"No!" growled Asher, savagely, "I don't." But he did though, for all that, though he would not own to it. There they were, clinging to the great round ball of the pendulum, and one dropping off at every beat, while fresh ones kept gliding down the long shaft into their places. What became of the others he could not tell, for, as they fell off, they seemed to dissolve in the glow which lit up the old clock's works. It was of no use to struggle, for the efforts only made the ropes cut into his wrists and legs; and if it had not been that the rope which went round his neck was the part covered with worsted to save the ringers' hands, it seemed to him that he would have been strangled. He was horribly frightened, but he would not own to it, and, in spite of the fierce cold, he felt wet with perspiration. "How slow the time goes," said the little figure. "I want to be off. You're about ready, I suppose." "No I'm not," cried Asher furiously, "I've no end to do." "Turn out Widow Bond for one thing," said the figure with a mocking leer. "Never mind about that. Only forty-five more minutes now." "What a horrible dream," cried Asher in agony. "'Tisn't a dream," said the little figure. "You pinch your leg and try now, or stop, I will," and in a moment the tiny fellow leaped down and nipped the clerk's leg so vigorously that he shrieked with pain. "Don't feel like a dream, does it?" said the spirit. "Don't think it does," said Asher, "at least I never dreamed so loud before that I know of." "No, I shouldn't think you did, but you won't dream any more," said the little spirit. "You don't mean that?" said Asher in a pitiful voice. "I shouldn't have said it if I had not," said the spirit. "Do you suppose we speak falsely?" "Oh, I don't know," groaned Asher. "But, I say, let me go this time." "Thirty-five minutes," said the little spirit; "only thirty-five minutes more, and then my work's done, and yours too." Asher groaned again, and then gave a furious struggle, which only tightened the ropes and made one of the bells above give a sonorous clang, which sounded like a knell to the groaning clerk. "How are you going to do it?" he cried at last. "Going to do what?" said the spirit. "Going to--to--to--make an end of me?" said Asher. "Oh!" said the spirit, "I shan't have anything to do with it. Some of those to come will do that; I shall be gone. I suppose they'll only put your head under the big hammer which strikes the hour, and it will do all that, so that people will say it was an accident. Only twenty-five minutes now." Asher turned as white as the parson's surplice, and his teeth chattered as he groaned out:-- "Oh! what for? what for?" "Why, you see, you are no good," said the spirit, "and only in the way, so some one else may just as well be in your place. What do you know of love, or friendship, or affection, or anything genial? Why you're cold enough to chill the whole parish. Only a quarter of an hour now."