nervous system the illusion was powerful. He
thought he heard her voice. The pistol slipped from his fingers, and he
fell back on the pillow with a sigh. The will beyond his will bound his
footsteps.

Who can tell? The grim, malign experience of Fleda in her bedroom with
the Thing she thought was from beyond the bounds of her own life; the
voice that spoke to Ingolby, and the breath that swept over his cheek
were, perhaps, as real in a sense as would have been the corporeal
presence of Jethro Fawe in one case and of Fleda Druse in the other.
It may be that in very truth Fleda Druse's spirit with its poignant
solicitude controlled his will as he "rose up to depart." But if it was
only an illusion, it was not less a miracle. Some power of suggestion
bound his fleeing footsteps, drew him back from the Brink.

He slept. Once the nurse came and looked at him and returned to the
other room; and twice Jim stole in silently for a moment and retired
again to his own chamber. The stars shone in at the doors that opened
out from the quiet room into the night, the watch beside the bed ticked
on, the fox-terrier which always slept on a mat at the foot of the bed
sighed in content, while his master breathed heavily in a sleep full of
dreams that hurried past like phantasmagoria--of a hundred things that
had been in his life, and that had never been; of people he had known,
distorted, ridiculous and tremendous. There were dreams of fiddlers
and barbers, of crowds writhing in passion in a room where there was a
billiard-table and a lucky horseshoe on the wall. There were dreams
that tossed and mingled in one whirlpool vision; and then at last came a
dream which was so cruel and clear that it froze his senses.

It was the dream of a great bridge over a swiftflowing river; of his own
bridge over the Sagalacof that bridge being destroyed by men who crept
through the night with dynamite in their hands.

With a hoarse, smothered cry he awoke. His eyes opened wide. His heart
was beating like a hammer against his side. Only the terrier at his feet
heard the muttered agony. With an instinct all its own, it slipped to
the floor.

It watched its master get out of bed, cross the room and feel for a coat
along the wall--an overcoat which he used as a dressing-gown at times.
Putting it on hastily, with outstretched hands Ingolby felt his way to
the glass doors opening on the veranda. The dog, as though to let him
know he was there, rubbed agai