Chapter 14 OF THE VISITOR WHO RAN DOWN THE ROAD IN THE NIGHT-TIME

It was a quarter past ten o'clock by the parlour timepiece when my father went off to his room, and left Esther and myself together. We heard his slow steps dying away up the creaking staircase, until the distant slamming of a door announced that he had reached his sanctum.

The simple oil lamp upon the table threw a weird, uncertain light over t