" he exclaimed; "it looks like physic!"

Jack snatched it away from him, with a cry of delight. "The very thing for me—and I never thought of it!"

It was the phial which Madame Fontaine had repentantly kept to herself, after having expressly filled it for him with the fatal dose of "Alexander's Wine"—the phial which he had found, when he first opened the "Pink-Room Cupboard." In the astonishment and delight of finding the blue-glass bottle immediately afterwards, he had entirely forgotten it. Nothing had since happened to remind him that it was in his pocket, until Schwartz had stumbled on the discovery.

"It cures you when you are tired or troubled in your mind," Jack announced in his grandest manner, repeating Madame Fontaine's own words. "Is there any water here?"

"Not a drop, thank Heaven!" said Schwartz, devoutly.

"Give me my glass, then. I once tried the remedy by itself, and it stung me as it went down. The wine won't hurt me, with this splendid stuff in it. I'll take it in the wine."

"Who told you to take it?" Schwartz asked, holding back the glass.

"Mrs. Housekeeper told me."

"A woman!" growled Schwartz, in a tone of sovereign contempt. "How dare you let a woman physic you, when you've got me for a doctor? Jack! I'm ashamed of you."

Jack defended his manhood. "Oh, I don't care what she says! I despise her—she's mad. You don't suppose she made this? I wouldn't touch it, if she had. No, no; her husband made it—a wonderful man! the greatest man in Germany!"

He reached across the table and secured his glass of wine. Before it was possible to interfere, he had emptied the contents of the phial into it, and had raised it to his lips. At that moment, Schwartz's restraining hand found its way to his wrist. The deputy watchman had far too sincere a regard for good wine to permit it to be drunk, in combination with physic, at his own table.

"Put it down!" he said gruffly. "You're my visitor, ain't you? Do you think I'm going to let housekeeper's cat-lap be drunk at my table? Look here!"

He held up his traveling-flask, with the metal drinking-cup taken off, so as to show the liquor through the glass. The rich amber color of it fascinated Jack. He put his wine-glass back on the table. "What is it?" he asked eagerly.

"Drinkable gold, Jack! My physic. Brandy!"

He poured out a dram into the metal cup. "Try that," he said, "and don't let me hear any more about the housekeeper's physic."

Jack tasted it. The water came into his eyes—he put his hands on his throat. "Fire!" he gasped faintly.

"Wait!" said Schwartz.

Jack waited. The fiery grip of the brandy relaxed; the genial warmth of it was wafted through him persuasively from head to foot. He took another sip. His eyes began to glitter. "What divine being made this?" he asked. Without waiting to be answered, he tried it again, and emptied the cup. "More!" he cried. "I never felt so big, I never felt so strong, I never felt so clever, as I feel now!"

Schwartz, drinking freely from his own bottle, recovered, and more than recovered, his Bacchanalian good humor. He clapped Jack on the shoulder. "Who's the right doctor now?" he asked cheerfully. "A drab of a housekeeper? or Father Schwartz? Your health, my jolly boy! When the bottle's empty, I'll help you to finish the flask. Drink away! and the devil take all heel-taps!"

The next dose of brandy fired Jack's excitable brain with a new idea. He fell on his knees at the table, and clasped his hands in a sudden fervor of devotion. "Silence!" he commanded sternly. "Your wine's only a poor devil. Your drinkable gold is a god. Take your cap off, Schwartz—I'm worshipping drinkable gold!"

Schwartz, highly diverted, threw his cap up to the ceiling. "Drinkable gold, ora pro nobis!" he shouted, profanely adapting himself to Jack's humor. "You shall be Pope, my boy—and I'll be the Pope's butler. Allow me to help your sacred majesty back to your chair."

Jack's answer betrayed another change in him. His tones were lofty; his manner was distant. "I prefer the floor," he said; "hand me down my mug." As he reached up to take it, the alarm-bell over the door caught his eye. Debased as he was by the fiery strength of the drink, his ineradicable love for his mistress made its noble influence felt through the coarse fumes that were mounting to his brain. "Stop!" he cried. "I must be where I can see the bell—I must be ready for her, the instant it rings."

