I shuddered, and felt an intense desire to scream, but my voice was gone. Had I then really lived to see a ghost? Was there, then, some foundation for the strange name given to the inn? I had never heard from my friend Rustcoin that it was reported haunted, and I most assuredly should have heard about it if he had had any knowledge of it. Perhaps it was a thing not generally known; perhaps its appearance was not usual, and it only appeared at intervals to certain privileged beings. Was I one of those beings? I asked myself. Perhaps so. It might have something to communicate. I would address it, but my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth, for now I saw distinctly that the head I had missed was carried under the left arm of the figure. I marked well the face; it was extremely beautiful, and I thought I recognised a likeness to the old portrait I had been looking at; but oh! how far short that old piece of painted panel fell of the original; if, indeed, it was ever intended for a representation of the lineaments I now gazed upon. I made a second effort to address it, but as I opened my mouth to speak I heard another most audible moan from the headless figure. I was awed, but that intense fear which I experienced when I became aware that some stranger had entered my chamber had all but vanished now that I was _certain_ that I was in the presence of a denizen of the spirit world. Awful as this certainty was, it seemed to fade into insignificance when compared with the terrible feeling of doubt I had before experienced. I now felt comparatively relieved; so much so, indeed, that I even found room in my heart for pity--that one so young and so beautiful as she appeared to be should have suffered such a cruel and ignominious death. At length, in a low and subdued tone, I addressed the figure. "Spirit, whate'er thou art or wert, whether of good or evil, whether from the regions of the blest or the haunts of the damned, speak! Declare thy mission." A hollow moan proceeded from the trunk of the headless figure, and the eyes in the head held under its arm rolled upwards with a look of despair, while in tones low, solemn, yet sweet, it spoke, the lips vibrating, though the voice came from the neck. "I am the spirit of one who, dying in mortal sin, am doomed to perpetual unrest. Beheaded for my crimes in this world, I wander nightly round this spot, the scene of my infamy. Here where this house now stands once stood the convent whose walls imprisoned me while yet on earth. Forced into a life of seclusion for which I had no calling by a relentless parent who, deeming that his daughter's alliance with the man she loved would sully his illustrious name, I was compelled to utter vows with my lips against which my heart revolted.