I have asked everybody.

We should have a full dinner-table." "Good," said his friend; and then whispering, as they followed Miss Drake to the living-room, "I say, don't act as though you expected the ghost of Banquo." In the bare, white loft, by candle-light, Sturgeon sat midway in some long and wheezy tale, to which the padre and his wife listened with true forbearance.

Greetings over, the stodgy annalist continued.

The story was forgotten as soon as ended; talk languished; and even by the quaking light of the candles, it was plain that the silence was no mere waiting solemnity before meat, but a period of tension.
The relief came oddly.

Up from the road sounded a hubbub of voices, the tramp of feet, and loud halloos.
"By Jove!" cried Sturgeon, like a man who fears the worst; and for all his bulk, he was first at the window.
A straggling file of lanterns, borne by some small army, came jogging and crowding to a halt under the walls.