I rubbed the window-pane with my handkerchief and looked out.  The surrounding roof was steep and high.  The walls looked soiled and dark.  The windows lined with dust and dirt, and the window-stones were in places tufted with moss, and grass, and groundsel.  An arched doorway had opened from the house into this darkened square, but it was soiled and dusty; and the damp weeds that overgrew the quadrangle drooped undisturbed against it.  It was plain that human footsteps tracked it little, and I gazed into that blind and sinister area with a strange thrill and sinking.

’This is the second floor—­there is the enclosed court-yard’—­I, as it were, soliloquised.

‘What are you afraid of, Maud? you look as ye’d seen a ghost,’ exclaimed Milly, who came to the window and peeped over my shoulder.

‘It reminded me suddenly, Milly, of that frightful business.’

‘What business, Maud?—­what a plague are ye thinking on?’ demanded Milly, rather amused.

’It was in one of these rooms—­maybe this—­yes, it certainly was this—­for see, the panelling has been pulled off the wall—­that Mr. Charke killed himself.’

I was staring ruefully round the dim chamber, in whose corners the shadows of night were already gathering.

‘Charke!—­what about him?—­who’s Charke?’ asked Milly.

‘Why, you must have heard of him,’ said I.

‘Not as I’m aware on,’ answered she.  ’And he killed himself, did he, hanged himself, eh, or blowed his brains out?’

’He cut his throat in one of these rooms—­this one, I’m sure—­for your papa had the wainscoting stripped from the wall to ascertain whether there was any second door through which a murderer could have come; and you see these walls are stripped, and bear the marks of the woodwork that has been removed,’ I answered.

’Well, that was awful!  I don’t know how they have pluck to cut their throats; if I was doing it, I’d like best to put a pistol to my head and fire, like the young gentleman did, they say, in Deadman’s Hollow.  But the fellows that cut their throats, they must be awful game lads, I’m thinkin’, for it’s a long slice, you know.’

‘Don’t, don’t, Milly dear.  Suppose we come away,’ I said, for the evening was deepening rapidly into night.

’Hey and bury-me-wick, but here’s the blood; don’t you see a big black cloud all spread over the floor hereabout, don’t ye see?’ Milly was stooping over the spot, and tracing the outline of this, perhaps, imaginary mapping, in the air with her finger.

’No, Milly, you could not see it:  the floor is too dark, and it’s all in shadow.  It must be fancy; and perhaps, after all, this is not the room.’

‘Well—­I think, I’m sure it is.  Stand—­just look.’

’We’ll come in the morning, and if you are right we can see it better then.  Come away,’ I said, growing frightened.

And just as we stood up to depart, the white high-cauled cap and large sallow features of old L’Amour peeped in at the door.