He crawled across the floor, and seated himself with his back against the wall of one of the empty cells, on the left-hand side of the room. Schwartz, shaking his fat sides with laughter, handed down the cup to his guest. Jack took no notice of it. His eyes, reddened already by the brandy, were fixed on the bell opposite to him. "I want to know about it," he said. "What's that steel thing there, under the brass cover?"

"What's the use of asking?" Schwartz replied, returning to his bottle.

"I want to know!"

"Patience, Jack—patience. Follow my fore-finger. My hand seems to shake a little; but it's as honest a hand as ever was. That steel thing there, is the bell hammer, you know. And, bless your heart, the hammer's everything. Cost, Lord knows how much. Another toast, my son. Good luck to the bell!"

Jack changed again; he began to cry. "She's sleeping too long on that sofa, in there," he said sadly. "I want her to speak to me; I want to hear her scold me for drinking in this horrid place. My heart's all cold again. Where's the mug?" He found it, as he spoke; the fire of the brandy went down his throat once more, and lashed him into frantic high spirits. "I'm up in the clouds!" he shouted; "I'm riding on a whirlwind. Sing, Schwartz! Ha! there are the stars twinkling through the skylight! Sing the stars down from heaven!"

Schwartz emptied his bottle, without the ceremony of using the glass. "Now we are primed!" he said—"now for the mad watchman's song!" He snatched up the paper from the table, and roared out hoarsely the first verse:

The moon was shining, cold and bright,

In the Frankfort Deadhouse, on New Year's night

And I was the watchman, left alone,

While the rest to feast and dance were gone;

I envied their lot, and cursed my own—

Poor me!

"Chorus, Jack! 'I envied their lot and cursed my own'——"

The last words of the verse were lost in a yell of drunken terror. Schwartz started out of his chair, and pointed, panic-stricken, to the lower end of the room. "A ghost!" he screamed. "A ghost in black, at the door!"

Jack looked round, and burst out laughing. "Sit down again, you old fool," he said. "It's only Mrs. Housekeeper. We are singing, Mrs. Housekeeper! You haven't heard my voice yet—I'm the finest singer in Germany."

Madame Fontaine approached him humbly. "You have a kind heart, Jack—I am sure you will help me," she said. "Show me how to get out of this frightful place."

"The devil take you!" growled Schwartz, recovering himself. "How did you get in?"

"She's a witch!" shouted Jack. "She rode in on a broomstick—she crept in through the keyhole. Where's the fire? Let's take her downstairs, and burn her!"

Schwartz applied himself to the brandy-flask, and began to laugh again. "There never was such good company as Jack," he said, in his oiliest tones. "You can't get out to-night, Mrs. Witch. The gates are locked—and they don't trust me with the key. Walk in, ma'am. Plenty of accommodation for you, on that side of the room where Jack sits. We are slack of guests for the grave, to-night. Walk in."

She renewed her entreaties. "I'll give you all the money I have about me! Who can I go to for the key? Jack! Jack! speak for me!"

"Go on with the song!" cried Jack.

She appealed again in her despair to Schwartz. "Oh, sir, have mercy on me! I fainted, out there—and, when I came to myself, I tried to open the gates—and I called, and called, and nobody heard me."

Schwartz's sense of humor was tickled by this. "If you could bellow like a bull," he said, "nobody would hear you. Take a seat, ma'am."

"Go on with the song!" Jack reiterated. "I'm tired of waiting."

Madame Fontaine looked wildly from one to the other of them. "Oh, God, I'm locked in with an idiot and a drunkard!" The thought of it maddened her as it crossed her mind. Once more, she fled from the room. Again, and again, in the outer darkness, she shrieked for help.

Schwartz advanced staggering towards the door, with Jack's empty chair in his hand. "Perhaps you'll be able to pipe a little higher, ma'am, if you come back, and sit down? Now for the song, Jack!"

He burst out with the second verse:

Backwards and forwards, with silent tread,

I walked on my watch by the doors of the dead.

And I said, It's hard, on this New Year,

While the rest are dancing to leave me here,

Alone with death and cold and fear—

Poor me!

"Chorus, Jack! Chorus, Mrs. Housekeeper! Ho! ho! look at her! She can't resist the music—she has come back to us already. What can we do for you, ma'am? The flask's not quite drained yet. Come and have a drink."

