Little Helen clasped her trembling hands under the bed-cover, and repeated the Lord's Prayer as devoutly and reverentially as mortal lips could utter it, but this act of devotion did not soothe her into slumber, or banish the phantom that flitted round her couch. Finding it impossible to breathe under the bed-cover any longer, and fearing to die of suffocation, she slowly emerged from her burying-clothes till her mouth came in contact with the cool, fresh air. She kept her eyes tightly closed, that she might not see the _darkness_. She remembered hearing her brother, who prided himself upon being a great mathematician, say that if one counted ten, over and over again, till they were very tired, they would fall asleep without knowing it. She tried this experiment, but her heart kept time with its loud, quick beatings; so loud, so quick, she sometimes mistook them for the skeleton foot-tramps of the traveler. She was sure she heard a rustling in the chimney, a clattering against the walls. She thought she felt a chilly breath sweep over her cheek. At length, unable to endure the awful oppression of her fears, she resolved to make a desperate attempt, and rush down stairs to her mother, telling her she should die if she remained where she was. It was horrible to go down alone in the darkness, it was more horrible to remain in that haunted room. So, gathering up all her courage, she jumped from the bed, and sought the door with her nervous, grasping hands. Her little feet turned to ice, as their naked soles scampered over the bare floor, but she did not mind that; she found the door, opened it, and entered a long, dark passage, leading to the stairway. Then she recollected that on the left of that passage there was a lumber-room, running out slantingly to the eaves of the house, with a low entrance into it, which was left without a door. This lumber-room had long been her especial terror. Whenever she passed it, even in broad daylight, it had a strange, mysterious appearance to her. The twilight shadows always gathered there first and lingered last; she never walked by it--she always ran with all her speed, as if the avenger of blood were behind her. Now she would have flown if she could, but her long night dress impeded her motions, and clung adhesively round her ankles. Once she trod upon it, and thinking some one arrested her, she uttered a loud scream and sprang forward through the door, which chanced to be open. This door was directly at the head of the stairs, and it is not at all surprising that Helen, finding it impossible to recover her equilibrium, should pass over the steps in a quicker manner than she intended, swift as her footsteps were. Down she went, tumbling and bumping, till she came against the lower door with a force that burst it open, and in rolled a yellow flannel ball into the centre of the illuminated apartment.