in the shape of
a pair of discolored and tattered curtains tied with ribbons that must
once have been brilliant and cheery of color.

Nor was this the only sign in the room of a bygone presence that had
possessed a taste for something beyond the mere necessities of life.
On the grim coarsely papered wall hung more than one picture; cut from
pictorial newspapers to be sure, but each and every one, if I may be
called a judge of such matters, possessing some quality of expression to
commend it to a certain order of taste. They were all strong pictures.
Vivid faces of men and women in daring positions; a hunter holding back
a jaguar from his throat; a soldier protecting his comrade from the
stroke; and most striking of all, a woman lissome as she was powerful,
starting aghast and horror stricken from--what? I could not tell; a
rough hand had stripped the remainder of the picture from the wall.

A bit of candle and a half sheet of a newspaper lay on the floor. I
picked up the paper. It was a Rutland Herald and bore the date of two
days before. As I read I realized what I had done. If these daring
robbers were not at this very moment in the house, they had been there,
and that within two or three days. The broken panes of glass in the
garret above were now explained. I was not the first one who had climbed
that creaking pine tree this fall.

Something like a sensible dread of a very possible danger now seized
hold of me. If I had stumbled upon these strangely subtile, yet
devilishly bold creatures in their secret lair, the pistol I carried was
not going to save me. Shut in like a fox in a hole, I had little to hope
for, if they once made their appearance at the stairhead or came upon me
from any of the dim halls of the crazy old dwelling, which I now began
to find altogether too large for my comfort. Stealing cautiously forth
from the room in which I had found so much to disconcert me, I crept
towards the front staircase and listened. All was deathly quiet. The
old pine tree moaned and twisted without, and from time to time the wind
came sweeping down the chimney with an unearthly shrieking sound that
was weirdly in keeping with the place. But within and below all was
still as the tomb, and though in no ways reassured, I determined to
descend and have the suspense over at once. I did so, pistol in hand
and ears stretched to their utmost to catch the slightest rustle, but no
sound came to disturb me, nor did I meet on this