Read "The Childerbridge Mystery" by Guy Boothby online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
Hastening round the gallery of the hall, Jim endeavoured to discover some traces of the mysterious visitor, spectre or human, whom he had seen. The corridor, however, leading to the oldest and western portion of the house, was quite empty. Like the remainder of the building, it was panelled with dark oak, some portion of it being curiously, though richly carved. He searched it up and down, stopping every now and then to listen, but save for the wind sighing round the house, and an occasional burst of laughter ascending from the servants' hall, he could hear nothing. At the end of the long corridor a flight of stone steps led to the domestic offices below. These he descended, and having reached the servants' hall, called Wilkins, the butler, to him. When the latter emerged, Jim led him a short distance down the passage before he spoke.
"Wilkins," he said, "do you remember the night when you thought you saw the Black Dwarf on the landing?"