Welcome to sleep stories with Steph Your go-to podcast That offers you a calm and relaxing transition Into a great night's sleep It is time to relax and fully let go There is nothing you need to be doing now and nowhere you need to go Close your eyes And feel yourself sink into the support beneath you And let all the worries of the day Drift away This is your time and your space Take a deep breath in through your nose And let it out with a long sigh There is nothing you need to be doing now and nowhere you need to go Happy listening Chapter 21 continued Catherine looked round the room The window curtains seemed in motion It could be nothing but the violence of the wind penetrating through the divisions of the shutters And she stepped boldly forward Carelessly humming a tune to assure herself of its being so Peeped courageously behind each curtain Saw nothing on either low window seat to scare her And on placing a hand against the shutter felt the strongest conviction of the wind's force A glance at the old chest as she turned away from this examination was not without its use She scorned the coarseless fears of an idle fancy and began with the most happy indifference to prepare herself for bed She should take her time.
She should not hurry herself.
She did not care if she were the last person up in the house But she would not make up her fire That would seem cowardly as if she wished for the protection of light after she were in bed The fire therefore died away and Catherine having spent the best part of an hour in her arrangements Was beginning to think of stepping into bed when on giving a parting glance around the room She was struck by the appearance of a high old-fashioned black cabinet Though in a situation conspicuous enough It had never caught her notice before Henry's words,
His description of the ebony cabinet,
Which was to escape her observation at first Immediately rushed across her And though there could be nothing really in it There was something whimsical It was certainly a very remarkable coincidence She took her candle and looked closely at it It was not absolutely ebony and gold But it was japan black and yellow japan of the handsomest kind And as she held her candle The yellow had very much the effect of gold The key was in the door and she had a strange fancy to look into it Not however with the smallest expectation of finding anything But it was so very odd after what henry had said In short she could not sleep until she had examined it So placing the candle with great caution on a chair She seized the key with a very tremulous hand And tried to turn it But it resisted her utmost strength Alarmed but not discouraged She tried another way A bolt flew and she believed herself successful But how strangely mysterious The door was still immovable She paused a moment in breathless wonder The wind roared down the chimney The rain beating torrents against the windows and everything seemed to speak the awfulness of her situation To retire to bed therefore Unsatisfied on such a point would be vain since sleep must be impossible with a consciousness of a cabinet So mysteriously closed in her immediate vicinity Again therefore she applied herself to the key And after moving it in every possible way for some instance with the determined celerity of hope's last effort The door suddenly yielded Her heart leaped with exultation at such victory And having thrown open each folding door the second being secured only by bolts of less wonderful construction than the lock Though that her eye could not discern anything unusual A double range of small drawers appeared in view with some larger drawers above and below them And in the center a small door Closed also with a lock and key Secured in all probability a cavity of importance Catherine's heart beat quick But her courage did not fail her With a cheek flushed by hope and an eye straining with curiosity Her fingers grasped the handle of a drawer and drew it forth It was entirely empty With less alarm and greater eagerness She seized a second a third and a fourth Nothing was found Well read in the art of concealing a treasure the possibility of false lining to the drawers did not escape her So she felt around each with anxious cuteness in vain The place in the middle alone remained now unexplored And though she had never from the first had the smallest idea of finding anything in that part of the cabinet Was not in the least disappointed in her ill success thus far It would be foolish not to examine it thoroughly while she was about it It was some time however before she could unfasten the door But at length it did open and not vain as hitherto was her search her quick eyes Directly fell on a roll of paper pushed back into the furthest part of the cavity Her heart fluttered her knees trembled and her cheeks grew pale She seized with an unsteady hand the precious manuscript for half a glance suffice to ascertain written characters And while she acknowledged with awful sensations this striking exemplification of what henry had foretold Resolved instantly to peruse every line before she attempted to rest The dimness of the light her candle emitted made her turn to it with alarm But there was no danger of its sudden extinction It had yet some hours to burn And that she might not have any greater difficulty in distinguishing the writing And what its ancient date might occasion she hastily snuffed it Alas,
It was snuffed and extinguished in one a lamp could not have expired with more awful effect Catherine for a few moments was motionless with horror It was done completely not a remnant of light in the wick could give hope to the rekindling breath Darkness impenetrable and immovable filled the room A violent gust of wind rising with sudden fury added fresh horror Catherine trembled from head to foot In the pause which succeeded A sound like receding footsteps and the closing of a distant door struck on her affrighted ear Human nature could support no more A cold sweat stood on her forehead the manuscript fell from her hand and groping her way back to the bed She jumped hastily in And sought some suspension of agony by creeping far underneath the clothes To close her eyes in sleep that night.
She felt must be entirely out of the question With a curiosity so justly awakened and feelings in every way so agitated The pose must be absolutely impossible The storm sound is so dreadful She had not been used to feel alarm from wind,
But now every blast seemed fraught with awful intelligence The manuscript so wonderfully found so wonderfully accomplishing the morning's prediction How was it to be accounted for?
What could it contain?
To whom could it relate?
By what means could it have been so long concealed and how singularly strange that it should fall to her not to discover it Till she had made herself mistress of its contents,
However She could have neither repose nor comfort And with the sun's first rays,
She was determined to peruse it But many were the tedious hours which must yet intervene She shuddered tossed about in her bed and envied every quiet sleeper The storm still raged and various were the noises,
More terrific even than the wind,
Which struck at intervals on her startled ear The very curtain of her bed seemed at one movement in motion And at another the lock of her door was agitated as if by the attempt of someone to enter Hollow murmurs seemed to creep along the gallery And more than once her blood was chilled by the sound of distant moans Hour after hour passed away And the wearied Catherine had heard three reclaimed by all the clocks in the house Before the tempest subsided Or she unknowingly Fell fast asleep
