The Skeleton Key by Bernard Capes

(_From the Bickerdike MS._)

I was still in this resolved mood, when something happened one night which confirmed my worst suspicions, showing me how faithfully I had weighed and measured the character of the man posing as a benevolent guest in the house, the hospitality of which he was designing all the time, in some mysteriously villainous way, to abuse. On that night I had gone to bed rather late, outstaying, in fact, the entire family and household, whose early country ways my degenerate London habits found sometimes rather irksome. It was past midnight when I turned out the lights in the billiard room, and, taking a candle, made my way upstairs. There was a double flight rising from a pretty spacious hall, and both the Baron's room and my own gave upon the corridor which opened west from the first-floor landing. As I passed his door I noticed that a thread of light showed under it, proving him to be either still awake, or fallen asleep with his candle unextinguished. Which? For some unaccountable reason a thrill of excitement overtook me. No sound came from behind the door; the whole house was dead quiet. I stooped to peer through the keyhole -- a naked light burning beside one's bed is a dangerous thing -- but the key being in the lock prevented my seeing anything. Soft-footed I went on -- but not to sleep. I determined to sit up and listen in my own room for any possible developments. I don't know why it was, but my heart misgave me that there was some rascality afoot, and that I had only to wait patiently, and go warily, to unmask it. And I was not mistaken.