For, indeed, it was still early. The village cocks had only just crowed
for the first time. It could not be much beyond eleven.
After the lamps had been extinguished, the castle stood there in the
semi-obscurity of night like a black, old-world ruin. It stood right in
front of the moon which was now climbing up behind its bastions and
where its light fell upon two opposite windows which met together in a
corner room it shone through them both and lighted up the whole
apartment. This room was the baroness's dormitory.
While Mr. Gerzson was luxuriating in the contemplation of the moonlight,
he suddenly observed that the moonlight falling upon the windows was
obscured for an instant, as if somebody were passing up and down the
room. In a few moments this obscuration was repeated, and the same thing
happened a third time, and a fourth, and many times more, just as if
some one were passing up and down in that particular room in the middle
of the night restlessly, incessantly.
Mr. Gerzson counted on his pulses the seconds which elapsed between each
obscuration--sixteen seconds, consequently the room in which this person
was to-and-froing it so late at night like a spectre, must be sixteen
paces from one end to the other. So long as the other windows had been
lit up, this person had not begun to walk but as soon as the whole
castle was slumbering its restless course began.
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