This room was without a light, but its door stood open and sufficient light came from the kitchen to show that it also was untenanted.

It seemed to have been used as a lumber-room.
The boys turned to go, passing near the front of the empty house, where they shivered and stopped, mastered by a feeling they could not have explained.

The helpless door, like the staring eyes of a dead person, seemed to be calling to them to shut it, and Tommy was about to steal forward for this purpose when Corp gripped him and whispered that the light had gone out.

It was true, though Tommy disbelieved until they had returned to the east window to make sure.
"There maun be folk in the hoose, Tommy!" "You saw it was toom.

The lamp had gone out itself, or else--what's that ?" It was the unmistakable closing of a door, softly but firmly.