desire to have you explain to us, at your earliest convenience," the letter went on to say, "why you have so extravagantly raised the salary of every man, woman and child in our employ, utterly regardless of merit, and without consultation with those with whom you have been associated, to such a figure that the firm has been compelled to reduce its autumn dividend to meet the requirements of the pay roll. Your probable answer will be, I presume, – knowing your extraordinary resources in the matter of explanations – that you cannot consent to be a mere figure-head, and that you considered it your duty to impress upon our clerks the fact that you are not what they might suspect under the circumstances, but a vital, moving force in the concern; but you may as well spare yourself the trouble of making any such explanation, since it will not be satisfactory either to myself or to the other members of the firm, with the possible exception of our friend Mawson, who, with his customary about-town manners, is disposed to make light of the matter. We desire to have you distinctly understand that your duties are to be confined entirely to the London office, and to add that were it not for your esteemed father's sake we should at once cancel our agreement with you. The name you bear, honoured as it is in our profession, is of great value to us: but it is, after all, a luxury rather than a necessity, and in these hard times we are strongly inclined to dispense with luxuries whenever we find them too expensive for our pockets."
Hopkins paused in his reading and pursed his lips to give a long, low whistle, a sound which was frozen in transitu, for the lips were no sooner pursed than there came from a far corner the very sound that he had intended to utter.
For the first time in his life Toppleton knew what fear was; for the first time since he was a boy, when he wore it that way, did he become conscious that his hair stood upon end. His blood seemed to congeal in his veins, and his heart for a moment ceased to beat, and then, as if desirous of making up for lost time, began to thump against his ribs at lightning pace and with such force that Hopkins feared it might break the crystal of the watch which he carried in the upper left-hand pocket of his vest.
Mr. Morley's letter fluttered from his nerveless hand to the floor, and, despite its severity, was forgotten before it touched the handsome rug beneath Hopkins' table. The new sensation – the sensation of fear – had taken possession of his whole being, and, for an instant, he was as one paralyzed. Then, recovering his powers of motion, he whirled about in his revolving chair and started to his feet as if he had been shot.
"This is unbearable!" he cried, glancing nervously about the room. "It's bad enough to have an office-boy who whistles, but when you get the whistle in the abstract without the advantage of the office-boy, it is too much."
Then Hopkins rang the bell and summoned the janitor.
"Tell the agent I want to see him," he said when that worthy appeared, and then, returning to his desk, he sat down and mechanically opened a copy of the Daily Register and tried to read it.
"It's no use," he cried in a moment, crumpling the paper into a ball and throwing it across the room. "That vile whistle has regularly knocked me out."
The paper ball reached the door just as the agent entered, and struck him athwart the watch chain.
"Beg pardon," said Hopkins, "I didn't mean that for you. Everything here seems to be bewitched this morning, that dull compilation of legal woe included."
"It's of no consequence, sir, I assure you," returned the agent uneasily.
"No, I don't think it amounts to a row of beans to a man who hates trouble," said Hopkins, referring more to the journal than to the untoward act of the paper ball. "But I say, Mr. Stubbs, I've been having a devil of a time in this room this morning, and when I say devil I mean devil."
Stubbs paled visibly. The moment he had feared had come.
"Wh – wh – what sus – seems to b – be the m – mum – matter, sir?" he stammered.
"Nothing seems, something is the matter," returned Hopkins. "I don't wonder you stammer. You'd stammer worse if you had been here with me three minutes ago. Stubbs, I believe this room is haunted!"
Mr. Stubbs's efforts at surprise at this point were painful to witness.
"Haunted, sir?" he said.
"Yes, haunted!" retorted Hopkins; "and by a confoundedly impertinent something or other that not only sighs and knocks on the door but whistles, Stubbs – actually whistles. Has this room a history?"
"Well, a sort of a one," returned Stubbs; "but I never heard any one complain about it on the score of whistling, sir."
"Stubbs, I believe you are lying. Hasn't somebody killed an office-boy in this apartment, for whistling?" queried Hopkins, gazing sternly at the shuffling agent.
"I'll take an affidavit that nothing of the kind ever happened," returned the agent, gaining confidence.
"That won't be necessary," said Toppleton. "I am satisfied with your assurance. But, Stubbs, to what do you attribute these beastly disturbances? Ghosts?"
"Of course not, Mr. Toppleton," replied Mr. Stubbs. "I fancy you must have heard some boy whistling in the hall."
"How about the knock and the sigh?" demanded the American.
"The knock is easily accounted for," returned the agent. "Somebody in the room above you must have dropped something on the floor, while the sigh was probably the wind blowing through the key-hole."
"Or a bit of fog coming down the chimney, eh, Stubbs?" put in Hopkins, satirically.
"No, sir," replied poor Stubbs, growing red where he had been white; "there is no fog to-day, sir."
"True, Stubbs; and you will likewise observe there is no wind to sough through key-holes," retorted Hopkins, severely, rising and walking to the window.
Stubbs stood motionless, without an answer. Toppleton had cornered him in a flimsy pretext, and then came the climax to his horrible experience.
From behind him in the corner whence had come the sigh and the whistle, there now proceeded a smothered laugh – a sound which curdled his blood and left him so limp that he staggered to the mantel and grasped it to keep himself from falling to the floor.
Hopkins turned upon him, his face livid with anger, and the two men gazed at each other in silence for a moment, the one endeavouring to master his fear, the other to smother his wrath.
"Do you mean to insult me, Mr. Stubbs, by laughing in my face when I send for you to request explanations as to the conduct – as to the – er – the conduct of your room? It sounds ridiculous to say that, but there is no other way to put it, for it is the conduct of the room of which I complain. What do you mean by your ill-timed levity?"
"I pass you my word, Mr. Toppleton, I will swear to you, sir, that nothing was further from my thoughts than mirth. I agree with you that it is no laughing matter for – "
"But I heard you laugh," said Toppleton, eyeing the agent, his anger now not unmixed with awe. "You laughed as plainly as it is possible for any one to laugh, except that you endeavoured to smother the sound."
"I did nothing of the sort, Mr. Toppleton," pleaded Stubbs, his hand shaking and his eyes wandering fearsomely over toward the mysterious corner where all was still and innocent-looking. "That laugh came from other lips than mine – if, indeed, it came from lips at all, which I doubt."
"You mean," cried Toppleton, grasping Stubbs by the arm with a grip that made the agent wince, "you mean that this room is –
