Cassy fell over a stack of washtubs, and called on all the saints to help her. Mrs. Hawkins ordered Alice to let her go, and Cassy to get up, and me to move on. She was obeyed. A great general was our grandmother, and we all knew it! We left the dining-room, locking the last door behind us. We dodged the dark, blind alley, sheltered the candle from the drizzling mist, and went around into the kitchen and called Hector from above. The old man answered, and soon came toddling down the narrow stairs. "Hector, have you heard those noises?" inquired Mrs. Hawkins. "The Lord between us and evil! I've heern, mist'ess! I've heern!" "What do you suppose it is?" A dubious, solemn shake of the head was the old man's only reply. "Can't you speak, Hector? How do you account for these noises? Come! no mysteries; answer if you can; what are they?" "Dead people!" groaned the old man, with a shudder. "Pooh!" exclaimed Mrs. Hawkins. But I could see that even she was paler than usual. "Come, Hector! There is no one in the house--that is certain. And no one can get into it while we are gone, because it is locked up. Now fasten up the kitchen, and let us go and search the grounds, and unkennel any interlopers that may be lurking there." We came out and secured the kitchen door, and began our tour of the garden. As we left the door, our watchdog ran out to join us. This circumstance, while it greatly assisted us in our search, very much increased the perplexity of our minds. Had the dog heard the noises that had disturbed us, and if so, why had he not given the alarm?--or, on the other hand, were dogs insensible to supernatural sights and sounds? We could not tell; but we were glad to have Fidelle snuffing and trotting along before us, confident that if there were a human being lurking anywhere in the garden, he would smell him out. So we went up one grass-grown walk and down another, between rows of gooseberry bushes, currant bushes, and raspberry bushes, all damp and dripping with mist, and through alleys of dwarf plum trees, and all along the hedges of evergreen inside the brick wall, and past the iron gate, which was still chained, as it had been left, and then around in the stable, coachhouse, henhouse and smokehouse, each of which we found securely locked, and, when opened, damp, musty and vacant; and so we looked over every foot of ground, and into every outbuilding, finding all safe and leaving all safe; and at last, without having discovered anything, we arrived again at the dining-room door. We all entered, locked the door after us, clambered over the piles of furniture, and passed on into the parlor. The parlor, as I have said, was as yet unfurnished, damp and cold. Yet there we paused for a little while to take breath.