"We hear noises in the north wing as we don't hear elsewhere," said Martha, shivering. "Miss Ella, it is true--if anything ever was true in this world. It was the door of her room we heard just now--loud enough too. Just as if the wind had blown it to, or as if somebody had shut it in a temper." "There is hardly enough wind this evening to stir a leaf," reproved their young mistress. "And you know that every door in the north wing is locked outside, except that of my sitting-room." "No, Miss Ella, there's not enough wind, and the doors is locked, as you say; but we heard one of 'em bang, for all that, and it sounded like her door," answered Martha, with respectful persistency. Ella looked at the young women. Could she cure them of this foolish fear, she asked herself--or, at least, soften it? "Come with me, both of you," she said, taking the candle into her hand, and leading the way up the great oaken staircase. Clinging to each other, the servants followed. This, the north wing, was the oldest part of the house. Here and there a stair creaked beneath their footsteps; at every corner there were fantastic shadows, that seemed to lie in wait and then spring suddenly out. The squeaking of a mouse and the pattering of light feet behind the wainscot made the girls start and tremble; but Ella held lightly on her way till the corridor that ran along the whole length of the upper floor of the wing was reached. Into this corridor some dozen rooms opened. Here Ella halted for a moment, and held the candle aloft. "You shall see for yourselves that it could not be any of these doors you heard. We will examine them one by one." One after another, the doors were tried by Miss Winter. Each door was found to be locked, its key on the outside. When she reached Number Nine, she drew in her breath, and paused for a moment before turning the handle: perhaps she did not like that room more than the girls did. It was the room they had called "her room." But Number Nine was locked as the others were locked, and Ella passed on. When all the doors had been tried, Ella turned to the servants. "You see now that you must have been mistaken," she said, speaking very gravely; but in their own minds neither Martha nor Ann would have admitted anything of the kind.