gentleman in evening dress, and, back of him, the lights of a hall.  I guessed, from its elevation and distance from the sidewalk, that this light must come from the door of a house set back from the street, and I determined to approach it and ask the young man to tell me where I was.  But, in fumbling with the lock of the gate, I instinctively bent my head, and when I raised it again the door had partly closed, leaving only a narrow shaft of light.  Whether the young man had re-entered the house, or had left it I could not tell, but I hastened to open the gate, and as I stepped forward I found myself upon an asphalt walk.  At the same instant there was the sound of quick steps upon the path, and someone rushed past me.  I called to him, but he made no reply, and I heard the gate click and the footsteps hurrying away upon the sidewalk.

“Under other circumstances the young man’s rudeness, and his recklessness in dashing so hurriedly through the mist, would have struck me as peculiar, but everything was so distorted by the fog that at the moment I did not consider it.  The door was still as he had left it, partly open.  I went up the path, and, after much fumbling, found the knob of the door-bell and gave it a sharp pull.  The bell answered me from a great depth and distance, but no movement followed from inside the house, and, although I pulled the bell again and again, I could hear nothing save the dripping of the mist about me.  I was anxious to be on my way, but unless I knew where I was going there was little chance of my making any speed, and I was determined that until I learned my bearings I would not venture back into the fog.  So I pushed the door open and stepped into the house.

“I found myself in a long and narrow hall, upon which doors opened from either side.  At the end of the hall was a staircase with a balustrade which ended in a sweeping curve.  The balustrade was covered with heavy, Persian rugs, and the walls of the hall were also hung with them.  The door on my left was closed, but the one nearer me on the right was open, and, as I stepped opposite to it, I saw that it was a sort of reception or waiting-room, and that it was empty.  The door below it was also open, and, with the idea that I would surely find someone there, I walked on up the hall.  I was in evening dress, and I felt I did not look like a burglar, so I had no great fear that, should I encounter one of the inmates of the house, he would shoot me on sight.  The second door in the hall opened into a dining-room.  This was also empty.  One person had been dining at the table, but the cloth had not been cleared away, and a flickering candle showed half-filled wineglasses and the ashes of cigarettes.  The greater part of the room was in complete darkness.

“By this time I had grown conscious of the fact that I was wandering about in a strange house, and that, apparently, I was alone in it.  The silence of the place began to try my nerves, and in a sudden, unexplainable panic I started for the open street.  But as I turned, I saw a man sitting on a bench, which the curve of the balustrade had hidden from me.  His eyes were shut, and he was sleeping soundly.