I crept noiselessly out of bed and pulled on a few clothes; lit my candle and left the room, turning at the door to see that my father hadn't awakened. On the landing it was very gusty, and a racing puff caught at my flame, nearly extinguishing it. I guarded it with my hand, and made for the archway. Going was very slow, for with each step my candle nearly blew out, and in the darkness I should have been lost. So I crept on slowly, my attention fixed to the flame. It was an eerie journey, for I could give no heed to what lay ahead of me, only sparing a glance now and again into the darkness around, and feeling that if anything lay in wait for me I should be an easy prey. This feeling of helplessness increased upon me as I pushed further and further into the night, and felt the first bite of the cold air that warned me I was coming to the more open parts. How I expected to keep my candle alight I don't know; but I managed it through the first exposed space, waiting for a pause in the wind before I crossed, and reaching shelter as a huge gust raced out of the north and screamed overhead with a hundred mingled cries of pain and wrath and laughter. I rested a moment, for somehow my slow passage left me strangely breathless and exhausted, and I was all a-quiver with nervous apprehension, feeling that I was stepping deeper and deeper into some unknown snare. In spite of the crying gale, the air seemed to be tightening around me, the darkness closing in. Again and again I stopped, peering about me and ahead, and always it seemed that a luring shadow sank into the blackness as though dragging me on and still on. But I kept my attention on the flame of my candle, guarding it as though it were the last spark of my life, till I came to the stairway. I felt for it with my foot, but couldn't find it. I took a step forward and felt again, but it wasn't there. I held out the candle and gazed into the dark. There was no stairway at all, only a black length of corridor as far as the little light could pierce, and I began to wonder where I was. I traced over in my mind the way I had come, with the growing fear at my heart that I was lost somewhere in that wild ruin in the dead of a tempestuous night. But I wouldn't give in. Again I felt for the stairs as though they might have miraculously grown there while I was thinking; and again I retraced in imagination the way I had come. And then faintly behind me I heard a low clang as of a closing gate, and the blood ran cold under my feet. I turned quickly; too quickly; for a breath caught at my candle, and with a leap and a flutter the flame went out. But with the last of the light I saw a pale face at my shoulder, very thin and filmy, with black hollows at the eyes; and as I gazed horror-stricken it faded into the darkness, and I heard a low sigh breathed so close to me that the thin breath seemed to fan my hair. For a moment I was too terrified to move.