Jelly lived, so to say, on a volcano. She felt that, figuratively speaking, there was not an hour of the day or night but she might be blown into fragments. The rumours as to the death of Mrs. Rane were becoming more terrible. They stole up and down Dallory like a scorching tongue of fire, and Jelly had the satisfaction of knowing that it was she who had first set light to the flame. It was all very well to say that she had made herself safe by securing the evidence of Thomas Hepburn: in her secret conscience she knew that she was not safe; and that, even in spite of that evidence, Dr. Rane might chance to be innocent. If so, why, a pretty dilemma she would find herself in. There was no help for it; she could do nothing. The creeping, scorching tongue went twisting itself in and out, and she could not quench it.

One night Jelly was lying awake, according to custom now, buried deep in some horrible visions that had lately begun to haunt her: now of working in chains; now of stepping incessantly up a treadmill; now of picking oakum and living upon gruel. Turning in the bed, to escape, if possible, these imaginary pictures, she suddenly heard a knock at her door. A loud hasty knock; and now a louder. Jelly turned hot then cold as ice. Had the officers of the law come to arrest her?

"Who\'s there?--what is it?" she asked faintly, not daring to sit up in bed.

"Art thee awake, Jelly?" came the gentle response, as her door was opened a few inches. "I am very sorry to have to ask thee to get up, but my mother is worse. Make haste, please."

Had Miss Beverage\'s voice been that of an angel, it could not have sounded sweeter to Jelly just then. The relief was great.

"I\'ll get up instantly, ma\'am," was the ready answer--and Miss Beverage wondered it should have in it a tone as of gratitude. "I\'ll be with you at once."

Mrs. Beverage was subject to violent but rare attacks of spasms. She had felt ill before going to bed, but hoped it would pass off. Jelly and her own two servants were soon at her bedside. She was very ill indeed. Some of them ran to get hot water ready; Jelly thought it would be well to call in Dr. Rane.

"I should like the doctor to see her; at the same time, I grieve to arouse him from sleep," said Miss Beverage.

"Law, ma\'am, that\'s nothing to doctors; they are used to it," cried Jelly.

"Mother, would thee like Oliver Rane sent for?" asked Miss Beverage, bending over the suffering lady. "Yes--yes," was the feeble answer. "I am very ill, Sarah."

"Thee go, then, Jelly."

Away went Jelly. Unbarring their own front-door, she passed out of it, and approached Dr. Rane\'s. The doctor\'s professional lamp burnt clearly, and, to her great surprise, Jelly saw that the door was not closed.

"He cannot have gone to bed to-night," she thought, as she walked in without ringing. It was past three o\'clock.

But the house seemed to be still and dark. Jelly left the front-door open, and the light shone a little way into the passage. She tried the surgery-door; it was locked; she tried the dining-room; the key of that was also turned; the kitchen-door stood open, but it was all in darkness.

"He has gone to bed and forgotten to shut up," was the conclusion Jelly now arrived at. "I\'ll go up and call him."

Groping her way upstairs, she had almost reached the top, when a pale white light suddenly illumined the landing--just the same faint sort of light that Jelly had seen once before, and remembered all too well. Raising her head hastily, there stood--what?

Not quite at the moment did Jelly know what. Not in the first access of terror did she clearly recognize the features of Bessy Rane. It was she, all too surely; that is, the image of what she had been. She seemed to stand almost face to face with Jelly: Jelly nearly at the top of the staircase, she facing it before her. The light was even more faint before the figure than behind: but there was no mistaking it. What it was dressed in or whence it came, Jelly never knew: there it was--the form and face of Bessy Rane. With a cry of agony, that echoed to the ends of the empty house in the night\'s silence, Jelly turned and flew down again.

She never looked behind. Out at the front-door went she, slamming it, in her terror, to keep in what might be following her; and she almost gave forth another scream when she found herself touched by some one coming in at the gate, and saw that it was Dr. Rane.

