I suppose he put the wax-light down; I suppose he got over his astonishment in some way: all I knew was that in a moment he was holding me in his arms, trying to soothe my sobbing. Reaction had come, and with it tears; never before had I cried so violently; and I clung to him still in an agony of terror, as one, drowning, clings to the living. But nothing remained in the gallery. Whatever had been in it had vanished. "What is all this? What has alarmed you?" "It was there; it was coming towards me!" I whispered hysterically in answer. "Oh forgive me! Hold me! I feel as though I should die." "What was coming?" he inquired. "The same—I think—that is seen in the grounds. The ghost. I saw it." "How can you be so foolish? how can you take up these absurd fancies?" he remonstrated, in a sharp tone, moving some steps away from me. "I did, Mr. Chandos; I did. It came along with its arm raised, as if to warn me off: a tall skeleton of a form, with shadowy features the hue of the dead. Features that bear, in their formation, a great resemblance to yours." Was it fancy? or was it fact?—that his own features, as I spoke, assumed an ashy tint, just as they had done when the police-officers came? "What were you doing out here?" he asked, in the same sharp accent. "I only came to the window-seat to get a book. I saw it as I turned to go back." "You saw nothing," he persisted, with some warmth. "I am astonished at you, Miss Hereford: the fancy was the creation of your own brain, and nothing more. Pray, if the ghost was here then, where is it now?" "I don't know. It disappeared: I think it seemed to go back towards the west wing. It was certainly there." "You are certainly silly," was his response. "A vast deal more so than I had given you credit for." "Ah, Mr. Chandos, you cannot reason me out of my eyesight and my senses. Thank you, thank you ever for coming up the stairs just then: I do believe I should have died, or lost my reason." Picking up the "Heir of Redclyffe," I walked to my room, went in, and shut the door. Mr. Chandos pulled it open again with a sharp pull. "Forgive me if I have been harsh. Good-night." "Oh, yes, sir; I know how foolish it must seem to you. Good-night." "Go to rest in peace and safety, Anne. And be assured that no ill, ghostly or human, shall work you harm while I am at hand to prevent it." I closed the door and bolted it, a vague idea in my mind that a bolted door is a better safeguard against a ghost than on unbolted one. Mr. Chandos's footsteps died away in the direction of the west wing.