Then all at once he found himself attentively considering her two accidents.

Extraordinary they had been, both of them.  He could not have left that old nail standing in the wood; why, he had fetched tools specially from the kitchen; and he was convinced that that step that had broken beneath her weight had been as sound as the others.  It was inexplicable.  If these things could happen, anything could happen.  There was not a beam nor a jamb in the place that might not fall without warning, not a plank that might not crash inwards, not a nail that might not become a dagger.  The whole place was full of life even now; as he sat there in the dark he heard its crowds of noises as if the house had been one great microphone....

Only half conscious that he did so, he had been sitting for some time identifying these noises, attributing to each crack or creak or knock its material cause; but there was one noise which, again not fully conscious of the omission, he had not sought to account for.  It had last come some minutes ago; it came again now—­a sort of soft sweeping rustle that seemed to hold an almost inaudibly minute crackling.  For half a minute or so it had Oleron’s attention; then his heavy thoughts were of Elsie Bengough again.

He was nearer to loving her in that moment than he had ever been.  He thought how to some men their loved ones were but the dearer for those poor mortal blemishes that tell us we are but sojourners on earth, with a common fate not far distant that makes it hardly worth while to do anything but love for the time remaining.  Strangling sobs, blearing tears, bodies buffeted by sickness, hearts and mind callous and hard with the rubs of the world—­how little love there would be were these things a barrier to love!  In that sense he did love Elsie Bengough.  What her happiness had never moved in him her sorrow almost awoke....

Suddenly his meditation went.  His ear had once more become conscious of that soft and repeated noise—­the long sweep with the almost inaudible crackle in it.  Again and again it came, with a curious insistence and urgency.  It quickened a little as he became increasingly attentive ... it seemed to Oleron that it grew louder....

All at once he started bolt upright in his chair, tense and listening.  The silky rustle came again; he was trying to attach it to something....

The next moment he had leapt to his feet, unnerved and terrified.  His chair hung poised for a moment, and then went over, setting the fire-irons clattering as it fell.  There was only one noise in the world like that which had caused him to spring thus to his feet....

The next time it came Oleron felt behind him at the empty air with his hand, and backed slowly until he found himself against the wall.

“God in Heaven!” The ejaculation broke from Oleron’s lips.  The sound had ceased.

The next moment he had given a high cry.