“Yes,” the old man replied, “just such a storm as shook the house thirty-one years ago to-night, and above it all I hear Rover’s howl and the awful word you shouted aloud and which the winds caught up and carried everywhere so that the world is full of it.  Do you remember it, Hannah!”

Did she remember it.  Ask rather could she ever forget the awful word which it seemed to her was written on the very walls and doors of the house, and on her forehead where all the world might see it!

Ask her if she remembered, when even now, after the lapse of thirty-one years, she could hear so distinctly the shriek of despair, which, as her father had said, the winds had caught up and carried over the hills and far away, where it was still repeating itself over and over again, and would go on forever until reparation were made, if that were possible now.

It was always ringing in her ears, just as the stains were on her hands, where she felt them as she clasped her long thin fingers convulsively and wondered if she were going mad.

Her father was very quiet now; he was falling asleep, and sinking on her knees beside the bed, the wretched woman moaned piteously: 

“Oh, my Father in heaven, how long must I bear this burden which to-night presses so heavily?  Help me, help me, for I am so weak and sad.  Thou knowest I was innocent, and I have tried so hard to do right.  If I have failed—­if I ought to have spoken in spite of the vow, forgive me, for if my sin is great, great, too, has been my punishment.

“I cannot stay here,” she thought, as she rose from her knees.  “The room is full of phantoms which gibber at me from the dark corners, and shout the word in my ears as I shouted it that awful night when Rover kept me company.  Poor old Rover, lying under the snow.  If he were only here I should not be quite so desolate.  I believe that for the first time in my life I am a coward,” and shaking with cold, or fear, or both, Hannah left her father’s room and went into the kitchen, where Sam was stuffing the stove with wood.

The moment she appeared, however, he withdrew the stick he was crowding in, and began to close some of the draughts.  But she said to him: 

“Don’t do that, Sam.  Let it burn; put on more.  I am very cold.  And light a candle, Sam; three candles!  It is so dark here, and the wind howls so.  Does it say anything to you, Sam?  Any word, I mean?”

Sam had no idea what she meant, nor, indeed, did he think if she meant any thing, for his wits came slowly.  People called him stupid, and this was his greatest recommendation to Hannah, who could not have had a bright, quick-seeing boy in her household.

Sam suited her, and his answer to her question was characteristic of him.

“No, I don’t hear nothin’ it says, only it screams like a panther in a fit,” and Sam deliberately lighted the three candles, and placed them on the table, while Hannah drew a hard wooden chair to the stove, and putting her feet upon the hearth, clasped her hands around her knees, and sat there till she was thoroughly warm, and her nerves were quieted.