When he rode into the outskirts of the little scattered hamlet at the Warren, it was dark, and lights were shining in the cottage-windows. He looked for a boy to hold his horse, but, seeing none, dismounted at the bridge over the mill-pool, and threw the reins across the palings. As he crossed the bridge, which vibrated beneath him, he saw the stars and crescent-moon reflected in the pool, and heard the rush of the falling water. A dog howled mournfully as he approached the porch, and knocked with the butt of his riding-whip on the door, which stood ajar. There was no answer. He knocked again, and the dog chained in the courtyard set up his woeful howl. "Be quiet, Jip," he said. He had heard the name of the dog from May, and love remembers trifles. Hearing his voice, the dog howled again, and another at a distance caught up and prolonged the cry. "This is a dismal place," he thought. "No wonder May prefers to be with Margaret. How gloomy the shadowy hill looks, and the black mass of the mill yonder, and the tall trees over the white ricks!" He knocked a third time, and his blow echoed in the hall. "They must be out," he thought, giving the heavy door, studded with broad-headed nails, a push. It creaked like the gate of those dark regions which Dante explored, and swung slowly back. He listened on the threshold; there was no sound save the ponderous halting tick of the stair-clock. He called "Jane!" recollecting the housekeeper's name; his voice wandered in hollow spaces, and was lost. It occurred to him that perhaps she and the servants had taken advantage of the old man's helplessness and May's absence to go out for a gossip, and he became indignant. He stepped into the hall, and felt his way along a stone-paved passage, which he knew led to the great parlour; then reflected that he was intruding, and called again. "Mr Fisher!" The words came back to him, distorted by a broken echo from the hall. The dog without howled piteously. Felix, in the dark passage, felt a strange creeping sensation come over him. He shook it off, and groped his way to the door of the parlour. The great apartment was full of shadows, gloomy, cavernous; but a dim light, from the faint glow still lingering in the west and the moon, came through the window enabling him to see the beehive chair, with the back towards him. "Excuse me, sir; but I could not make any one hear," he said, advancing. He looked into the hollow recess of the chair, and saw the old man sitting there with the glint of the crescent-moon upon his eyeball. "I am afraid I have been rude," he began; but suddenly stopped, stretched forth his arm, and touched the old man's hands, which were folded upon his knee. Cold as a stone--he was dead!