It was the fifth of November when I first breakfasted in my new rooms.The Guys were going about in the brown fog,like magnified monsters of insects in table-beer,and there was a Guy resting on the door-steps of the House to Let.I put on my glasses,partly to see how the boys were pleased with what I sent them out by Peggy,and partly to make sure that she didn't approach too near the ridiculous object,which of course was full of sky-rockets,and might go off into bangs at any moment.In this way it happened that the first time I ever looked at the House to Let,after I became its opposite neighbour,I had my glasses on.And this might not have happened once in fifty times,for my sight is uncommonly good for my time of life;and I wear glasses as little as I can,for fear of spoiling it.
I knew already that it was a ten-roomed house,very dirty,and much dilapidated;that the area-rails were rusty and peeling away,and that two or three of them were wanting,or half-wanting;that there were broken panes of glass in the windows,and blotches of mud on other panes,which the boys had thrown at them;that there was quite a collection of stones in the area,also proceeding from those Young Mischiefs;that there were games chalked on the pavement before the house,and likenesses of ghosts chalked on the street-door;that the windows were all darkened by rotting old blinds,or shutters,or both;that the bills "To Let,"had curled up,as if the damp air of the place had given them cramps;or had dropped down into corners,as if they were no more.I had seen all this on my first visit,and I had remarked to Trottle,that the lower part of the black board about terms was split away;that the rest had become illegible,and that the very stone of the door-steps was broken across.
Notwithstanding,I sat at my breakfast table on that Please to Remember the fifth of November morning,staring at the House through my glasses,as if I had never looked at it before.
All at once--in the first-floor window on my right--down in a low corner,at a hole in a blind or a shutter--I found that I was looking at a secret Eye.The reflection of my fire may have touched it and made it shine;but,I saw it shine and vanish.
The eye might have seen me,or it might not have seen me,sitting there in the glow of my fire--you can take which probability you prefer,without offence--but something struck through my frame,as if the sparkle of this eye had been electric,and had flashed straight at me.It had such an effect upon me,that I could not remain by myself,and I rang for Flobbins,and invented some little jobs for her,to keep her in the room.After my breakfast was cleared away,I sat in the same place with my glasses on,moving my head,now so,and now so,trying whether,with the shining of my fire and the flaws in the window-glass,I could reproduce any sparkle seeming to be up there,that was like the sparkle of an eye.
But no;I could make nothing like it.I could make ripples and crooked lines in the front of the House to Let,and I could even twist one window up and loop it into another;but,I could make no eye,nor anything like an eye.So I convinced myself that I really had seen an eve.
Well,to be sure I could not get rid of the impression of this eye,and it troubled me and troubled me,until it was almost a torment.
I don't think I was previously inclined to concern my head much about the opposite House;but,after this eye,my head was full of the house;and I thought of little else than the house,and Iwatched the house,and I talked about the house,and I dreamed of the house.In all this,I fully believe now,there was a good Providence.But,you will judge for yourself about that,bye-and-bye.
My landlord was a butler,who had married a cook,and set up housekeeping.They had not kept house longer than a couple of years,and they knew no more about the House to Let than I did.
Neither could I find out anything concerning it among the trades-people or otherwise;further than what Trottle had told me at first.
It had been empty,some said six years,some said eight,some said ten.It never did let,they all agreed,and it never would let.
I soon felt convinced that I should work myself into one of my states about the House;and I soon did.I lived for a whole month in a flurry,that was always getting worse.Towers's preions,which I had brought to London with me,were of no more use than nothing.In the cold winter sunlight,in the thick winter fog,in the black winter rain,in the white winter snow,the House was equally on my mind.I have heard,as everybody else has,of a spirit's haunting a house;but I have had my own personal experience of a house's haunting a spirit;for that House haunted mine.
In all that month's time,I never saw anyone go into the House nor come out of the House.I supposed that such a thing must take place sometimes,in the dead of the night,or the glimmer of the morning;but,I never saw it done.I got no relief from having my curtains drawn when it came on dark,and shutting out the House.The Eye then began to shine in my fire.
I am a single old woman.I should say at once,without being at all afraid of the name,I am an old maid;only that I am older than the phrase would express.The time was when I had my love-trouble,but,it is long and long ago.He was killed at sea (Dear Heaven rest his blessed head!)when I was twenty-five.I have all my life,since ever I can remember,been deeply fond of children.I have always felt such a love for them,that I have had my sorrowful and sinful times when I have fancied something must have gone wrong in my life--something must have been turned aside from its original intention Imean--or I should have been the proud and happy mother of many children,and a fond old grandmother this day.I have soon known better in the cheerfulness and contentment that God has blessed me with and given me abundant reason for;and yet I have had to dry my eyes even then,when I have thought of my dear,brave,hopeful,handsome,bright-eyed Charley,and the trust meant to cheer me with.
