Page:Tales of Today.djvu/179

Rh upon the earth; the latter sheds a scanty, expiring light, so dull that it scarcely makes a shadow.

I perceived in the distance the dark mass of my garden, and I know not whence arose the feeling of disquiet that I experienced at the idea of entering it. I proceeded at a slower pace. The night was very balmy. The great group of trees seemed to me like a necropolis in which my house lay buried.

I opened my gate and entered the long alley of sycamores that stretched away toward the building, arching the road like a lofty tunnel; I threaded the dense, opaque masses of shrubbery and skirted the lawn where, in the wan darkness, the flower-beds lay in oval splashes of indistinct color.

As I drew near the house a strange disturbance took possession of my mind. I stopped. There was nothing to be heard. There was not a breath of air to move the leaves. "What ails me?" I thought. For ten years I had been coming home in this way, and never until now had I known the slightest uneasiness. I was not afraid. I have never been afraid at night. The sight of a man, a depredator, a robber, would have excited my wrath, and I should not have hesitated to try conclusions with him. Besides, I was armed. I had my revolver with me. I did not lay hand on it, however, for I wished to resist that influence of dread that was gathering within me.

What was it? A presentiment? The mysterious presentiment that takes possession of the minds of men when they behold the approach of the unfathomable? Perhaps so. Who can tell?

I felt my flesh creep as I went forward, and when at last I stood in front of my big house with its tightly