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‘She is dead!’ exclaimed the old man. ‘Meg is dead! Her Spirit calls to me. I hear it!’

‘The Spirit of your child bewails the dead, and mingles with the dead — dead hopes, dead fancies, dead imaginings of youth,’ returned the Bell, ‘but she is living. Learn from her life, a living truth. Learn from the creature dearest to your heart, how bad the bad are born. See every bud and leaf plucked one by one from off the fairest stem, and know how bare and wretched it may be. Follow her! To desperation!’

Each of the shadowy figures stretched its right arm forth, and pointed downward.

‘The Spirit of the Chimes is your companion,’ said the figure.

‘Go! It stands behind you!’

Trotty turned, and saw — the child! The child Will Fern had carried in the street; the child whom Meg had watched, but now, asleep!

‘I carried her myself, to-night,’ said Trotty. ‘In these arms!’

‘Show him what he calls himself,’ said the dark figures, one and all.

The tower opened at his feet. He looked down, and beheld his own form, lying at the bottom, on the outside: crushed and motionless.