Case of the Coughing Bookcase and dancing brass fernstand.

     A friend of ours was visiting; we were all sitting in the Library talking. It was  a cold winters night and it was snowing outside, Suddenly a coughing came from the built in ,ceiling to floor ,bookcase. Everyone looked startled. We were well away from the road or sidewalk. Our friend said someone must have been trying to eavesdrop on our conversation. I said, he sure didn't hear much. Our friend said I bet if we all go out we'll find his tracks. We took three flaslights and walked the entire area of the house near the library; especially the wall upon which the bookcase was built. There were no tracks but ours. As we walked our friend to the door that night we went from the library through the dining room and through the parlour but as we stepped into the hall a heavy brass fern stand with fern, started to hop up and down and rock across the floor. It was in front of us, noone was near it. The gyrations continued for what must of been better than a minute, then a heavy thud occured somewhere below us and that ended it. There is only a very narrow crawl space beneath that entryway.