ght to be able to see something waving which I
knew was an insect's leg, by the shape of it: but, Lord, what a size!
Why the beast must have been as tall as I am. And now you tell me
sawflies are an inch long or less. What do you make of it, Spearman?'

"'For goodness sake finish your story first,' I said. 'I never heard
anything like it.' 'Oh,' said he, 'there's no more to tell. Mary ran
in with a light, and there was nothing there. I didn't tell her what
was the matter. I changed my room for last night, and I expect for
good.' 'Have you searched this odd room of yours?' I said. 'What do
you keep in it?' 'We don't use it,' he answered. 'There's an old press
there, and some little other furniture.' 'And in the press?' said I.
'I don't know; I never saw it opened, but I do know that it's locked.'
'Well, I should have it looked into, and, if you had time, I own to
having some curiosity to see the place myself.' 'I didn't exactly like
to ask you, but that's rather what I hoped you'd say. Name your time
and I'll take you there.' 'No time like the present,' I said at once,
for I saw he would never settle down to anything while this affair was
in suspense. He got up with great alacrity, and looked at me, I am
tempted to think, with marked approval. 'Come along,' was all he said,
however; and was pretty silent all the way to his house. My Mary (as
he calls her in public, and I in private) was summoned, and we
proceeded to the room. The Doctor had gone so far as to tell her that
he had had something of a fright there last night, of what nature he
had not yet divulged; but now he pointed out and described, very
briefly, the incidents of his progress. When we were near the
important spot, he pulled up, and allowed me to pass on. 'There's the
room,' he said. 'Go in, Spearman, and tell us what you find.' Whatever
I might have felt at midnight, noonday I was sure would keep back
anything sinister, and I flung the door open with an air and stepped
in. It was a well-lighted room, with its large window on the right,
though not, I thought, a very airy one. The principal piece of
furniture was the gaunt old press of dark wood. There was, too, a
four-post bedstead, a mere skeleton which could hide nothing, and
there was a chest of drawers. On the window-sill and the floor near it
were the dead bodies of many hundred sawflies, and one torpid one
which I had some satisfaction in killing. I tried the door of the
press, but could not open it: