The sisters were sitting one day toward the end of November—­I think it was the twenty-fifth—­in the north room, which they had made their work-room.  The south room, according to the custom of our ancestors, still religiously preserved among us, was shut up “for company.”  The kitchen served them also for dining-room, and the largest room up stairs was their bed-chamber.  Miss Sophonisba was trimming a bonnet, a task for which she had an especial gift.  Ladies came to her even from Boston, saying that her work had an air and style quite its own, while her charges were not nearly so high as those of the more fashionable milliners in the city.  Faithful was altering a dress of her own.  Both were much engaged with their work, and neither had spoken for some time.  Suddenly, Faithful started slightly, and the needle dropped from her hand.

“What’s the matter?” asked her sister.

“Nothing,” said Faithful, rather confused.

“Yes, there is,” said Miss Sophonisba.  “People don’t jump that way for nothing.  What is it?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” hesitated Miss Faithful.  “I guess I pricked my finger.”

“Umph!” said Miss Sophonisba in a very incredulous way, but she pushed her inquiries no farther.

As soon as her sister was silent, Miss Faithful’s conscience began to chide her for her little evasion.  Twice she opened her mouth to speak, and as often checked herself, but the third time the words were uttered:  “If I tell you, Sophonisba, you will laugh at me.”

“Well, that wouldn’t kill you, child.”

“No; but—­well—­it was only that I thought all of a sudden some one was standing behind my chair.”

“How could you think so when there was no one there?”

“I don’t know, but it felt as if there was.”

“Nonsense, Faithful!  If you didn’t see any one, how did you know there was any one?  Have you got eyes in the back of your head?”

“I didn’t see it—­I sort of felt so.”

“‘Sort of felt so!’” said Miss Sophonisba, with good-natured contempt.  “If I was you, I’d take some catnip tea when I went to bed:  you’re kind of narvy.”

Miss Faithful assented, and went on quietly with her sewing, but she changed the seat which she had occupied, with her back to the cellar door, for one close to her sister.

No further disturbance occurred till the middle of December.  It had been a very windy day.  The bay was tossing in long gray-green lines of waves crested with flying foam.  The black savins sighed and wailed as they bent to the cutting blast.  The wind was east, and it took a good deal of fire to keep the old house warm, but wood was cheap in those days, and Miss Sophonisba, though prudent and economical, was not given to what New England expressively calls “skrimping.”

Miss Faithful, not feeling very well, had gone up stairs to bed soon after tea.  A windy day always made her uncomfortable, recalling, too vividly perhaps, the gale in which the Federalist had gone down.  Miss Sophonisba, having some work on hand which she was anxious to finish, was sitting up rather beyond her usual hour.  Pausing for a moment in her sewing, she heard some one walking about in the room above her to and fro, with a regular though light step, as of bare or thinly-shod feet, on the boards.