"But for what purpose do you think she drugged your drink?" "To throw us into a deep sleep for many hours, which would enable her to come and go, to and from the chapel, undiscovered and unmolested." "But why should she wish to come back and forth to such a dreary, empty old place as this?" "Ah! that I cannot tell; at that point conjecture is utterly baffled," answered Lyon. "Yes; because conjecture has been pursuing a phantom--a phantom that vanishes upon being nearly approached. I cannot accept your theory of the mystery, Berners; and what is worse, I cannot substitute one of my own," said Captain Pendleton, shaking his head. "And now I have something to reveal," said Sybil, solemnly. "Another morning dream?" inquired Lyon, while Pendleton looked up with interest. "No; a reality--a ghastly, horrible reality," she answered. And while both looked at her with strange, deep interest and curiosity, she related her sepulchral experiences of the night. When with pale cheeks and shuddering frame she described the six dark, shrouded forms that had come up out of the vault, bearing long shadowy coffins, which they carried in a slow procession down along the east wall, past the Gothic windows and out at the front door, her two listeners looked at her, and then at each other, in amazement and incredulity. "It was an opium dream," said Mr. Berners, in a positive manner. "It would be useless, dear Lyon, for me to tell you that I was rather wider awake then than I am now, yet I really was," said Sybil, with equal assurance. "And yet you did not lift hand or voice to call my attention to what was going on." "I did not wish to do it; my will seemed palsied. I could only gaze at the awful procession and think how ghastly it was, and thinking so, I sank into a dreamless sleep, and knew no more until I woke up this afternoon." "Meanwhile let us go and look at the door of the vault. You say the door was wide open?" inquired Captain Pendleton. "Of course it was wide open: that is, wide open last night when those horrible forms came up out of the vault; but this morning it was fast enough," answered Sybil. "Oh!" exclaimed Mr. Berners. "I know what that 'oh!' means, Lyon. But I hope before we leave this chapel that you will find out that I can distinguish a dream from a dreadful reality," observed his wife. Meanwhile they had reached the iron door of the vault. It was fast. Pendleton took hold of the iron bars and tried to shake it; but the bars were bedded in solid stone, and the door was immovable. Then he looked through the grating down into the depths below, but he only saw the top of the staircase, the bottom of which disappeared in the darkness.