The next evening I came late to my lodgings. The events of the previous evening had made me nervous and ill;I had tried to cure myself and attain to clear thinking by walking in the open air, but I was oppressed with a horrible presentiment of evil—a presentiment which I could not formulate.It was a chill, foggy night;my clothing and hair were damp and I shook with cold.In my dressing-gown and slippers before a blazing grate of coals I was even more uncomfortable.I no longer shivered but shuddered—there is a difference.The dread of some impending calamity was so strong and dispiriting that I tried to drive it away by inviting a real sorrow—tried to dispel the conception of a terrible future by substituting the memory of a painful past.I recalled the death of my parents and endeavoured to fix my mind upon the last sad scenes at their bedsides and their graves.It all seemed vague and unreal, as having occurred ages ago and to another person.Suddenly, striking through my thought and parting it as a tense cord is parted by the stroke of steel—I can think of no other comparison—I heard a sharp cry as of one in mortal agony!
The voice was that of my brother and seemed to come from the street outside my window. I sprang to the window and threw it open.A street lamp directly opposite threw a wan and ghastly light upon the wet pavement and the fronts of the houses.A single policeman, with upturned collar, was leaning against a gatepost, quietly smoking a cigar.No one else was in sight.I closed the window and pulled down the shade, seated myself before the fire and tried to fix my mind upon my surroundings.By way of assisting, by performance of some familiar act, I looked at my watch;it marked half-past eleven.Again I heard that awful cry!It seemed in the room—at my side.I was frightened and for some moments had not the power to move.A few minutes later—I have no recollection of the intermediate time—I found myself hurrying along an unfamiliar street as fast as I could walk.I did not know where I was, nor whither I was going, but presently sprang up the steps of a house before which were two or three carriages and in which were moving lights and a subdued confusion of voices.It was the house of Mr.Margovan.