Ten minutes after the little spirit told the trembling man that he had but five minutes more, and four of these were wasted in unavailing struggles and prayers for release, when all at once Asher felt himself seized by hundreds of tiny hands. The cords were tightened till their pressure was agonising; and then he seemed to be floated up into the great open floor where the bells hung in the massive oaken framework, and though he could not see it, he knew well enough where the tenor bell was, and also how the great iron clock hammer was fixed, which would crush his skull like an egg-shell. Asher struggled and tried to scream, but he felt himself impelled towards the bell, and directly after his cheek was resting upon the cold metal on one side, while the great hammer barely touched his temple on the other, and he knew when it was raised that it would come down with a fierce crash, and he shuddered as he thought of the splashed bell, and the blood, and brains, and hair clinging to the hammer. "And they'll say it was an accident," muttered Asher to himself, quoting the spirit's remark. "They'll never give me credit for doing it myself. I'm the wrong sort." And then the thoughts of a life seemed crowded into that last minute, and he shuddered to see what a little good he had done. Always money and self, and now what was it worth? He had pinched and punished all around him for the sake of heaping up riches, and now above all would come in those words-- "Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee." Thoughts crowded through the wretched man's brain thick and fast. He seemed living his life through in these few remaining seconds, while above all there was the reproaching face of the poor widow whom he would have cast out that night homeless and friendless upon the bitter world. He could not explain it to himself, but it seemed that this face kept him down where he was more than anything else. There was no anger upon it, nothing but bitter sorrowful reproach, and though he would have closed his eyes he could not hide from his gaze that sad countenance. But now came the horror of death, for he seemed to see the little spirits glide down the pendulum far beneath him, rest for a moment upon the bob, and then as one was beaten off, up rose the hammer, and he felt its cold touch leave his temple. Up--up--higher--higher--and now it was about to come down and would dash out his brains. It was coming, and all was over, and for that second the agony he suffered was intense. Then down it came, after seeming to be poised in the air for an awful space of time, and at last came the fearful stroke. "Clang," and his brain rocked and reeled as the blow fell upon the sonorous metal close by his forehead. The piercing tones rang through him, but before he could collect his thoughts--"Clang" went the hammer again again, and yet his heart did not revive, for he felt that it would be the _last_ stroke which would crush him.