He returned downstairs to the kitchen, where he wandered restlessly about, occasionally pausing to look out of the window into the darkness of the night.  The rain had ceased, but the wind blew fiercely, and the sea thundered at the foot of the cliffs.  The gloom outside was thinning, and as Thalassa glanced out his eye lighted on a strange shape among the rocks.  To his imagination it appeared to have something of the semblance of a man’s form standing motionless, watching the house.

Thalassa remained near the window staring out at the object.  While he stood thus, a faint sound reached him in the stillness.  It was the muffled yet insistent tap of somebody apparently anxious to attract attention without making too much noise, and coming, as it seemed, from the front door.  Thalassa glanced at his wife, but she appeared to have heard nothing, and her grey head was bent over her cards.  He walked noiselessly out of the kitchen, closing the door gently behind him.

His wife remained at the table, unconscious of everything but the lay of her cards; shuffling, dealing, setting them out afresh in perpendicular rows, muttering at the obstinacy of the kings and queens as though their painted faces were alive and sensitive to her reproof.  The old house creaked and groaned in the wind, then became suddenly silent, like a man overtaken by sleep in the midst of stretching and yawning.  Time sped on.  Thalassa did not return, but she did not notice his absence.  More rain fell, beating against the window importunately, as if begging admission, then ceased all at once, as at a hidden command, and again there was a profound silence.

A piece of coal jumped from the fire with a hissing noise, and fell at Mrs. Thalassa’s feet.  She got up to replace it, and observed that she was alone.

She thought she heard her husband’s footsteps in the passage, and opened the door.  But there was nobody there.  The lower part of the house was gloomy and dark, but she could see the lamp glimmering on the hall stand.  She was about to return to her seat when the hall lamp suddenly mooned up, cast monstrous shadows, and went black out.

This fantastic trick of the lamp frightened her.  What had made it flare up like that and go out?  And whose footsteps had she heard?  With a chill feeling of fear she shut the door and turned again to her game.  But for once the charm of the cards failed her.  Where was Jasper, and why did he not return?  Silence held oppressive empire; her fears plucked at her like ghostly hands.  The lamp and the footstep—­what did they mean?  Had she really heard a footstep?

She thought she saw something white in the uncurtained space of the window.  She buried her face in her hands, lacking the courage to cross the room and pull down the blind.

Mysterious noises overhead, like somebody creeping on all-fours, drew her eyes back to the door opening into the passage.  With dismay she saw it was not properly shut.  She wondered if she dared go and lock it.  Suppose it was her husband, after all?  And the noises?  Were they real, or had she imagined them?