So far committed, Geordie's courage came with a drawing up of his
muscles; and muttering between his teeth, which risped like files, "I
will face any one except the devil," he lifted the candle, the glimmer
of which paled in the thick air of the opening. He waved it up and down
before he entered; but it seemed as if the weak rays could not find
their way in the dense atmosphere--enough, notwithstanding, to show him
dimly a long lobby. He snorted as the accumulated must stimulated his
nostrils; but there was more than must--the smell was that of an opened
grave which had been covered with moil for a century. Yet his step was
instinctively forward,--the small light flitting here and there like the
fitful gleam of a magic lantern. Half groping with the left hand, as he
held the candle with his right, he soon began to discover particulars.
There were three doors, opening no doubt to rooms, on his left; and as
the light--becoming accustomed, like men's eyes, to the dark--shone
forwards towards the end, he saw another door, which was open. Desperate
men--and Geordie was now wound up--aim at the farthest extremities. He
made his way forward, laying down each stocking-clad foot as if in fear
of being heard by the family below, whose hysterics at a tread above
them at midnight, and in that house, would lead to inquiry and
detection.