She took from her pocket a little purse.  He seized it, and hastened to the other side of the screen where the two men were playing.  Almost immediately they invited him to join their game, whereupon, throwing Nell’s purse down upon the table, he gathered up the cards as a miser would clutch at gold.  The child sat by and watched the game in a perfect agony of fear, regardless of the run of luck; and mindful only of the desperate passion which had its hold upon her grandfather, losses and gains were to her alike.

The storm had raged for full three hours, when at length the play came to an end.  Nell’s little purse lay empty, and still the old man sat poring over the cards until the child laid her arm upon his shoulder, telling him that it was near midnight.

Now Nell had still the piece of gold, and considering the lateness of the hour, and into what a state of consternation they would throw Mrs. Jarley by knocking her up at that hour, proposed to her grandfather that they stay where they were for the night.  As they would leave very early in the morning, the child was anxious to pay for their entertainment before they retired, but as she felt the necessity of concealing her little hoard from her grandfather, and had to change the piece of gold, she took it out secretly, and following the landlord into the bar, tendered it to him there.  She was returning, when she fancied she saw a figure gliding in at the door.  There was only a dark passage between this door and the place where she had changed the money, and being very certain that no person had passed in or out while she stood there, she felt that she had been watched.  She was still thinking of this, when a girl came to light her to bed.

It was a great gloomy house, which the flaring candles seemed to make yet more gloomy, and the child did not feel comfortable when she was left alone.  She could not help thinking of the figure stealing through the passage downstairs.  At last a broken and fitful sleep stole upon her.  A deeper slumber followed this—­and then—­What!  That figure in the room!  A figure was there, it crouched and slunk along, stealing round the bed.  She had no voice to cry for help, no power to move,—­on it came—­silently and stealthily to the bed’s head.  There it remained, motionless as she.  At length, it busied its hands in something, and she heard the chink of money.  Then it dropped upon its hands and knees, and crawled away.  It reached the door at last, the steps creaked beneath its noiseless tread, and it was gone.

The first impulse of the child was not to be alone—­and with no consciousness of having moved, she gained the door.  Once in her grandfather’s room, she would be safe.  An idea flashed suddenly upon her—­what if the figure should enter there, and have a design upon the old man’s life?  She turned faint and sick.  She saw it creeping in front of her.  It went in.  Not knowing what she meant to do, but meaning to preserve him, or be killed herself, she staggered forward and looked in.