Clara’s Guardian Angel or something/someone else?

Striking parallels between Clara finding Carwin (pg 97) in her closet and Clara finding Catherine dead in her apartment. The most striking similarity pertains to the mysterious commanding voice that exclaims, “Hold, hold.” First, one needs to view the facts. In the first instance, Clara is in the process of opening her closet door to get her father’s memoirs when she hears a voice saying “Hold, hold.” Despite being shocked and afraid, she still persists to open the closet and finds the person inside attempting to keep the door closed. After a short while, the person “gives up” and reveals himself to be Carwin.

In the second instance (pg167-168), Clara had proceeded to the foot of the stairs, fearful of what unknown dangers may lay upstairs since she saw from the outside window someone moving in her bedroom. Somewhat fearful of the unknown and recollecting the “mysterious interposition which had been experienced on the last night,” she thought to herself that since the situation she was in was quite similar to the night before, a warning from her guardian angel would be expected in the presence of danger. She began to fearfully ponder whether the present absence of that warning indicated the absence of danger of the absence of her guardian angel. As she was pondering, she cast a fearful glance behind her and heard the same command “Hold, hold.” At the exact same time, she saw a face turned towards her with “its” mouth opened in the process of shrieking. “The sound and the vision were present, and departed together at the same instant.” (pg. 168) She thought the face was strikingly similar to that of Carwin but wondered if her imagination was affecting her. Shaken, she persists in going upstairs and finds a newly written letter by Carwin on her table and the dead body of Catherine in her room.

Why did the voice only command her to “hold” when she looked back? What danger was there in looking back. The only danger possible was the unknown upstairs. In that case, the voice should have commanded her to “hold” right when she first started to proceed to the foot of the stairs. Furthermore, since their really was no danger upstairs, we can confidently assume that the voice commanding her to “hold” must have been referring to her action of looking back. Thus, this mysterious voice’s warning seems more of a reaction or response to something she was in the process of doing. The first incidence was a reaction to Clara opening her closet door. The second was reaction to her looking back.

This realization began to make me consider whether there was actually any danger in both instances that necessitated a warning from Clara’s guardian angel. Maybe, this voice was not actually warning her of danger. Was this voice actually trying to prevent her from doing or seeing something? In addition, Carwin seems to be somewhat involved in both instances. The first instance is clearly obvious but the second instance also involves Carwin because of three evidences. First, Clara had received a letter from Carwin to meet him in her room when she cautiously entered the house. Second, she had thought that the face she saw looked like Carwin (except for the glowing eyes). And lastly, Carwin’s letter had been just written when she entered the room. Carwin must have recently left the room sometime between when she saw from outside someone in her room and when she came in. It seems quite probable that the face she had seen was actually Carwin’s face.

Combining all these “coincidences” and data together, I have a strong “hunch” that Carwin the Biloquist is the source of the “mysterious voice.” All these instances, he might have spoken in the mysterious voice to hinder and scare Clara from doing something that would reveal his presence- first in her closet and second in her house at the murder scene. I believe that we will soon find out in a couple of pages.