very earnestly and mysteriously beckoned to me.
That man was the man who had gone second of
the two along Piccadilly, and whose face was of
the colour of impure wax.

The figure, having beckoned, drew back and
closed the door. With no longer pause than
was made by my crossing the bedroom, I opened
the dressing-room door, and looked in. I had a
lighted candle already in my hand. I felt no
inward expectation of seeing the figure in the
dressing-room, and I did not see it there.

Conscious that my servant stood amazed, I
turned round to him, and said: "Derrick, could
you believe that in my cool senses I fancied I
saw a——" As I there laid my hand upon his
breast, with a sudden start he trembled violently,
and said, "O Lord yes, sir! A dead man
beckoning!"

Now, I do not believe that this John Derrick,
my trusty and attached servant for more than
twenty years, had any impression whatever of
having seen any such figure, until I touched
him. The change in him was so startling when
I touched him, that I fully believe he derived
his impression in some occult manner from me
at that instant.

I bade John Derrick bring some brandy, and
I gave him a dram, and was glad to take one
myself. Of what had preceded that night's
phenomenon, I told him not a single word.
Reflecting on it, I was absolutely certain that I
had never seen that face before, except on the
one occasion in Piccadilly. Comparing its
expression when beckoning at the door, with its
expression when it had stared up at me as I
stood at my window, I came to the conclusion
that on the first occasion it had sought to fasten
itself upon my memory, and that on the second
occasion it had made sure of being immediately
remembered.

I was not very comfortable that night, though
I felt a certainty, difficult to explain, that the
figure would not return. At daylight, I fell into
a heavy sleep, from which I was awakened by
John Derrick's coming to my bedside with a
paper in his hand.

This paper, it appeared, had been the subject
of an altercation at the door between its bearer
and my servant. It was a summons to me to
serve upon a Jury at the forthcoming Sessions
of the Central Criminal Court at the Old Bailey.
I had never before been summoned on such a
Jury, as John Derrick well knew. He believed
—I am not certain at this hour whether with
reason or otherwise—that that class of Jurors
were customarily chosen on a lower qualification
than mine, and he had at first refused to
accept the summons. The man who served it
had taken the matter very coolly. He had said
that my attendance or non-attendance was
nothing to him; there the summons was; and I
should deal with it at my own peril, and not at
his.

For a day or two I was undecided whether to
respond to this call, or take no notice of it. I
was not conscious of the slightest mysterious bias,
influence, or attraction, one way or other. Of that
I am as strictly sure as of every other statement
that I make here. Ultimately I decided, as a
break in the monotony of my life, that I would
go.

The appointed morning was a raw morning in
the month of November. There was a dense
brown fog in Piccadilly, and it became positively
black and in the last degree oppressive East of
Temple Bar. I found the passages and staircases
of the Court House flaringly lighted with gas,
and the Court itself similarly illuminated. I
think that until I was conducted by officers into
the Old Court and saw its crowded state, I did
not know that the Murderer was to be tried that
day. I think that until I was so helped into the
Old Court with considerable difficulty, I did not
know into which of the two Courts sitting, my
summons would take me. But this must not be
received as a positive assertion, for I am not
completely satisfied in my mind on either point.

I took my seat in the place appropriated to
Jurors in waiting, and I looked about the Court
as well as I could through the cloud of fog and
breath that was heavy in it. I noticed the black
vapour hanging like a murky curtain outside the
great windows, and I noticed the stifled sound
of wheels on the straw or tan that was littered
in the street; also, the hum of the people
gathered there, which a shrill whistle, or a louder
song or hail than the rest, occasionally pierced.
Soon afterwards the Judges, two in number,
entered and took their seats. The buzz in the
Court was awfully hushed. The direction was
given to put the Murderer to the bar. He
appeared there. And in that same instant I
recognised in him, the first of the two men who
had gone down Piccadilly.

If my name had been called then, I doubt if I
could have answered to it audibly. But it was
called about sixth or eighth in the panel, and I was
by that time able to say "Here!" Now, observe.
As I stepped into the box, the prisoner, who
had been looking on attentively but with no sign
of concern, became violently agitated, and
beckoned to his attorney. The prisoner's wish
to challenge me was so manifest, that it occasioned
a pause, during which the attorney,
with his hand upon the dock, whispered with
his client, and shook his head. I afterwards
had it from that gentleman, that the prisoner's
first affrighted words to him were, "At all
hazards challenge that man!" But, that as he
would give no reason for it, and admitted that
he had not even known my name until he heard
it called and I appeared, it was not done.

Both on the ground already explained, that I
wish to avoid reviving the unwholesome memory
of that Murderer, and also because a detailed
account of his long trial is by no means indispensable
to my narrative, I shall confine myself
closely to such incidents in the ten days and
nights during which we, the Jury, were kept
together, as directly bear on my own curious
personal experience. It is in that, and not in the
Murderer, that I seek to interest my reader. It
is to that, and not to a page of the Newgate
Calendar, that I beg attention.