I have myself many times lain awake wrestling in thought with difficulties which in the hours of darkness seemed insurmountable, but with the dawn resolved themselves into merely trivial inconveniences.

So on this night, as I sat up in bed looking into the dark, with the sound of that melody in my ears, it seemed as if something too terrible for words had happened; as though the evil spirit, which we had hoped was exorcised, had returned with others sevenfold more wicked than himself, and taken up his abode again with my lost brother.

The memory of another night rushed to my mind when Constance had called me from my bed at Royston, and we had stolen together down the moonlit passages with the lilt of that wicked music vibrating on the still summer air.

Poor Constance! She was in her grave now; yet _her_ troubles at least were over, but here, as by some bitter irony, instead of carol or sweet symphony, it was the _Gagliarda_ that woke me from my sleep on Christmas morning.
I flung my dressing-gown about me, and hurried through the corridor and down the stairs which led to the lower storey and my brother's room.
As I opened my bedroom door the violin ceased suddenly in the middle of a bar.

Its last sound was not a musical note, but rather a horrible scream, such as I pray I may never hear again.