Horne Fisher, as if to
deprive himself of any excuse for his refusal of early rising, had
been the first to retire to his room; but, sleepy as he looked, he
could not sleep. He had picked up from a table the book of
antiquarian topography, in which Haddow had found his first hints
about the origin of the local name, and, being a man with a quiet
and quaint capacity for being interested in anything, he began to
read it steadily, making notes now and then of details on which his
previous reading left him with a certain doubt about his present
conclusions. His room was the one nearest to the lake in the center
of the woods, and was therefore the quietest, and none of the last
echoes of the evening's festivity could reach him. He had followed
carefully the argument which established the derivation from Mr.
Prior's farm and the hole in the wall, and disposed of any
fashionable fancy about monks and magic wells, when he began to be
conscious of a noise audible in the frozen silence of the night. It
was not a particularly loud noise, but it seemed to consist of a
series of thuds or heavy blows, such as might be struck on a wooden
door by a man seeking to enter. They were followed by something like
a faint creak or crack, as if the obstacle had either been opened or
had given way.
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