'He had to strangle seventeen people every night for seven months, my dear. Well, that made an impression upon him, and I daresay he began to look upon himself as a lawful strangler. I must say, that when he strangled the people on the stage, he did it in such a manner that no one could help believing that he enjoyed it.' 'It was realistic acting, Josey,' said Turk complacently; 'that's what it was.' 'It was a little too realistic for me,' observed Josey. 'For what do you think he did one night, Chris, my dear? He was living in this house at the time, and we all went to bed quite comfortably, after a heavy supper. Turk had had a great triumph that night, and the audience were so delighted with the way in which he strangled his victims, that they called him before the curtain more than once. We talked of it a great deal after supper. Well, in the middle of the night I woke up with a curious sensation upon me. Something seemed to be crawling towards me very stealthily. I listened in a terrible fright, and sure enough I heard something crawling in the room. I lit a candle quickly, you may be sure; and there I saw Turk in his nightshirt, as I'm a living woman, creeping about on the floor, as he was in the habit every night of creeping about on the stage in the character of The Thug. He was fast asleep, my dear. "Turk! Turk!" I cried, and I was about to jump out of bed and give him a good shaking, when he shouted, "Ha! ha! I have you! Die! die!" and he ran up to me. My dear, if I hadn't jumped out on the other side of the bed, and poured a jug of cold water down his back, I believe he would have strangled me. It woke him up, and a nice state he was in. Every night after that, until the run of the piece was over, and he was playing other characters, I locked him in his bedroom, and took away the key. I wasn't going to have the children strangled in their sleep, and Turk hanged for it. I used to go to the door of his room in the dead of night, and more than once I heard him crawling about on the floor, strangling imaginary people, with his "Ha! ha! Die! die!" He never knew anything of it, my dear, and used to come down to breakfast looking as innocent as a lamb.' Turk seemed to take pride in this narration. 'It shows that I was in earnest,' he said. 'There's ten o'clock striking.' We listened in silence, and did not speak until the last echo had quite died away. Then I raised my head and saw that Josey was looking at me very earnestly. 'Chris, my dear,' she said, somewhat nervously, 'you have good cause to remember the first night you came into this house.' 'Indeed I have, Josey,' I replied.