She had returned, recoiling from the outer darkness and silence, giddy with the sickening sense of faintness which was creeping over her again. When Schwartz spoke she advanced with tottering steps. "Water!" she exclaimed, gasping for breath. "I'm faint—water! water!"

"Not a drop in the place, ma'am! Brandy, if you like?"

"I forbid it!" cried Jack, with a peremptory sign of the hand. "Drinkable gold is for us—not for her!"

The glass of wine which Schwartz had prevented him from drinking caught his notice. To give Madame Fontaine her own "remedy," stolen from her own room, was just the sort of trick to please Jack in his present humor. He pointed to the glass, and winked at the watchman. After a momentary hesitation, Schwartz's muddled brain absorbed the new idea. "Here's a drop of wine left, ma'am," he said. "Suppose you try it?"

She leaned one hand on the table to support herself. Her heart sank lower and lower; a cold perspiration bedewed her face. "Quick! quick!" she murmured faintly. She seized the glass, and emptied it eagerly to the last drop.

Schwartz and Jack eyed her with malicious curiosity. The idea of getting away was still in her mind. "I think I can walk now," she said. "For God's sake, let me out!"

"Haven't I told you already? I can't get out myself."

At that brutal answer, she shrank back. Slowly and feebly she made her way to the chair, and dropped on it.

"Cheer up, ma'am!" said Schwartz. "You shall have more music to help you—you shall hear how the mad watchman lost his wits. Another drop of the drinkable gold, Jack. A dram for you and a dram for me—and here goes!" He roared out the last verses of the song:—

Any company's better than none, I said:

If I can't have the living, I'd like the dead.

In one terrific moment more,

The corpse-bell rang at each cell door,

The moonlight shivered on the floor—

Poor me!

The curtains gaped; there stood a ghost,

On every threshold, as white as frost,

You called us, they shrieked, and we gathered soon;

Dance with your guests by the New Year's moon!

I danced till I dropped in a deadly swoon—

Poor me!

And since that night I've lost my wits,

And I shake with ceaseless ague-fits:

For the ghosts they turned me cold as stone,

On that New Year's night when the white moon shone,

And I walked on my watch, all, all alone—

Poor me!

And, oh, when I lie in my coffin-bed,

Heap thick the earth above my head!

Or I shall come back, and dance once more,

With frantic feet on the Deadhouse floor,

And a ghost for a partner at every door—

Poor me!

The night had cleared. While Schwartz was singing, the moon shone in at the skylight. At the last verse of the song, a ray of the cold yellow light streamed across Jack's face. The fire of the brandy leapt into flame—the madness broke out in him, with a burst of its by-gone fury. He sprang, screaming, to his feet.

"The moon!" he shouted—"the mad watchman's moon! The mad watchman himself is coming back. There he is, sliding down on the slanting light! Do you see the brown earth of the grave dropping from him, and the rope round his neck? Ha! how he skips, and twists, and twirls! He's dancing again with the dead ones. Make way there! I mean to dance with them too. Come on, mad watchman—come on! I'm as mad as you are!"

He whirled round and round with the fancied ghost for a partner in the dance. The coarse laughter of Schwartz burst out again at the terrible sight. He called, with drunken triumph, to Madame Fontaine. "Look at Jacky, ma'am. There's a dancer for you! There's good company for a dull winter night!" She neither looked nor moved—she sat crouched on the chair, spellbound with terror. Jack threw up his arms, turned giddily once or twice, and sank exhausted on the floor. "The cold of him creeps up my hands," he said, still possessed by the vision of the watchman. "He cools my eyes, he calms my heart, he stuns my head. I'm dying, dying, dying—going back with him to the grave. Poor me! poor me!"

He lay hushed in a strange repose; his eyes wide open, staring up at the moon. Schwartz drained the last drop of brandy out of the flask. "Jack's name ought to be Solomon," he pronounced with drowsy solemnity; "Solomon was wise; and Jack's wise. Jack goes to sleep, when the liquor's done. Take away the bottle, before the overseer comes in. If any man says I am not sober, that man lies. The Rhine wine has a way of humming in one's head. That's all, Mr. Overseer—that's all. Do I see the sun rising, up there in the skylight? I wish you good-night; I wish—you—good—night."

