The Return by Walter de la Mare — Read

"What's in a name? " laughed Herbert. "But it really is a queer show-up of human oddity. A fellow comes in here, searching; that's all. " His back was turned, as he stood staring absently out, sipping his tea between his sentences. "He comes in -- oh, it's a positive fact, for I've seen him myself, just sitting back in my chair here, you know, watching him as one would a tramp in one's orchard. " He cast a candid glance over his shoulder. "First he looks round, like a prying servant. Then he comes cautiously on -- a kind of grizzled, fawn-coloured face, middle-size, with big hands; and then just like some quiet, groping, nocturnal creature, he begins his precious search -- shelves, drawers that are not here, cupboards gone years ago, questing and nosing no end, and quite methodically too, until he reaches the window. Then he stops, looks back, narrows his foxy lids, listens -- quite perceptibly, you know, a kind of gingerish blur; then he seems to open this corner bookcase here, as if it were a door and goes out along what I suppose might at some time have been an outside gallery or balcony, unless, as I rather fancy, the house extended once beyond these windows. Anyhow, out he goes quite deliberately, treading the air as lightly as Botticelli's angels, until, however far you lean out of the window, you can't follow him any further. And then -- and this is the bit that takes one's fancy -- when you have contentedly noddled down again to whatever you may have been doing when the wretch appeared, or are sitting in a cold sweat, with bolting eyes awaiting developments, just according to your school of thought, or of nerves, the creature comes back -- comes back; and with what looks uncommonly like a lighted candle in his hand. That really is a thrill, I assure you."

"But you've seen this -- you've really seen this yourself?"