l. But you
shall not escape. It is not too late even now to punish you. Within an
hour the world shall know everything, and you will be dead, if devils
can die. I have been your tool, but, since I know your wickedness, I
will not be your accomplice. Oh, my God! is it possible that a man
breathing the pure air of heaven can be so vile?"

All the time I had been thus denouncing him I had been standing just as
I was when he entered the room, with Valerie still crouching at my feet.
The dangerous light I remembered so well of old had returned to his
eyes, making him look indescribably fiendish.

"Are you mad that you dare to talk to me in this fashion?" he said at
last, but with a calmness the meaning of which there was no mistaking.
"Since it is plain that you do not remember the hold I have upon you,
nor what your fate will be if you anger me, I must enlighten you. You
bring these accusations against me and you threaten to betray me to the
world--me, Pharos the Egyptian, and to your pitiful world which I spurn
beneath my feet. Once more I ask you, are you mad? But since there is no
further need for concealment, and you desire the truth, you shall hear
it." He paused, and when he spoke again it was noticeable that he had
dropped his former conversational tone and had adopted a manner more in
keeping with the solemnity of what he had to say. "Know, then, that what
thou sawest in the vision before the Sphinx and in the Temple of Ammon
was the truth, and not a dream, as I desired thee to believe. I, whom
thou hast known as Pharos, am none other than Ptahmes, son of
Netruhotep, prophet of the north and south, the same whom Pharaoh sought
to kill, and who died in hiding and was buried by his faithful priests
under cover of night more than three thousand years ago. Cursed by the
Gods, and denied the right of burial by order of the King, I have
inhabited this shape since then. Darest thou, knowing this, pit thyself
against the servant of the Mighty Ones? For I tell thee assuredly that
the plague which is now destroying Europe was decreed by the Gods of
Egypt against such nations as have committed the sin of sacrilege."

He paused, and for a moment I thought he would have sprung upon me as he
had done that night in my studio. But he controlled himself with an
effort, and a moment later his voice was as soft and conciliatory and
yet as full of malice as before. I also noticed that he had returned to
his ordinary and more colloqui