He laid his heavy arms on the table; his head dropped on them—he slept.

The time passed. No sound broke the silence but the lumpish snoring of Schwartz. No change appeared in Jack; there he lay, staring up at the moon.

Somewhere in the building (unheard thus far in the uproar) a clock struck the first hour of the morning.

Madame Fontaine started. The sound shook her with a new fear—a fear that expressed itself in a furtive look at the cell in which the dead woman lay. If the corpse-bell rang, would the stroke of it be like the single stroke of the clock?

"Jack!" she whispered. "Do you hear the clock? Oh, Jack, the stillness is dreadful—speak to me."

He slowly raised himself. Perhaps the striking of the clock—perhaps some inner prompting—had roused him. He neither answered Madame Fontaine, nor looked at her. With his arms clasped round his knees, he sat on the floor in the attitude of a savage. His eyes, which had stared at the moon, now stared with the same rigid, glassy look at the alarm-bell over the cell-door.

The time went on. Again the oppression of silence became more than Madame Fontaine could endure. Again she tried to make Jack speak to her.

"What are you looking at?" she asked. "What are you waiting for? Is it——?" The rest of the sentence died away on her lips: the words that would finish it were words too terrible to be spoken.

The sound of her voice produced no visible impression on Jack. Had it influenced him, in some unseen way? Something did certainly disturb the strange torpor that held him. He spoke. The tones were slow and mechanical—the tones of a man searching his memory with pain and difficulty; repeating his recollections, one by one, as he recovered them, to himself.

"When she moves," he muttered, "her hands pull the string. Her hands send a message up: up and up to the bell." He paused, and pointed to the cell-door.

The action had a horrible suggestiveness to the guilty wretch who was watching him.

"Don't do that!" she cried. "Don't point there!"

His hand never moved; he pursued his newly-found recollections of what the doctor had shown to him.

"Up and up to the bell," he repeated. "And the bell feels it. The steel thing moves. The bell speaks. Good bell! Faithful bell!"

The clock struck the half-hour past one. Madame Fontaine shrieked at the sound—her senses knew no distinction between the clock and the bell.

She saw his pointing hand drop back, and clasp itself with the other hand, round his knees. He spoke—softly and tenderly now—he was speaking to the dead. "Rise Mistress, rise! Dear soul, the time is long; and poor Jack is waiting for you!"

She thought the closed curtains moved: the delusion was reality to her. She tried to rouse Schwartz.

"Watchman! watchman! Wake up!"

He slept on as heavily as ever.

She half rose from her chair. She was almost on her feet—when she sank back again. Jack had moved. He got up on his knees. "Mistress hears me!" he said. The light of vivid expression showed itself in his eyes. Their vacancy was gone: they looked longingly at the door of the cell. He got on his feet—he pressed both hands over his bosom. "Come!" he said. "Oh, Mistress, come!"

There was a sound—a faint premonitory rustling sound—over the door.

The steel hammer moved—rose—struck the metal globe. The bell rang.

He stood rooted to the floor, sobbing hysterically. The iron grasp of suspense held him.

Not a cry, not a movement escaped Madame Fontaine. The life seemed to have been struck out of her by the stroke of the bell. It woke Schwartz. Except that he looked up, he too never moved: he too was like a living creature turned to stone.

A minute passed.

The curtains swayed gently. Tremulous fingers crept out, parting them. Slowly, over the black surface of the curtain, a fair naked arm showed itself, widening the gap.

The figure appeared, in its velvet pall. On the pale face the stillness of repose was barely ruffled yet. The eyes alone were conscious of returning life. They looked out on the room, softly surprised and perplexed—no more. They looked downwards: the lips trembled sweetly into a smile. She saw Jack, kneeling in ecstasy at her feet.

And now again, there was stillness in the room. Unutterable happiness rejoiced, unutterable dread suffered, in the same silence.

The first sound heard came suddenly from the lonely outer hall. Hurrying footsteps swept over the courtyard. The flash of lights flew along the dark passage. Voices of men and women, mingled together, poured into the Watchman's Chamber.