He said nothing could be simpler, but when he lifted it, it began to fall all apart, like a clock in the house of the Hoodoo.

Its marble base dropped-off; its pillars tottered; its pediment swayed to one side.
While Mrs.March lamented her hard fate, and implored him to hurry it together before any one came, he contrived to reconstruct it in its new place.

Then they both breathed freer, and returned to sit down before the stove.

But at the same moment they both saw, ineffaceably outlined on the lacquered top, the basal form of the clock.

The chambermaid would see it in the morning; she would notice the removal of the clock, and would make a merit of reporting its ruin by the heat to the landlord, and in the end they would be mulcted of its value.