"I am called out to a country patient," he quietly said. "Whilst I was putting the horse to the gig, an impression came over me that I had left my house-door open, so I thought I had better come back and see. What are you doing here at this hour, Jelly? Any one ill?"

Jelly was in terrible distress and confusion of mind. Clutching his arm as if for protection, she sobbed for an instant or two hysterically. Dr. Rane stared at her, not knowing what to make of it. He began to think she must require his services herself.

"Sir--do you know--do you know who is in the house?"

"Nobody\'s there: unless they\'ve come in these last few minutes--for I suppose I did leave the door open," was Dr. Rane\'s rejoinder, and his composure contrasted strongly with Jelly\'s emotion. "When I leave my house at night, I carry my household with me, Jelly."

"Your wife\'s there," she whispered, with a burst of agony. "Sir, it\'s as true as that I am living to tell it."

"What do you say?"

Jelly\'s answer was to relate what she had seen. When Dr. Rane had gathered in her full meaning, he grew very angry.

"Why, you must be mad, woman," he cried in a low concentrated voice. "This is the second time. How dare you invent such folly?"

"I swear that her ghost walks, and that it is in there now," exclaimed Jelly, almost beside herself. "It is on the landing, exactly where I saw it before. Why should she come again?--why should she haunt that one particular spot? Sir, don\'t look at me like that. You know I would not invent such a thing."

"Your fancy invents it, and then you speak of it as if were fact. How dare you do so?"

"But he could not appease Jelly: he could not persuade her out of her belief. And the doctor saw that it was useless to attempt it.

"Why, why should her poor ghost walk?" wailed Jelly, wringing her hands in distress.

"I\'m sure I don\'t know why it should walk," returned the doctor, as if he would humour Jelly and at the same time ridicule her words. "It never walks when I am in the house." But the ridicule was lost on Jelly.

"She can\'t lie quiet in her grave. What reason is there for it?--oh, what dreadful mystery is in it?"

Dr. Rane looked as though he would have liked to annihilate Jelly. "I begin to think that you are either a fool or a knave," he cried. "What brought you in my house at three o\'clock in the morning?"

The question, together with his unconcealed anger, recalled Jelly\'s scattered senses. She told him about the illness of Mrs. Beverage, and asked if he would come in.

"No, I cannot come," said Dr. Rane quite savagely, for it seemed that he could not get the better of his anger. "I am called out to a case of emergency, and have no time to waste over Mrs. Beverage. If she wants a doctor, send for Seeley."

He opened his door with his latch-key, and shut it loudly after him. However, it seemed that he reconsidered the matter, for when Jelly was slowly walking across the road towards Mr. Seeley\'s, Dr. Rane came out again, called her back, and said he would spare a minute or two.

With a stern caution to Jelly not to make the same foolish exhibition of herself to others that she had to him, he went up to Mrs. Beverage--who was then easier, and had dozed off to sleep. Giving a few general directions in case the paroxysm should return, Dr. Rane departed. About ten minutes afterwards, Jelly was in her room, which looked towards the lane, when she heard his gig come driving down and stop at his garden-door. After waiting there a short time--he had probably come in for some case of instruments--it went away quickly across country.

The horse and gig used by the doctor belonged to the neighbouring public-house. Dr. Rane had a key to the stables, so that if he wanted to go out during the night, he could harness the horse to the gig without disturbing any one.

"If he had not said beforehand that he was putting the horse to, I should have thought he\'d gone out because he daredn\'t stay in the house," muttered Jelly, as she glued her face to the window pane, to look after the doctor and the gig. She could see neither; the night was very dark.

Jelly\'s mind was in a chaos. What she had witnessed caused her still to shiver and tremble as though she had an ague; and she fully believed that she was really in danger of becoming what the doctor had told her she was already--mad.

Suddenly, a cry arose in the house. Mrs. Beverage was worse again. The paroxysm had returned so violently that it seemed to the frightened beholders as though she would die. Dr. Rane was not attainable, and Miss Beverage sent one of the under-servants for Mr. Seeley. He came promptly.

In about an hour the danger had passed; the house was quiet again, and Mr. S............