Pickwick Abroad: A Companion to the Pickwick Papers — page 203: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“a * ‘ from the tower two nights previously—the mysterious conduct of ingular inmate— the discg¥ery of the ear-ring—and the pre- sent strange obj ct which my hand had en- PICKWICK ABROAD. “a i 2" Byte gone? When once he had ascended to the ‘summit of the building, he must either have leaped to the ground, or evaporated into the ve 187 Yet whither was the mysterious str nger countered, I yielded to the first impulse of | air; the first was improbable, and I need not © my alarm and hastened down stairs. The noise which my retreating footsteps made upon the stone steps reverberated through the old building; and something more than a re: echo succeeded them; for when, ashamed of my childish fears, I stood still and listened, other footsteps distinctly fell upon my ears. I hited no longer, but re- traced my way up stairs; and rushing past the place where I had felt the cold face, ithout extending my arm again, hastened into the large apartment on the second floor, just as the clock of the adjacent Hotel de Ville struck the hour of five. It was now broad day-light ; and there—in the middle | Th ee of the apartment—up | his ol ihe yy sound asleep, to all appear- ance, lay the chiffonnier. Iwas about to arouse him, when suddenly the creaking of a door, at the further end of the apartment, startled me. That door open- ed upon the flight of stairs which led to the top rooms and the roof of the building. | I glanced in that direction, and the shadow of a tall nan, Wen tampa tly in Rd gloom, “« my,eyes. The pers t me immediately ; for he instantly retreated ; and at the same time _the chiffonnier sud- nly roused himself, started wp, and looked anxiously around him. Without a moment’s hesitation, 1 rushed towards the door behind which I had/seen the figure, darted up the stair-case, and heard footsteps hastily ascend- ing the steps above me. “This time,” thought I, “the mystery shall be unravelled ;” and [ ran with the speed of lichtning after the fugitive. But I suddenly merged upon the roof of the tower—and no one was to be seen! Luttered a desperate imprecation against this unaccountable dis- appearance; and methought that a loud lauch, issuing from the room beneath, rang through the old tower. ue What could I do? I been deceived by my own imagination? No—that was im- possible; for I recollected the appearance, and saw the principal characteristics in the dress of the man whom I had only seen for a moment behind the door. He was tall, handsome, with dark hair ana mustachios, ‘ and piercing black eyes; and he was clad in a long frock coat and dark grey trousers. It could therefore be no illusion of the brain? on. his straw—clad im | evidently saw. say, the latter was still more so. Yet the staircase Was a spiral one, formed in the cir cular hollow of one of the angles of the tow- er, and leading to no apartment or passage — save those which I had looked into as I pass- ed them! Besides—the sound of the foot- steps, which [ had followed, ceased only at the actual extremity of the stair-case, at the little door opening upon the leads of the roof rom the raised structure at one comer of the building, Astonished as I was, I could not help cast- Ing a glance over the parapet at the mighty ‘spread for miles around the yer. The gilded spires on the 1es glittered in the morning- sun; the tri-colored banners waved from many a staff to. greet the refreshing breeze ; and the hum of the great city, awaking from its rest, reached me even where I[ stood! At ‘a short distance were the two towers of No- tre Dame; and it struck me that I would have given many years of my life to be able to imitate the bird which at that moment start- led by my steps, winged its lofty flight from the eminence where I stood to one of those I ‘was surveying! And then, through a thou- sand high-piled masses of buildings, palaces, temples, churches, museums, and princely abodes—beneath the mighty arms which the ingenuity of man had stretched across it— glided the silent and placid Seine, as if its treacherous waters could be reproached with no midnight murder and no long-concealed suicide | _ | eo allowed myself one moment to contemplate all that it takes me minutes here to describe. Irecollected that the chif- fonnier was below; and now, being deter- mined to question him more closely than ever, I hastened down the stairs to the room on the second floor. He was still lymg upon his straw ; but this time his eyes were not closed. | I interrogated him in every manner which the singularity of all I had seen could sug- gest; but he denied having been to the gam- bling-house as strenuously as he persisted in his ignorance of there being any other inmate of the tower. Undecided how to act, I with- drew slowly from the room; andas I passed the little loop-hole perforated in the well, I looked anxiously to ascertain if there were » ¥ connicloooks (CO)